Читать книгу The Eyes of Love - Warwick Deeping - Страница 4

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Jesse turned into the high-road by the white gate and walked slowly in the direction of Ashhurst village. It was one of those nights when restlessness possessed him, and when the play of the wind in the hedgerows helped him to think.

Falconer had gone a quarter of a mile along the lonely upland road and was watching the flashing of the distant light on the Ram’s Head when he heard voices coming from the direction of Ashhurst village. Heavy country boots scraped clumsily along the road with a stumbling irregularity that suggested the homeward wanderings of some rustic Omar.

A voice broke into song.

“Sh’ wore a wreth o’ roses

Th’ first time thut we met.”

The inspiration gave out abruptly, and changed to grumbling, querulous declaiming. Unsteady feet went scuffling to and fro across the road. Falconer heard another voice, persuading, reasoning, cajoling.

He drew back, under the hedge and waited.

“I tell ’ee I be chast and subor as a snowflake. Woa, Jolly, m’ boy! Yon’s t’light on Ram’s Head. I can see ut, Nan, plain as a pub window.”

The girl’s voice chimed in:

“Sure, Dad, we’re near home. Take my arm, now.”

The scraping of feet came nearer, and Falconer saw two dim figures draw out of the darkness, moving close together in the middle of the road.

The man lurched badly, and showed a sharp flare of temper.

“What be y’ a-pushin’ for? Walk steady.”

The girl’s voice had a quiet, patient comeliness. It was like a mellow breath of the wind amid the bells of a belfry.

“There, dad, you trod on a stone.”

“Damn t’ stones; I wish they was in hell.”

They passed Falconer without seeing him, and went on down the road, the man muttering and grumbling into the night. The farmer hesitated and then followed them, walking on the grass so that his footsteps were not heard. He knew the man for Sam Wetherell, who lived in the cottage under the Quarry Bank down towards the ruins of Pool Castle. It seemed hard that this slip of a girl should have to bring home an old reprobate of a father.

Jesse followed the pair till the light from the window of a cottage shone through a tangled hedge. He heard the click of a gate latch and Wetherell’s footsteps going unsteadily up a brick-paved path. Then a door opened, showing a yellow oblong under the heavy thatch.

Falconer turned back, asking himself why he had troubled to shepherd Wetherell and his daughter. The man was a waster, and as for Ann, he remembered her as half child, half woman, a slim, sallow-faced girl with dark eyes, a girl whom a man might not notice till he had seen her many times. Yet sometimes it happens that a woman who has never existed save to be glanced at and forgotten, rises suddenly into the intimate inner consciousness of a man’s thoughts. Jesse Falconer walked back to Fox Farm, thinking of Ann Wetherell, and the queer one-storeyed cottage by the old quarry. It was as though the sound of the girl’s voice had penetrated his indifference and stirred in him a strange and mysterious sympathy.

There was both gipsy and gentle blood in the Wetherells, and the strains showed themselves in the man’s method of getting a living. He was a vagrant who happened to live in a cottage, a brown, battered nest of a place that seemed to overflow with children. Wetherell had lost his wife five years ago, and the hands of Ann, the eldest, had become a mother’s hands. That was why, perhaps, the girl’s dark eyes looked older and sadder than her years. She had taken care prematurely into her heart, with a drunken, indolent man about the house, and six bodies to clothe and feed.

Wetherell was no man’s man. A lean, fiery-eyed adventurer with slouching shoulders, prominent masticatory muscles, and a ragged black beard, he knew as much as any poacher, gamekeeper, or tramp in the county. Folk were a little afraid of him. His laziness disappeared with dangerous rapidity when a crackle of words boded the flare of a quarrel. Yet Sam Wetherell was something of a philosopher. He had begotten children, and he did not see why these same children should not be of use. The education authorities were troublesome at times, but Wetherell knew how to circumvent them by the use of the strap and by risings at three on summer mornings. Prosecuted on one occasion by the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, he had been fined one pound and costs for thrashing his elder boy Slim. And to demonstrate the futility of these old women’s methods Sam had thrashed the boy every day for a week, and no one had dared to tell.

