Chapter 41

THE CROSS UPREARED

Mr. Blee had but reported Will correctly, and it was not until some hours later that the child at Newtake caused his parents any alarm. Then he awoke in evident suffering, and Will, at Phoebe's frantic entreaty, arose and was soon galloping down through the night for Doctor Parsons.

His thundering knock fell upon the physician's door, and a moment later a window above him was opened.

"Why can't you ring the bell instead of making that fiendish noise, and waking the whole house? Who is it?"

"Blanchard, from Newtake."

"What's wrong?"

"'T is my bwoy. He've got something amiss with his breathing parts by the looks of it."

"Ah."

"Doan't delay. Gert fear comed to his mother under the darkness, 'cause he seemed nicely when he went to sleep, then woke up worse. So I felt us had better not wait till morning."

"I'll be with you in five minutes."

Soon the Doctor appeared down a lane from the rear of the house. He was leading his horse by the bridle.

"I'm better mounted than you," he said, "so I'll push forward. Every minute saved is gained."

Will thanked him, and Doctor Parsons disappeared. When the father reached home, it was to hear that his child was seriously ill, though nothing of a final nature could be done to combat the sickness until it assumed a more definite form.

"It's a grave case," said the physician, drearily in the dawn, as he pulled on his gloves and discussed the matter with Will before departing. "I'll be up again to-night. We mustn't overlook the proverbial vitality of the young, but if you are wise you will school your mind and your wife's to be resigned. You understand."

He stroked his peaked naval beard, shook his head, then mounted his horse and was gone.

From that day forward life stood still at Newtake, in so far as it is possible for life to do so, and a long-drawn weariness of many words dragged dully of a hundred pages would be necessary to reflect that tale of noctural terrors and daylight respites, of intermittent fears, of nerve-shattering suspense, and of the ebb and flow of hope through a fortnight of time. Overtaxed and overwrought, Phoebe ceased to be of much service in the sick-room after a week without sleep; Will did all that he could, which was little enough; but his mother took her place in the house unquestioned at this juncture, and ruled under Doctor Parsons. The struggle seemed to make her younger again, to rub off the slow-gathering rust of age and charm up all her stores of sense and energy.

So they battled for that young life. More than once a shriek from Phoebe would echo to the farm that little Will was gone; and yet he lived; many a time the child's father in his strength surveyed the perishing atom, and prayed to take the burden, all too heavy for a baby's shoulders. In one mood he supplicated, in another cursed Heaven for its cruelty.

There came a morning in early April when their physician, visiting Newtake before noon, broke it to husband and wife that the child could scarcely survive another day. He promised to return in the evening, and left them to their despair. Mrs. Blanchard, however, refused to credit this assurance, and cried to them to be hopeful still.

In the afternoon Mr. Blee rode up from Monks Barton. Daily a messenger visited Newtake for Mr. Lyddon's satisfaction, but it was not often that Billy came. Now he arrived, however, entered the kitchen, and set down a basket laden with good things. The apartment lacked its old polish and cleanliness. The whitewash was very dirty; the little eight-day clock on the mantelpiece had run down; the begonias in pots on the window-ledge were at death's door for water. Between two of them a lean cat stretched in the sun and licked its paws; beside the fire lay Ship with his nose on the ground; and Will sat close by, a fortnight's beard upon his chin. He looked listlessly up as Mr. Blee entered and nodded but did not speak.

"Well, what 's the best news? I've brought 'e fair-fashioned weather at any rate. The air 's so soft as milk, even up here, an' you can see the green things grawin' to make up for lost time. Sun was proper hot on my face as I travelled along. How be the poor little lad?"

"Alive, that's all. Doctor's thrawed un awver now."

"Never! Yet I've knawed even Parsons to make mistakes. I've brought 'e a braave bunch o' berries, got by the gracious gudeness of Miller from Newton Abbot; also a jelly; also a bottle o' brandy--the auld stuff from down cellar--I brushed the Dartmoor dew, as 't is called, off the bottle myself; also a fowl for the missis."

"No call to have come. 'T is all awver bar the end."

"Never say it while the child's livin'! They 'm magical li'l twoads for givin' a doctor the lie. You 'm wisht an' weary along o' night watchings."

"Us must faace it. Ban't no oncommon thing. Hope's dead in me these many days; an' dying now in Phoebe--dying cruel by inches. She caan't bring herself to say 'gude-by' to the li'l darling bwoy."

"What mother could? What do Mrs. Blanchard the elder say?"

"She plucks up 'bout it. She 'm awver hopeful."

"Doan't say so! A very wise woman her."

Phoebe entered at this moment, and Mr. Blee turned from where he was standing by his basket.

"I be cheerin' your gude man up," he said.

She sighed, and sat down wearily near Will.

"I've brought 'e a chick for your awn eatin' an'--"

Here a scuffle and snarling and spitting interrupted Billy. The hungry cat, finding a fowl almost under its nose, had leapt to the ground with it, and the dog observed the action. Might is right in hungry communities; Ship asserted himself, and almost before the visitor realised what had happened, poor Phoebe's chicken was gone.

