Читать книгу Dariel - R. D. Blackmore - Страница 13

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According to Farmer Bandilow (who was now our last old tenant, striving to escape from the wreck of plough, by paddling with spade and trowel), the London season begins with turnip-tops, and ends with cabbage-grubs. But this year it must have lasted well into the time of turnip-bottoms; otherwise how could my sister, Lady Fitzragon, have been in London? Not that we knew very much about the movements of her ladyship, for she found our cottage beyond the reach of her fat and glittering horses; only that she must have been now in town, because our Grace was with her. And this was a lucky thing for me; for if Grace had been at home, she must have known all about my wounded arm, and a nice fuss she would have made of it. But my mother, though equally kind and good, was not very quick of perception; and being out of doors nearly all the day now, and keeping my own hours, I found it easy enough to avoid all notice and escape all questions. For the people at the cottage very seldom came to my special den, the harness-room; and I kept my own little larder in what had once been a kennel close at hand, and my own little bed up a flat-runged ladder, and so troubled none but a sweetly deaf old dame. And this arrangement grew and prospered, whenever there was no Grace to break through it.

However, there is no luck for some people. One night, when I felt sure that all the cottage was asleep, I had taken off the bandages, and was pumping very happily on my left forearm, where the flesh had been torn, when there in the stableyard before me, conspicuous in the moonlight, with a blazing satin waistcoat, stood the only man who could do justice to it. For this gallant fellow had a style of his own, which added new brilliance to the most brilliant apparel.

"Why, Tom," I cried, "where on earth do you come from? I can't shake hands, or I shall spoil some of your charms. Why, you must have been dining with the governor. New togs again! What a coxcomb it is!"

"Never would I have sported these, and indeed I would never have come down at all, if I had known Grace was out of the way."

He was allowed to call her Grace to me.

"How slow it is without her! But I say, old chap, what a frightful arm you've got! Pitchfork again, I suppose"—for I had received a scratch before—"only ten times as bad. Why, you mustn't neglect this. You'll have it off at the elbow, if you do. Why, even by this light—By Jove, what a whacking arm you've got! Why, it is twice the size of mine. I could never have believed it. Let me pull off my coat, and show you."

"But you cannot want one the size of mine"—I answered with a laugh, for it was thoroughly like Tom to fetch everything into his own person; "you could never put it into a waistcoat like that."

"George, you are an ass," was his very rude reply, and it seemed to ring into me far beyond his meaning. "My dear fellow, you will be, in your own parish, what nobody has seen anywhere—a dead jackass—if you go on like this. There is a black stripe down your arm; the same as you see on a 'mild-cured-haddy' when he shines by moonlight. What does that mean? Putrefaction."

"Rot!" I replied, meaning his own words. "I'll pump on you, waistcoat and all, my dear Tom, if you go on with this sort of rubbish." And yet I had some idea that he might be right. But the worst—as I need not tell any strong young fellow—of the absurdities our worthy doctors try to screw into us now—that a man must not draw the breath the Lord breathed into him, for fear of myrio-mycelia-micro-somethings, neither dare to put his fork into the grand haunch of mutton which his Maker ordered him to arise and eat—of all such infantile stuff the harm is this, that it makes a healthy man deride the better sense that is in them.

"Come to my hole, and have a smoke," I said to my dear friend. "And mind you, not a word about this scratch to my good people. To-morrow we shall cut our first field of wheat. Though it won't pay for cutting and binding, Tom, the sight is as glorious as ever. What a pity for our descendants, if we ever have any, to get no chance of ever seeing the noblest sight of Old England! Come to this gate, and take a look. In a few more years, there will be no such sight."

"Poetry is all very fine in its way," replied Tom, who had about as much as I possess, although he could make a hook and eye of rhyme sometimes. "But the moon will go on all the same, I suppose; and she does most of our poetry."

She was doing plenty of it now, in silence, such as any man may feel, but none can make another feel. We waited a minute or two by the gate, till a white cloud veiled the quivering disc, and then all the lustre flowed softly to our eyes, like a sea of silver playing smoothly on a shore of gold.

