Part 2

After the lapse of years, how new it all looks, and yet how old; how changed, and yet familiar. There is the church, the same gray weather-beaten pile, in spite of the vicar’s manful efforts to get it put into a state of thorough repair. The vicar himself is the same cheery good friend in gladness, and the sympathising comforter in sorrow; his hair is almost gray now, and his figure is inclined to be rotund; but he is still the same. There are, however, new gravestones in the churchyard, and they bear the names of old friends. Their places in the world have been easily filled up; their places in the memory of the survivors never can be. Ay, there is change indeed.

But here is the golden autumn, its lustre slowly growing dim under the touch of approaching winter; there are the green fields and the red ploughed lands—they are just as they looked long ago, although his eyes see them through the sad haze which separates him from the past. There are the sounds of the cattle, the ripple of the river, and the rustle of the trees—sounds to which he gave no particular heed in the old time, and now they are like the voices of welcoming friends.

So the present steps by us; pain and sorrow plant milestones on our way; by-and-by the eye glances tenderly backward and over them, and in old age we hear the voices of our youth.

‘Good-afternoon, Mr Beecham. Do you think it will rain?’

He lifted his head, and bowed to Madge and Philip as they were about to pass over the stile. He looked up at the sky.

‘I am afraid it will rain; but you will be home before it begins, I think.’

Philip gave her his hand; she mounted the three foot-worn wooden steps and descended on the meadow side.

‘I hope you will always have a strong hand to help you over the stiles, Miss Heathcote,’ he said, smiling; but there seemed to be as much of earnest as of jest in his meaning.

‘I believe she may fairly count upon that, Mr Beecham,’ answered Philip.

‘The pity is, we so seldom find what we count upon,’ said Mr Beecham, shaking his head.

‘Then we must make the best of what we do find,’ replied Philip cheerfully, ‘and scramble over somehow without a helping hand.’

The two passed on at a smart pace up the meadow, Mr Beecham looking after them with a dream in his eyes.

Overhead, on this afternoon, was a sky gloomy and threatening; but on the horizon were rivers of pale golden light, giving hope and courage to the weary ones who were like to faint by the wayside. Suddenly a white light relieved the gloom immediately above, and the golden rivers were lashed with dark promontories; but still, the farthest point was light. Again suddenly a white glory burst through the gloom, dazzling the eyes and breaking the clouds into fantastic shapes, which fled from it like the witches of evil fleeing before the majestic genii of good. Another change, and all gradually toned down into the soft repose of a calm evening, bearing the promise of a pleasant day to follow.

‘I have lived alone too much,’ muttered Mr Beecham with a long-drawn breath, which is the only approach to a sigh ventured upon by a man past middle age; ‘and my own morbid broodings make me superstitious, showing me symbols in everything. I hope this one may turn out well, however.’

Philip and Madge had disappeared by this time, and Mr Beecham walked slowly on to the village.

When the young people reached the homestead, Madge announced that Philip had come to tell them something very important, which he had refused to reveal until they should be in the house.

Aunt Hessy glanced uneasily from one to the other; but seeing no sign of disturbance on either face, her uneasiness passed away. She concluded that it was some jest with which Philip had been teasing Madge.

‘I have seen Mr Shield again to-day,’ he began, ‘and I have received new instructions from him.’

‘He is not going to send you off to Griqualand, after all?’ queried Madge quickly.

‘O no; but maybe you would prefer that he should order me off there, rather than tell me to take chambers in town.’

‘Chambers in town! What can that be for?’

‘Well, he was as short and bustling as ever; he never seems to have time to discuss anything. “That’s what I want,” he says; “if you don’t like it, write, and tell me why.” All he said about it was that he desired me to feel independent.’

The uneasy expression reappeared on Aunt Hessy’s face.

‘Have you consented to make this change?’ she asked quietly.