"Out on the blamed thieves!" cried Billy, astounded at such manners. He was going to strike the dog, but Will stopped him.

"Let un bide," he said. "He didn't take it, an' since it weern't for Phoebe, better him had it than the cat. He works for his livin', she doan't."

"Such gwaines-on 'mongst dumb beasts o' the field I never seen!" protested Billy; "an' chickens worth what they be this spring!"

Presently conversation drifted into a channel that enabled the desperate, powerless man to use his brains and employ his muscles; while for the mother it furnished a fresh gleam of hope built upon faith. Billy it was who brought about this consummation. Led by Phoebe he ascended to the sick-room and bid Mrs. Blanchard "good-day." She sat with the insensible child on her lap by the fire, where a long-spouted kettle sent forth jets of steam.

"This here jelly what I've brought would put life in a corpse I do b'lieve; an' them butivul grapes, tu,--they'll cool his fever to rights, I should judge."

"He 'm past all that," said Phoebe.

"Never!" cried the other woman. "He'm a bit easier to my thinkin'."

"Let me take un then," said the mother. "You'm most blind for sleep."

"Not a bit of it. I'll have forty winks later, after Doctor's been again."

Will here entered, sat down by his mother, and stroked the child's little limp hand.

"He ban't fightin' so hard, by the looks of it," he said.

"No more he is. Come he sleep like this till dark, I lay he'll do braave."

Nobody spoke for some minutes, then Billy, having pondered the point in silence, suddenly relieved his mind and attacked Will, to the astonishment of all present.

"'Tis a black thought for you to knaw this trouble's of your awn wicked hatching, Farmer," he said abruptly; "though it ban't a very likely time to say so, perhaps. Yet theer's life still, so I speak."

Will glared speechless; but Billy knew himself too puny and too venerable to fear rough handling. He regarded the angry man before him without fear, and explained his allusion.

"You may glaze 'pon me, an' stick your savage eyes out your head; but that doan't alter truth. 'T 'as awnly a bit ago in the fall as I told un what would awvertake un," he continued, turning to the women. "He left the cross what Mr. Grimbal found upsy-down in the airth; he stood up afore the company an' damned the glory of all Christian men. Ess fay, he done that fearful thing, an' if 't weern't enough to turn the Lard's hand from un, what was? Snug an' vitty he weer afore that, so far as anybody knawed; an' since--why, troubles have tumbled 'pon each other's tails like apple-dranes out of a nest."

The face of Phoebe was lighted with some eagerness, some deep anxiety, and not a little passion as she listened to this harangue.

"You mean that gate-stone brought this upon us?" she asked.

"No, no, never," declared Damaris; "'t is contrary to all reason."

"'T is true, whether or no; an' any fule, let alone a man as knaws like I do, would tell 'e the same. 'T is common sense if you axes me. Your man was told 't was a blessed cross, an' he flouted the lot of us an' left it wheer 't was. 'T is a challenge, if you come to think of it, a scoffin' of the A'mighty to the very face of Un. I wouldn't stand it myself if I was Him."

"Will, do 'e hear Mr. Blee?" asked Phoebe.

"I hear un. 'T is tu late now, even if what he said was true, which it ban't."

"Never tu late to do a gude deed," declared Billy; "an' you'll have to come to it, or you'll get the skin cussed off your back afore you 'm done with. Gormed if ever I seed sich a man as you! Theer be some gude points about 'e, as everything must have from God A'mighty's workshop, down to poisonous varmints. But certain sure am I that you don't ought to think twice 'pon this job."

"Do 'e mean it might even make the differ'nee between life an' death to the bwoy?" asked Phoebe breathlessly.

"I do. Just all that."

"Will--for God's love, Will!"

"What do 'e say, mother?"

"It may be truth. Strange things fall out. Yet it never hurted my parents in the past."

"For why?" asked Billy. "'Cause they didn't knaw 't was theer, so allowance was made by the Watching Eye. Now 't is differ'nt, an' His rage be waxing."

"Your blessed God 's got no common sense, then--an' that's all I've got to say 'bout it. What would you have me do?"

Will put the question to Mr. Blee, but his wife it was who answered, being now worked up to a pitch of frenzy at the delay.

"Go! Dig--dig as you never digged afore! Dig the holy stone out the ground direckly minute! Now, now, Will, 'fore the life's out of his li'l flutterin' body. Lay bare the cross, an' drag un out for God in heaven to see! Doan't stand clackin' theer, when every moment's worth more'n gawld."

"So like's not He'll forgive 'e if 'e do," argued Mr. Blee. "Allowed the Lard o' Hosts graws a bit short in His temper now an' again, as with them gormed Israelites, an' sich like, an' small blame to Him; but He's all for mercy at heart, 'cordin' to the opinion of these times, so you'd best to dig."

"Why doan't he strike me down if I've angered Him--not this innocent cheel?"

"The sins of the fathers be visited--" began Mr. Blee glibly, when Mrs. Blanchard interrupted.

"Ban't the time to argue, Will. Do it, an' do it sharp, if't will add wan grain o' hope to the baaby's chance."