"After all, love is rot," said Tom, carried away by larger beauty, after some snub of the day before. "I should like to see any girl who could compare with that. And a man must be a muff who could look at this, and then trouble his head about their stupid little tricks. Look at the breadth of this, look at the depth of it! Why, it lifts one; it makes one feel larger, George; that is the way to take things."

"Especially when some one has been making you feel small," I answered at a venture, for I understood my friend; and this abstract worship of beauty was not so satisfactory to me now. "But come into my place, and tell me all about it, my dear Tom. You were so mysterious the other day, that I knew you were after some other wild goose."

"I am happy, most happy," Tom went on to say, after pouring forth the sorrows of his last love-tale, through many a blue eye and bright curl of smoke; "I feel that I cannot be thankful enough at the amount of side that girl puts on. And the beauty of it is, that she hasn't got a rap, and her husband would have to help to keep her mother. How lucky for me she never can have heard of the glorious Tinman, or my oofy maiden-aunt; wouldn't she have jumped at me, if she had? A fellow can't be too careful, George, when you come to think. But you'll never make a fool of yourself. Not a bit of romance about you, Farmer Jarge; and a fellow of your size and family has a right to go in for ten thousand a-year. How about those gipsies in the valley, though? You mustn't go on with that, even if you could, my friend. Great swells, I daresay, but no tin."

"What business of yours? What do you know about them? I'll thank you to hold your tongue upon subjects that are above you."

"Ha, ha! Ho, ho! Tinmen must look up to tinkers, must they? How dare I call them tinkers? Well, it is just like this. These people are gipsies, all gipsies are tinkers, therefore these people are tinkers. But don't get in a wax, George. I was only chaffing. It may be Cleopatra herself, for all I know, come to look after her needle—would not look at it, while her own, will look at nothing else, when lost. Oh, I know what women are."

"And I know what idiots are," I answered with a superior smile; not being quite such a fool, I trust, as to pretend to that knowledge which even the highest genius denies to man. "And an idiot you are to-night, Tom."

"Well, I may be a little upset," said he, striking his glorious waistcoat, and then stroking it to remove the mark. "I confess I did like that girl. And she liked me; I am sure of that. Why, bless her little heart, she cried, my boy! However, it was not to be. And when I told her that I must look higher (meaning only up to heaven) for gradual consolation, what a wax she did get in! Never mind. Let it pass. There are lots of pretty girls about. And no man can be called mercenary, for I am blest if any of them have got a bit of tin. I thank the Lord, every night of my life, that my old aunt never was a beauty. And that makes her think all the more of me. Sir, your most obedient!"

Behind my chair was an old looking-glass, which Grace had insisted upon hanging there, to make the place look rather smart; and Tom, who had not seen himself for some hours, stood up before it in the weak candle-light, and proceeded in his usual manner. "Tom, my friend, you don't look so much amiss. If your heart is broken, there is enough of it left to do a little breaking on its own account. Don't be cast down, my boy. You may not be a beauty, though beautiful girls think better of you than your modesty allows you to proclaim. But one thing you may say, Tom; whoever has the luck to get you, will find you a model husband."

This I thought likely enough; if only he should get a wife with plenty of sense and love to guide him. But what was the opinion of a tall, hard man who stood in the doorway with a long gun on his arm, criticising Erricker's sweet self-commune with a puzzled and yet a very well-contented gaze?

"Mr. Stoneman!" I exclaimed, giving Tom a little push, for he stood with his back to him, in happy innocence of critics. "We did not expect this pleasure so late at night. This is an old friend of mine—Mr. Erricker. Allow me to introduce you, Tom, to Mr. Jackson Stoneman." My old friend turned round, without a symptom of embarrassment, and bowed almost as gracefully as he had been salaaming to himself.