‘I could see no objection; and in several ways the arrangement will be convenient. I made it clear that it was not in any way to be considered as a step towards separating me from my family. He said I could please myself as regarded my family—he had nothing to do with that.... Do you not like it, Madge?’

The clear eyes looked wistfully in his face. ‘No, Philip; I do not like it. But perhaps Mr Shield is right; and it may be as well that you should have the experience of being away from us for a time at least.’

‘Living away from you! Why I shall be here as often as ever!’

She said nothing; and Aunt Hessy put the apparently irrelevant question:

‘Have you seen Mr Beecham to-day, Madge?’

‘We saw him by the stile at the foot of the meadow as we passed.’

Aunt Hessy, with evident disappointment, abandoned the droll fancy which had for a time possessed her mind.

SOME QUEER DISHES.

If, in England, a man was pushed to discover a new animal food, it would, I think, be a long time before he hit upon bats as at all likely to furnish him with a desirable addition to his table, even if their diminutive size did not place an insuperable obstacle in the way of their being so utilised. But in many of the South Sea Islands where the flying-fox—a species of bat, fifteen inches or so across the wings—is common, it is used as food by the natives, and its flesh is by no means to be despised even by epicures. This animal, frugivorous in his tastes as a rule, does not for all that turn up his nose at a plump moth or a succulent beetle when they chance to come in his way; but he usually confines himself to fruit—ripe bananas of the best quality and plenty of them being about his mark; and dreadful havoc he and his friends would make in the banana gardens, if the natives—well aware of his habits—did not hasten to bind quantities of dead leaves round the ripening fruit, and so preserve it from his attacks. It would seem absurd to a stranger to the country to be informed that such an insignificant animal as a bat could seriously threaten the fruit-harvest in countries where it is so abundant; but he would change his opinion when informed that the flying-foxes often settle in hundreds in any likely plantation; and as they always destroy very much more than they consume, the loss and inconvenience they cause to the natives may be properly estimated.

The bat in question is not so strictly nocturnal in his habits as his English brother; and although he usually sallies out at sunset, yet I have often noticed them sailing about in broad daylight, provided the weather was dull and overcast; the flight is even and regular, very like that of a rook, and not in the least resembling the extremely erratic mode of progression affected by our native species. If in their manner of flying—a few steady flaps and then a long sail—they remind one of the rook, they also resemble our old friend in their habit of assembling together at bedtime, when they all retire to roost on the same grove of trees, and hang head downwards with their wings wrapped round their bodies, looking like a collection of large cobwebs.

It must not, however, be supposed that the meeting and subsequent proceedings take place in silence; the contrary is the case; and an immense amount of chattering is carried on for a considerable time, when no doubt all the affairs of the day are duly discussed, as well as other matters amatory and otherwise. In the old heathen times, the rookeries were strongly tabooed by the priests; and even to the present day, the natives, more especially the old men, have an evident aversion to interfere with the sacred trees, a feeling which does not in the least prevent them from killing all the bats they can in other places.

The natives prepare them for food by first cutting off the wings and then passing the body through the fire, to remove the fur, and with it the strong foxy smell with which it is impregnated. It is then carefully scraped, split open, and afterwards grilled on the coals spitchcock fashion, when it is ready for consumption; and is capital eating, having a rich gamy flavour something between a hare and a woodcock.

I was so much encouraged by the success of my first essay at bat-eating, that I afterwards had a pie made of several I had shot, and from my previous experience, rather looked forward to a good dinner; but when the pastry was cut open, I was grievously disappointed by finding that the fetid odour peculiar to the live animal had survived the cooking—from being unable to escape from the pastry—rendering it utterly uneatable, and so for the future contented myself with bat _au naturel_—that is, native fashion.

The above-mentioned animal is very common in Australia, and is quite as great a nuisance among the orchards there as he is in the islands; but it will be some considerable time, I fancy, before our colonial brothers utilise him in the kitchen.