In the country money may be made in many picturesque ways. Wetherell knew and practised them all. In the spring there were wild flowers to be gathered—primroses, blue bells, lilies of the valley, and king-cups, flowers that could be sold in Lymnor seven miles away. Young Slim Wetherell would be kicked out before dawn to steal plover’s eggs in the fields. Then came hop-tying, hay-making, fruit-picking. Sam would lock up the cottage, and take his whole family a-wandering with the piebald pony and the knock-kneed cart. Harvest and hop-picking were useful in their turn. Then there were mushrooms to be gathered in the dew-wet fields. In autumn the youngsters went out blackberrying while other folk were asleep. Nor must Sam’s two cats be forgotten, fierce, predatory beasts, who were capable of contributing a partridge or a full-grown rabbit.

As for Wetherell himself, he would accept occasional odd jobs to get beer-money, and tobacco for his pipe. He bought dogs and resold them. A little hedging and ditching, some days in the hay and harvest fields, forking up sheaves at thrashing time, these labours served. In winter he earned money as a beater when the local gentry shot over their preserves, or by taking out his ferret and nets and disposing of rats and rabbits. Beyond an occasional hour’s spade work in his own garden, he was not responsible for the raising of its crops. His life was largely a patriarchal life, passed in enforcing the labours of his children.

The pageant of the day opened for the Wetherell children with the blare of their father’s voice.

“Slim, get up with ye, or I’ll knock the life out of yer body.”

And Slim would hustle out of the box of a bed where he slept with Joe, his younger brother, tumble into his clothes without waiting to wash, and go forth to chop wood, draw water, or thieve something for a living. Slim was a thin, muddy-faced lad with a hard mouth and insolent blue eyes. Mischievous as an ape, he was at war with the world, and reverenced nothing so much as the buckle end of his father’s belt.

Since blackberries fetched a fair price in Lymnor, blackberrying was the order of the day in autumn, and the young Wetherells were out early with baskets and hooked sticks. Ann stayed at home to wash, cook, and clean. She kept the cottage and the children sweet and neat, Slim being the only dirty member, owing to his having reached an age when his right to be dirty was insisted on with arrogance. Next to Slim in age, came Rose, a fat and smiling thing of fourteen. Sam’s favourite, because she was merry and pleasant to behold. Prudence, the third girl, had a thin, brown, hungry little face, with pinched nostrils and open mouth. Wetherell disliked the child because she was sickly. Joe, the youngest, was a gentleman with fat legs, and a snub nose that rarely was irreproachable. He delighted in discords, and had a genius for making a noise. Prudence and Joe still went to the Board School at Ashhurst village, tramping off with bread and cheese in an old satchel, and carrying a brown umbrella when the weather was wet.

“Kids back yet?”

Sam Wetherell’s head appeared at the doorway in the mellow sunlight of an October morning.

“No, not yet, dad.”

Ann was laying the table, her brown forearms showing up against a white apron, her black hair drawn back on either side of her forehead. Her skin looked fresh, firm, and sleek, and her simple bodice fitted tightly to her figure.

“Kettle boilin’?”

“Sure.”

“Make the brew; I be hungry.”

Wetherell slouched in and sat down at the end of the table. The room with its pink rose paper, its strange and multifarious pictures, and its brick floor, was beautifully clean. There were geraniums on the table by the window, and the queer odds and ends of furniture showed no dust. Over the porch a few late roses nodded, and the old black soil of the garden carried green broccoli, cabbages, and purple kale.

Ann knew her father’s moods and habits. She made the tea and set a dish of bacon on the table. Sam Wetherell was never without money to buy good food. Ingenuity paid him better than hard work.