"I have heard of Mr. Erricker, and have great pleasure in making his acquaintance," our new visitor replied, and I saw that the pleasure was genuine, and knew why; to wit, that he was thinking in his heart, "That little fop to make up to Grace Cranleigh!" For no doubt he had heard of Tom's frequent visits, and the inference drawn by neighbours. "But I must beg pardon," he continued, "for daring to look in at such a time. It was only this, I have been down to the pond at the bottom of the long shrubbery, to look for some shoveller ducks I heard of, and see that no poachers are after them. I don't want to shoot them, though I brought my gun; and going back, I happened to see your light up here."

"Sit down, Mr. Stoneman," said Tom, as if he were the master of the place. "I have often wished to see you, and I will tell you why. I am a bit of a sportsman, when I can get the chance. But this fellow, Cranleigh, is so hard at work always that he never will come anywhere to show me where to go."

"And he has not many places to take you to now." I spoke without thinking, for to beg permission from this new landowner was about the last thing I would do. And I was vexed with my friend for his effrontery.

"Of course I should never dream," proceeded Tom, for he had some reason in him after all, "to ask leave to shoot on any land of yours, or where you have taken the shooting rights. But there is a little warren with a lot of rabbits, on Bandilow's farm, where Sir Harold gives me leave. But I must go a mile round to get at it, unless I may cross the park with my gun. May I do so, without firing, of course?"

"To be sure. As often as you like. Any friend of Mr. Cranleigh may do much more than that. And I am come to ask a favour, too. I have three fellows doing next to nothing. They have just finished bundling a lot of furze. Capital fellows with a hook, I believe; and so I don't want to turn them off. I hear you intend to begin reaping to-morrow. Can you find a job for them, just for a few days?"

This was a very pretty way to put it. I knew that he had plenty of work for the men, but wanted to help us with our harvest labour, having heard, no doubt, that we were short of hands. I thanked him warmly, for these men would be of the greatest service to us. And then he turned upon me severely, as if my health were under his superintendence, and I was trying to elude it, by keeping my arm from his notice.

"You are doing a very stupid thing. You have a shocking wound in your left arm, caused by the tooth or the claws of a dog; and instead of having it treated properly, all you do is to pump upon it."

"Halloa!" cried Tom Erricker, "a dog. I wouldn't have that for a thousand pounds. George, how could you play me such a trick? You told me it was a pitchfork."

"I told you nothing of the kind. I simply said nothing whatever about it. It can concern nobody but myself. And I will thank Mr. Stoneman, and you, too, to attend to your own business."

"It may be no business of mine, perhaps," the stockbroker answered severely; "but it is the undoubted business of any intimate friend of yours, and most of all that of your family. Such behaviour of yours is not true manliness, as I daresay you suppose, but foolhardy recklessness, and want of consideration for your friends. And what does that come to but selfishness, under one of its many disguises?"

Tom chimed in to the same effect, even going so far as to ask me what my father and mother could do without me, even if they survived the trial of seeing me smothered under a feather-bed. But when both my friends had killed me of rabies to their entire satisfaction, I showed them in very few words how little they knew about what they were talking of. For I had done for myself all that could be done, as well as any doctor could have managed it, and now there was nothing for it but cold water, and an easy mind, and trust in Providence.

As soon as Tom Erricker heard of Providence, he began to yawn, as if he were in church; so I begged him to go to bed, for which he was quite ready, while I had a little talk with our tenant.

"How did you hear of this affair?" I asked, hoping for some light upon other matters; "none of our people know it. They make such a fuss about a dog-bite, that I was obliged to keep it close. I will beg you to do the same, if you wish to oblige me."

"There is nothing I wish for more than that." Stoneman drew his chair over as he spoke, and offered me one of his grand cigars; and I was not above accepting it, with my knowledge of his feelings. "I have your permission to call you George. I will do so, now that your bright young friend is gone. When I think of the reports that reached me—but I will say no more. A fine young fellow, no doubt, or he would not be a friend of yours." The vision of Tom Erricker at the mirror brought a smile to his firm lips; but for my sake he suppressed it. "Now I want to talk to you seriously, George. And you will not take it as a liberty, knowing my very warm regard for—for you."

"You may say what you like. I shall take it kindly. I am well aware that you know a thousand times as much of the world as I do."