I don’t suppose that many people—at least English people, who are tolerably prejudiced in their way—have ever voluntarily gone in for a cuttle-fish or octopus diet, as they are horribly weird, uncanny animals to look at; and few, I opine, would feel inclined to make a ‘square meal’ off the shiny creatures, at least until other more prepossessing kinds of food remained to be tried. Nevertheless, throughout the whole of the Pacific, including Japan, all the different varieties of cuttle and octopus are regarded as a _bonne bouche_ of peculiar excellence; and both in its capture and preparation, the natives display considerable ingenuity. I remember once, when sailing in the tropics, seeing one morning the deck of our little schooner nearly covered with that very elegant little cuttle-fish called the ‘flying-squid.’ The sea had been very rough during the night, and I could never properly ascertain whether the squid had come on board of their own accord, attracted by the light—as the men affirmed—or had been left there by a heavy sea we had shipped just before daylight. Anyway, our cook, a smart Maltese, at once set to work to collect them, and then, much to the disgust of the sailors, who are the most prejudiced of mortals, he forthwith proceeded to cook them for the cabin table, and sent us down dishes of squid both curried and fried that were much approved of by all who partook of them; and proved a delightful change after the long course of ‘salt junk’ and tinned soup and bouillie that the slow sailing of our little craft had obliged us to adopt.

These fish were about six inches long, had large brilliant eyes of a set expression, and were furnished with a pair of flippers or wings. They also—unlike any other kind of fish that I am acquainted with—rejoice in a couple of tails, in lieu of the orthodox number. The body, almost transparent, was of a delicate olive brown. Altogether, they were pretty little things, and tasted even better than they looked.

I am now about to introduce my readers to a dish of octopus prepared _secundum artem_ by a South Sea native. The octopus is by no means, without proper apparatus, an easy animal to lay hold of; on the contrary, it demands all the cunning of the most experienced South Sea fisherman to wile him from his haunts in the coral and to secure a good number for a feast.

But here is my Tongese friend Fakatene, just about to launch his _hamatefna_, or fishing-canoe; and we cannot do better than accompany him on his trip, and lend a hand in catching the fish we are to partake of. But first, just notice how ingeniously his tiny vessel is constructed out of timber of the bread-fruit tree. This tree does not, so far south—we are in about twenty-three degrees five minutes south—attain to any great size, and the timber, therefore, is proportionately small and scarce, which accounts for the small size of the pieces used. The hull, you notice, is pretty well in one piece, except that queer-shaped bit so artfully let in near the bows, and so close-fitting all round that even a penknife could not be introduced between the seams; and were it not for the difference in the grain of the wood, the ingenious patch would never be detected. The top sides are formed of several small planks neatly sewn on to the hull with sinnet, and joined in the same manner to one another; and yet, with all this patching, she exceeds in beauty, in the grace of her lines, and in her extreme buoyancy in the water, the finest four-oar ever turned out by Searle in his most palmy days.

Fakatene is pleased with our admiration of his highly prized canoe, and takes some pains to explain that she was moulded on the lines of the bonito, one of the swiftest of fishes. Not such a bad idea that, we consider, for a poor native; but one that we intellectual white men are much too proud, not to say too conceited, to follow; so we go in for all kinds of scientific curves and angles, with the result that our builders are constantly producing craft that will neither pull nor sail, and that would have been a disgrace to Noah himself, or even to prehistoric man.—But to return to our canoe. She is provided with an outrigger called a ‘thama,’ to prevent capsizing; with a carved-wood bailer, in case we ship a sea or make any water from the working of the seams; also with a long three-pronged fish-spear, a few lines, a bamboo of fresh water; and last, but not least, with the inevitable fire-stick, or smouldering twist of tapa cloth, to furnish a light for our friend’s _seluka_ (cigarette). Off at last; and Fakatene, who poled swiftly over the shallow part of the reef, has taken to his paddle, and coasting along the island for some distance, we soon come to a favourable spot for our purpose; so we drop anchor—a large stone—and business commences.