Voices came up the high-banked lane where the old quarry opened with its waving plumes of broom and furze and its reefs of bracken. The children were returning with their baskets full of fruit.

Wetherell gave a grunt and helped himself to bacon. The children’s voices died down as they entered the garden. They had learnt to wait in silence upon their father’s moods.

They came in through the sunlight: Slim, sly-eyed and hungry-faced; Rose, with juice-stained lips; Prudence with her black stockings in wrinkles on her little sticks of legs; Joe, round-eyed and sniffing. Wetherell did not glance at them. The children stood round and fidgeted, but did not come to the table.

“What ye got?”

He spoke with a mouth full of bread. The youngsters showed their tins and baskets. Slim’s eyes ogled the food. But his greed was subservient to the greater and more authoritative greed of his father.

“Humph! More bread.”

Ann cut slices from the loaf. She herself had touched no food as yet. Wetherell always sat down to eat ten minutes before his children, and took the best of everything that was on the table.

“Come on.”

He drew a white jam pot towards him, and emptied it before the sullen eyes of his eldest son. If there was one thing that irritated Wetherell it was being stared at while he ate.

“Slim, what be ye a-rollin’ yer eyes round my plate for?”

“Wasn’t.”

“None o’ yer lip sauce.”

The boy sidled into a rickety chair. Ann’s hands were busy ministering to their needs. Wetherell sat and stuffed bread and jam into a voracious mouth.

“Where ye bin this mornin’?”

Rose answered for the rest.

“Down by Furze End.”

“Yah—no good! Take ’em down to the castle, Nan, after school.”

Ann poured out her own tea. She was the last to take her share.

“Yes, father.”

Wetherell felt for his clay pipe. He filled it with shag and began to smoke. Slim, blue eyes furtive, was eating like a starved rat. Nothing was certain so long as the humours of the patriarchal temper clouded the air.

“Slim.”

The boy looked up sharply.

“Greedy young hog, ain’t ye! Just you go out and put the pony in the cart.”

Ann interposed.

“I’ll do’t, father.”

Wetherell’s mouth curled.

“Sit down. Slim——!”

The boy jumped up, looking sullen and cowed. He had snatched a piece of bread, and held it behind him.

“When I speaks, I speaks. Don’t you waste no time, Slim, or I’ll be arter ye with my belt.”

Sam Wetherell drove away to Lymnor, leaving orders that the children were to go blackberrying down at Pool. The Pool was a great sheet of sheltered water lying in the valley below Fox Farm. In the midst of its lily leaves stood the old castle of The Pool, or Pool as the folk called it, a castle of ten towers linked together by a great curtain wall. The grey-black towers with their battlements and machicolations were reflected in the still, black water, and the more ruinous portions of the walls were overgrown with grass, ferns, young ash trees, gilliflower, and valerian. The pool had been made in the fourteenth century after the castle had been built upon its stone-faced knoll. A great bank had been thrown up across the side valley, and a small stream turned into the hollow. A shrub-covered bank that projected into the water showed the old causeway that led towards the little island barbican whose two bridges had given access to the main gate. The castle with its sheet of placid water had a hundred moods, and a hundred legends. It was a silent, empty, tranquil place, gorgeous at dawn and at sunset. Jackdaws built in the towers, and littered the worn stairways with twigs.

When Wetherell sent his children blackberrying by Pool Castle he knew that they would return with full baskets. A wilderness surrounded it, where brambles had grown into great hillocks, and the bracken stood in places as high as a man. The Fox Farm lands came down to the water on the south, and Jesse Falconer never troubled to interfere with the gipsies who often camped there.

To Ann, purple-fingered and bare-headed, dragging down brambles with a crooked stick, came the frightened yelping of a dog. Prudence, who had been gathering beside Ann, had worked nearer towards the Pool. Rose and Master Joseph were far away beyond the castle, and Slim, that lazy rogue, had not been visible for half an hour.