"And a very poor knowledge it is," he replied, gazing at a cloud of his own smoke. "When the question is of deeper matters, the wisdom of the world is a broken reed. And yet I want to bring it into play just now. In the case of another, that is so much easier; just as any fool can pass judgment on the labour he has never tried with his own hand. Excuse me, George, if I speak amiss, I do it out of good-will, as some of them do not, but to show their own superiority. To cut the matter short—I know all about—no, not all, but a lot about your new friends down in the valley."

"They can scarcely be called my friends, if I require to be informed about them." My mind had been full of them, although it was clear that they cared not to hear any more of me.

"You are surprised, perhaps, at my knowledge of what occurred the other day. That was by the purest accident; for I am not the sort of man to play the spy. You know that, I hope. Very well, I took the liberty then of inquiring for my own sake, and that of the neighbourhood, who these mysterious settlers were, and I knew where to go for my information. Like most things, when you get nearer to them, there is no real mystery at all. The only wonder is that they can have been there so long, without attracting notice. If the country had been hunted, as it used to be, when people could afford to keep up the pack, they would never have been left so quiet. The parson of the parish, as a general rule, routs up every newcomer for church purposes, no matter what his creed may be; and I know that they seldom give much start even to the tax-collectors. But the parson of that parish is a very old man, and has no one to look after him, and the country is very thinly peopled. Well, they seem to have bought the place for an old song, so that nobody can interfere with them. And they soon put it into better order—"

"But who are they? And what are they doing there? And how long do they mean to stop?"

"Don't be in a hurry, my good friend. There is plenty of time for another cigar. Pipes you prefer? Very well, fill again. However, for fear of being knocked on the head, I will resume my parable. Nothing can be done without paying for it. That is the golden rule in England, and everywhere else upon this planet. And wherever money passes, it can be followed up. The strange thing is that these people seem to care very little about concealment, though they are not sociable. What their native language is, we do not know, though they seem to be great linguists. French, German, Russian, Arabic, and I don't know what else, and some of them very good in our beloved tongue, the hardest to learn of all the lot. They are of Eastern race, that appears quite certain, though neither Jews, Turks, nor Armenians. But what they are here for seems pretty plain—forgery!"

"Ridiculous!" I exclaimed, though without showing any wrath. "They are people of high rank, I am sure of that. Political exiles, refugees, Anarchists, or even Nihilists—though I cannot think that. But as for forgers—"

"It scarcely sounds nice; and yet I have little doubt about it; and the police have come to that conclusion, and are keeping a sharp eye upon them. For what other purpose can they want a mill? And a mill which they have set up themselves, to suit themselves. The old water-wheel they had, and the cogs and all that, left from the old corn-grinding time; but they have refitted it for quite a different purpose, and done almost all of it with their own hands. What for? Plain as a pikestaff—to make their own paper, and get stamping power, and turn out forged notes, foreign of course, Russian rouble, the simplest of all."

He had made up his mind. He was sure of this solution. He had no doubt whatever. Ah, but he had never seen the majestic man who met me, much less that beautiful nymph of the shrine!

"Stoneman, all this sounds very fine." I met his smile of confidence, and as it seemed to me of heartless triumph, with a gaze of faith in humanity—which some people might call romance. "But there is not a word of truth in it. What inference does a policeman draw? The worst he can imagine—grist for his own mill. They make the world a black chapter, to suit their own book. But I have no motive. What motive could I have, to make out that people are better than they seem? I tell you, and you may take my word for it, that this little colony, of whatever race it may be, has no evil purpose in coming among us. I might even go further and say that I am sure of their having an excellent object, a noble object, some great discovery, perhaps surpassing all my brother's, and something that will be of service to entire humanity."

"Money, to wit. You know what the last great forger who was hanged, before we left off that wise plan, what he said when exhorted to repentance, 'You make money for yourself, sir, I make it for the good of the public.' No doubt they take that view of the case."

"Very well, you take a lesson from them, and improve the morals of the Stock Exchange."