The octopus dwells in holes in the reef, keeping only a portion of his body exposed, so that, while he can look out for his prey, he can at the same time quickly withdraw within his hole, directly his dread enemy the shark appears, who is always foraging about the reefs in search of adventurous cuttles.

Now, I must tell you that the octopus, although partial enough to crabs, is particularly fond of the inhabitant of the spotted cowrie or ear-shell, so common in our shops; and so Fakatene, well aware of this fact, has prepared a cunning bait, artfully constructed of a number of small plates of the shell fastened together in such a manner that while similar in appearance to the real thing, yet, being much heavier, and not containing any air, sinks at once, which a real shell would not do. Our friend now lowers his line, with the shell-bait attached, until it touches the bottom, and then raising it a few inches off the ground, jerks it gently up and down. Presently, a pull on the line shows that the fish has taken the bait; more jerking on the part of the native; which the octopus replies to by at once throwing out a fresh arm. The jerking still continues; until the fish, dreading the escape of his prey, lets go his hold of the rocks, and wraps the whole of his body round the shell; when the native, perceiving that his line is no longer fast to the ground, gently hauls up the line, and finally deposits an immense octopus in the bottom of the canoe. Our new friend no sooner finds himself caught, than he lets go the deceptive bait, and with his great goggle eyes staring hard at nothing in particular, sprawls about in the most awkward fashion, at the same time giving vent to a species of grunt, until at last he finally retires into the darkest corner he can find, and collapses into a lump of grayish-looking jelly, about a third part of his apparent size when in motion.

Having by the same means secured several more fish, we return to land, when the canoe is duly housed, and Fakatene disposes of the octopi by turning them inside out and hanging them up to dry in the sun, having first carefully saved all the sepia left in the fish, as this is esteemed a great luxury, and an indispensable ingredient in preparing the sauce.

When the cuttle is to be cooked, it is first of all carefully cleaned and scraped, when all the outer skin, including the hideous-looking suckers, comes off. The fish is then cut in pieces, and having been tied up in a banana-leaf, is baked in an oven for a considerable time in conjunction with cocoa-nut milk and a certain proportion of the inky-hued sepia above mentioned, and which, as is well known, is made use of by the fish when alive to obscure the water when escaping from the pursuit of its enemies. It takes some time to cook octopus properly, as it is naturally tough and stringy; but when well prepared, it is one of the most delicate and luscious dishes I ever tasted; and, singular to say, the cooking converts the tripy, stringy-looking substance into a solid meaty food, bearing a curious resemblance to lobster both in taste and colour, only rather firmer in texture; a most unlooked-for occurrence in such dissimilar articles.

A WITNESS FOR THE DEFENCE.

IN THREE CHAPTERS.—CHAPTER II.

When I got back to town, the sessions were only a week off; so the first thing I did was to call on the solicitor in charge of my murder case, in order to learn from him how it stood, and to take it off his hands. The magistrate, of course, had sent the prisoner for trial. When I came to read the depositions, the case against him seemed perfectly simple, and as conclusive as circumstantial evidence could make it. The crime had not occurred so long ago but that a diligent search had unearthed several witnesses. The servant-girl, who had now become the wife of a dairyman in the immediate neighbourhood, was found. She proved the bad conduct of young Harden, and the ill-will which gradually grew up between him and her former mistress. She also spoke to his ejectment from the house on the day of the murder, and to his threats at the street-door. She swore to the knife, which had been in the possession of the police ever since, as having belonged to the prisoner. There were other witnesses to the same facts; and the landlord, my client, and several others, proved the flourishing of the identical knife and the ominous words in the public-house. To complete the chain, the man who had instructed me proved the finding of the knife in the room where the murder was committed; and two or three witnesses remembered being by his side and seeing him stoop down and pick it up. These, with the final facts of his sudden disappearance and changes of name, appeared both to me and to my friend to be capable of being spun into a rope quite strong enough to swing John Harden out of the world.