Ann paused to listen, freeing her sleeve from the aggressive clutches of a trailing bramble. She heard Prudence calling her with the agonised eagerness of a lost child:

“Nan—Nan——”

“I’m here, Prue.”

A little figure came pushing through the bracken. Prudence’s face was a smudge of tears. She ran to Ann with a choking cry.

“They—they be drow—drowning a poor ’ittle puppy.”

“Who?”

“A young man and Slim. I don’t want it drownded—I don’t want it drownded!”

The child howled, and her softness of heart found full sympathy in Ann. She took Prudence by the hand, and leaving her basket and stick, pushed her way through towards the water. A burst of lads’ laughter came from the direction of the pool, laughter that was gloating and cruel.

Prudence’s “young man” was a crop-headed youth with great bony knees and hands, and a mouth that was a mere ugly slit above a weak chin. He had a rough-haired white mongrel by the scruff of the neck, a mere puppy by the size of it, and anything between a fox-terrier and a spaniel. Slim Wetherell stood by grinning as the lout swung the dog far out over the water. It fell with a splash, sank, reappeared, and came paddling back towards the bank, nose up, fore-paws splashing.

The lads jeered.

“Chuck a stone.”

“Ain’t got un.”

“Ere y’are.”

Prudence began to wail.

“Ben’t they cruel! I don’t want it drownded.”

Ann had gone dead white. A queer gleam came into her eyes. She left Prudence, and ran towards the water.

“Slim—throw that stone if you dare!”

Two insolent and jeering faces turned in surprise. The crop-headed lout had half a brick in his fist. He looked at Ann, and grinned.

“’Tain’t none o’ your business.”

He raised his arm, but the dog had reached the bank. It scrambled out with dripping body, and lay down to pant. This was the third time that he had struggled back to the bank.

Slim spread his fingers at his sister. Crop-head bent down, and took the dog by the neck.

Ann’s eyes flashed. She went red as a winter sunset.

“Don’t you touch it!”

“It be my dog.”

“No, t’ain’t. You’ve thrown it away.”

“Mind yer silly business.”

Ann flew at him like a young fury, but he dodged her, and threw the dog far out over the water.

“You coward!”

She caught him by the collar, and beat a small brown fist in his face. For the moment the lout seemed too astonished to defend himself. Then he blurted out foul words. A bony paw came up, and caught Ann by the hair.

“I’ll teach ye——”

He twisted his hands into her hair.

“Now, then, say yer sorry.”

She set her teeth, refusing to cry out, and tried to free herself from his grip. The lout chortled, and twisted her hair the tighter. Slim stood by and jeered; that was the sort of soul he had.

Suddenly something intervened. A big, brown figure loomed through the bracken, and caught Master Crop-head by the ear. The lad twisted, yelled, and then stood still.

“Leave go!”

He let go of Ann’s hair, and in an instant he was swept waterwards, and tumbled into the shallows.

“See how you like the game yourself!”

Ann stood looking at Jesse Falconer. There were tears in her eyes, tears of pain, pity, and anger. The white dog was still swimming some yards from the bank, but the little beast was exhausted and made no headway. Falconer saw that it would drown.

Slim’s comrade came crawling out, muddy and weed-streaked, as Falconer walked into the pool like an Atlas into the ocean. The water was up to his waist before he reached the dog, lifted him out, and brought him back to land.

Ann held out compassionate arms.

“Oh, Mr. Falconer, you be all wet!”

“So is the dog. He’ll wet you through if you hold him.”

None the less she took the half-drowned mongrel into her arms.

Falconer turned to the lout.

“Well, how do you like the game? I’ve a good mind to have you summoned, you cruel young beast!”

The lad blurted out sulky threats.

“I’ll tell on ye. ’Tain’t your dog. My dad’ll have the law.”

Falconer eyed him as a hound might eye a low cur.

“The best thing you can do,” he said, “is to shut your mouth, and go and change your clothes.”

The lad went, not liking the look in Falconer’s eyes.