The stockbroker smiled very pleasantly, as one who was thoroughly at home with that old joke; then he took up his gun, and marched off for the Hall, leaving me to make the best of things.

Feeling how small are the minds of mankind, even the best of them, when they listen to the police, and knowing that I could not sleep as yet, I went once more to the gate at the top of the yard, and gazed over the wheat which was to lie low on the morrow. Although I had just received proof of friendship, from two very nice fellows better than myself, which should have encouraged me to think the best, sadness came into my heart, and a sombre view of life depressed me. There are two things only that can save a man from deep dejection occasionally. One of them is to have no thought whatever, except for affairs of the moment; and the other and surer is to believe with unchangeable conviction that all is ordered by a Higher Power, benevolent ever, and ever watchful for those who commit themselves to it. That atom of humanity, which is myself, has never been able to sink to the depth of the one condition, or soar to the height of the other. So there must be frequent ups and downs with ordinary mortals, gleams of light, and bars of shade; and happy is the man who can keep the latter from deepening as his steps go on. But who am I to moralise?

Enough that any fellow worth his salt must be grieved and lowered, when suspicions arise, concerning those of whom he has formed a high opinion. How much worse, when his own judgment owns that things look rather black, and memory quotes against his wishes more than one such disappointment. If it were so, if those who had made so deep an impression on me were skulking rogues and stealthy felons, no wonder they had not cared to ask what became of the stranger, who by remarkable presence of mind had saved the life of their valued warder, and then with a modesty no less rare, had vanished before they could thank him, if they ever had the grace to intend it. "All the better," I said to myself, with the acumen of the wisest fox that ever entered vineyard, "even if all had been right, it never could have led to any good; and see what a vast amount of work is coming on all at once, with no one else to do it! And all the time is there any one but myself to see to my young sister's doings? Here is this fellow Stoneman sweet upon her, wonderfully sweet, quite spoony—who could have believed it of a stockbroker? What do I know about him? Nothing, except that he has endless tin, and spends it certainly like a brick. Is he worthy of her, and if he is, will she even look at him? Rather a romantic girl, too fond of her own opinions, and yet a little prone to hero-worship. She might fall in love with some hero in London who hasn't got a half-penny—halloa, what can that be, winding in and out so, through the wheat?"

The moon, now very nearly full, was making that low round of the sky which is all it can manage in August, and seemed rather to look along the field than heartily down upon it. The effect was very different now from that which Tom and I had watched. For the surface of the luxuriant corn, instead of imbibing and simpering with light, was flawed and patched (like a flowing tide) with flittings and hoverings of light and shade. And along a sweep of darkness near the shadow of a tree, there was something moving stealthily like the figure of a man.

For a moment or two, I did not enjoy that calmness of mind which is believed (by Britons) to be the prerogative of Britons. The period of the night, and the posture of the moon, and peculiar tone of things not to be told, as well as some dread of a mischief to my brain—through what had befallen me recently—took away from me that superior gift which had enabled me to beat the bull-dog. However, I might just as well not have been afraid—as we generally find out afterwards—for the other apparition, whatever it might be, was ever so much more afraid of me.

"What on earth are you about there?" I shouted bravely, when this welcome truth came to my knowledge. "Can't you stand up like a man, and say what you are about?"

In reply to my challenge an undersized figure scarcely any taller than the corn arose, showing a very strange head-dress and other outlandish garments, and a loose idea generally of being all abroad. "You are the little chap I saw the other day," said I.

He nodded his head, and said something altogether outside of my classical attainments; and then he pulled forth from a long coat, whose colours no moon, or even rainbow could render, a small square package, which he lifted to his eyes. With a rush of my heart into the situation, I seized him by his collar, or the thing that represented it, and twisted him over the gate; and he looked thankful, having some fear perhaps of English five-bars.