‘But,’ said my solicitor-friend, ‘the queerest thing of all is that no one is going to appear for the prisoner.’

‘No one to appear for him?’

‘No one. Young Elkin holds a watching brief on behalf of the prisoner’s master, and that is all. He said Harden had been in Mr Slocum’s—that’s his master—service for over seven years, behaving extremely well all the time. He was invaluable to his old master, who is something of an invalid. He had turned religious, and was disgusted at his former wicked life.’

‘But I suppose he has money—or, at anyrate, if Slocum is so fond of him, why doesn’t he pay for the defence?’

‘Why, it seems that his notion of religion forbids Harden to avail himself of worldly arts. Slocum is only too anxious to retain some one; but Harden won’t have it, and no one can persuade him. Says he is in the hands of a Higher Power, and it shall be given him what he shall speak, and all the rest of it. He wanted to make a speech to the magistrate; but Slocum, by Elkin’s advice, did manage to induce him to hold his tongue for the present, and say he would reserve his defence. Of course they hope he will come to his senses before the trial. But I don’t know how that will be. I never saw such an obstinate pig. Only gave in to his master about not speaking because the poor man began to whimper in court!’

The main part of my work had been done for me, and it only remained to bespeak copies of the depositions, see the witnesses, and make sure that they intended to say at the Old Bailey substantially the same things as they had said at the police court—a most necessary precaution, the imagination being so vivid in people of this class that they are very likely to amplify their tale if possible—and prepare the brief for the prosecuting counsel. This done, I had but to let things take their course.

When the day of the trial came, I was betimes in my place at the Central Criminal Court, having various other cases in hand there. The prisoners, as is customary, were first put up and arraigned—that is, had the substance of their several indictments read over to them—and were called on to plead ‘guilty’ or ‘not guilty.’ These disposed of, the case for John Harden was called, and I looked at him with some curiosity. No sooner had I done so than I knew that his was a face upon which at some time or other I had looked before, and of which I had taken note. It is a useful peculiarity of mine that I never forget a face to which I have once paid any attention, and I can generally recollect the place and circumstances under which I last saw it. But here the latter part of my powers failed me. I knew the face well, but could not imagine when and where I had beheld it. I even knew that I had seen the man bare-headed, and that he was not then, as now, bald on the crown. The thing worried me not a little. In the meanwhile, John Harden was being put up to take his trial for the murder of Agatha Harden.

‘I, m’lud, appear to prosecute in this case,’ said my counsel, starting up and down again like the blade of a knife.

‘Does nobody appear for the prisoner?’ asked the judge.

‘I understand, m’lud, that the prisoner is not represented,’ said counsel, appearing and disappearing as before.

‘My lord,’ said an agitated voice from the body of the court, ‘I have used all possible efforts’——

‘Si-lence!’ proclaimed the usher.

‘Who is that?’ inquired the judge, looking over his spectacles.

‘My lord, I am this foolish fellow’s master; and I am perfectly convinced’——

‘I cannot hear you, sir. If the prisoner wishes to have counsel assigned to him for his defence, I will name a gentleman, and will take care that the prisoner shall have due opportunity for his instruction; and if you desire to give evidence on his behalf, you can do so.—Prisoner, is it your wish that counsel be assigned to you for your defence?’

Harden had been standing with his head slightly bent, and his clasped hands resting on the rail of the dock. He now looked up at the judge, and replied in a grave and impassive voice: ‘My lord, I wish no help but the help of God. I am in His hands, and I am an innocent man. If He sees good to deliver me, He will do so. Who am I, that I should interfere with His work?’

‘You appear to me,’ said the judge gently, ‘to be under an unfortunate delusion. You say rightly that you are in God’s hands; but that should not hinder you from using such instruments for your deliverance as he offers you. Once more I will ask, do you now desire to be represented by counsel?’

‘I do not, my lord.’

‘So be it.—Now, Mr Clincher.’