In half a minute, I had this little fellow in my den, where he trembled and blinked at the light, and then grinned, as if to propitiate a cannibal. And I was pleased to see that he had pluck enough to put one hand upon the hilt of a little blue skewer which he wore in his belt, and then he looked at me boldly. With a smile to reassure him, I offered to take the missive from his other hand. But that was not the proper style of doing business with him. He drew back for a pace or two, and made the utmost of his puny figure, and then with a low bow stretched forth both hands, and behold there was a letter in the end of a cleft stick! Where he found the cleft stick is more than I can tell. At the same time, he said Allai, which turned out afterwards to be his own name.

"Sit down in that corner, little chap," I said as graciously as if he knew English. "And make yourself at home, while I get on with this." Perhaps he was out of practice in the art of sitting down, for instead of accepting the chair I offered, he clapped himself in some wonderful manner upon a hassock. But it was impossible for me to attend to him much, until I knew what he had brought.

Now there was nothing particularly foreign about this. It looked like an ordinary English letter, except that the paper was not like ours, and the envelope was secured with silk, as well as sealed. But the writing was the daintiest that ever I did see; and I longed to get rid of that "darkie" in the corner, whose eyes flashed at me from the gloomy floor. And his hand was playing with his kinjal all the time, for so they call those deadly bits of steel, without which they never think their attire complete. Being unaccustomed to be looked at so, I could not enter into my fair letter as I wished; though that little fellow would have flown up to the slates, before he could get near me with that hateful snakish thing. And to tell the truth, I did him wrong by any such suspicion; for there could never be a more loyal, honest, and zealous retainer than Allai. "Here you are," I said, addressing him in English, though well aware now that he was none the wiser; "here's a drop of good beer for you, young man. You take a pull at that, while I write my answer. Ah, you won't get such stuff as that in—well, I don't know where you hail from; but all over the world I defy you to get anything like it."

Allai gave a grunt which I took for acquiescence; and leaving him to enjoy himself, I wrote a few lines and enclosed them in a cover. Then I found a bit of sealing wax, and sealed it very carefully, and fixed it in the cleft wand, and handed it to Allai.

"You go straight away, quick-sticks, with this, and don't you lose it, or I'll break your neck. Why, I'm blest if the pagan has drunk a drop of his beer! Can such a race ever be brought up to date? Why, he takes it for virulent poison!"

The young savage had poured my good ale upon the floor, and was soaking the point of his dagger in it. He had put the glass to his lips no doubt, and arrived at the sage conclusion that here was swift death for his enemies. However, he possessed some civilisation as to the meaning of a broad crown-piece, which in the fervour of my joy I set before him. To a rich man it would have been well worth the money, to see the glad sparkle of those black eyes, and the grin upon those swarthy cheeks. Suddenly with a deep salaam his slender form turned and was gone like a shadow.

And then I was able at last to dwell upon this very beautiful letter, which might to the outward eye appear to convey not a token of anything more than "Miss Mary Jones presents her compliments;" but to my deeper perception, and hopes higher than any telescope may carry, it showed the sky cast open at the zenith, like a lily, and a host of golden angels letting down a ladder for me. For no longer could I hide my state of mind, or disguise it from myself. Henceforth I shall be open about it, though hitherto ashamed to say half of what I thought, while I had such a little to go upon. But here is my key to Paradise. Let every man judge for himself, bearing in mind that he never can be wise until he has been a fool seventy times seven.

"Sir—My dear father, Sûr Imar, of Daghestan, has been injured very greatly by your alien conduct to him. Your actions were of high bravery, and great benevolence to us. But when we desired very largely to inform you of our much gratitude, we could not discover you in any place, and we sought for you vainly, with great eagerness of sorrow. And then, for a long space of time, we made endeavour to find out the name of the gentleman who had done us so great a service, but would not permit us to thank him. We are strangers here, and have not much knowledge. After that, a man who possesses three goats pronounced to us that he understood the matter. According to his words, I take the liberty of letter, entreating you, if it is right, to come, and permit us to see to whom we owe so much. And my father is afraid that the gentleman was injured in the conflict with a furious English beast. If, then, this should have happened, he can remedy it, as perhaps you cannot in this country. I desire also, if it is right, to join my own entreaties. I am, Sir, Yours very faithfully, Dariel."