The younger woman's sufferings rose to a frantic half-hushed scream at the protracted delay.

"O Christ, why for do 'e hold back? Ban't anything worth tryin' for your awn son? I'd scratch the stone out wi' my raw, bleedin' finger-bones if I was a man. Do 'e want to send me mad? Do 'e want to make me hate the sight of 'e? Go--go for love of your mother, if not of me!"

"An' I'll help," said Billy, "an' that chap messin' about in the yard can lend a hand likewise. I be a cracked vessel myself for strength, an' past heavy work, but my best is yours to call 'pon in this pass."

Will turned and left the sick-room without more words, while Billy followed him.

The farmer fetched two picks and a shovel, called Ted Chown and a minute later had struck the first blow towards restoration of his granite cross. All laboured with their utmost power, and Will, who had flung off his coat and waistcoat, bared his arms, tightened his belt, and did the work of two men. The manual labour sweetened his mind a little, and scoured it of some bitterness. While Mr. Blee, with many a grunt and groan, removed the soil as the others broke it away, Blanchard, during these moments of enforced idleness, looked hungrily at the little window of the upper chamber where all his hopes and interests were centred. Then he swung his pick again.

Presently a ray of sunlight brightened Newtake, and contributed to soothe the toiling father. He read promise into it, and when three feet below the surface indications of cross-arms appeared upon the stone, Will felt still more heartened. Grimbal's prediction was now verified; and it remained only to prove Billy's prophecy also true. His tremendous physical exertions, the bright setting sunshine, and the discovery of the cross affected Will strangely. His mind swung round from frank irreligion, to a sort of superstitious credulity, awestricken yet joyful, that made him cling to the saving virtue of the stone. Because Martin had been right in his assertion concerning the gate-post, Blanchard felt a hazy conviction that Blee's estimate of the stone's virtue must also prove correct. He saw his wife at the window, and waved to her, and cried aloud that the cross was uncovered.

"A poor thing in holy relics, sure 'nough," said Billy, wiping his forehead.

"But a cross--a clear cross? Keep workin', Chown, will 'e? You still think 'twill serve, doan't 'e, Blee?"

"No room for doubt, though woful out o' repair," answered Billy, occupied with the ancient monument. "Just the stumps o' the arms left, but more'n enough to swear by."

All laboured on; then the stone suddenly subsided and fell in such a manner that with some sloping of one side of the excavated pit they were able to drag it out.

"Something's talking to me as us have done the wan thing needful," murmured Will, in a subdued voice, but with more light than the sunset on his face. "Something's hurting me bad that I said what I said in the chamber, an' thought what I thought. God's nigher than us might think, minding what small creatures we be. I hope He'll forgive them words."

"He's a peacock for eyes, as be well knawn," declared Mr. Blee. "An' He've got His various manners an' customs o' handlin' the human race. Some He softens wi' gude things an' gude fortune till they be bound to turn to Him for sheer shame; others He breaks 'pon the rocks of His wrath till they falls on their knees an' squeals for forgiveness. I've seed it both ways scores o' times; an' if your little lad 's spared to 'e, you'll be brought to the Lard by a easier way than you deserve, Blanchard."

"I knaw, I knaw, Mr. Blee. He 'm surely gwaine to let us keep li'l Willy, an' win us to heaven for all time."

The cross now lay at their feet, and Billy was about to return to the house and see how matters prospered, when Will bade him stay a little longer.

"Not yet," he said.

"What more's to do?"

"I feel a kind o' message like to set it plumb-true under the sky. Us caan't lift it, but if I pull a plank or two out o' the pig's house an' put a harrow chain round 'em, we could get the cross on an' let a horse pull un up theer to the hill, and set un up. Then us would have done all man can."

He pointed to the bosom of the adjacent hill, now glowing in great sunset light.

"Starve me! but you 'm wise. Us'll set the thing up under the A'mighty's eye. 'Twill serve--mark my words. 'Twill turn the purpose of the Lard o' Hosts, or I'm no prophet."

"'Tis in my head you 'm right. I be lifted up in a way I never was."

"The Lard 's found 'e by the looks of it," said Billy critically, "either that, or you 'm light-headed for want of sleep. But truly I think He've called 'e. Now 't is for you to answer."

They cleaned the cross with a bucket or two of water, then dragged it half-way up the hill, and, where a rabbit burrow lessened labour, raised their venerable monument under the afterglow.

"It do look as if it had been part o' the view for all time," declared Ted Chown, as the party retreated a few paces; and, indeed, the stone rose harmoniously upon its new site, and might have stood an immemorial feature of the scene.

Blanchard stayed not a moment when the work was done but strode to Newtake like a jubilant giant, while Mr. Blee and Chown, with the horse, tools, and rough sledge, followed more slowly.

The father proceeded homewards at tremendous speed; a glorious hope filled his heart, sharing the same with sorrow and repentance. He mumbled shamefaced prayers as he went, speaking half to himself, half to Heaven. He rambled on from a petition for forgiveness into a broken thanksgiving for the mercy he already regarded as granted. His labours, the glamour of the present achievement, and the previous long strain upon his mind and body, united to smother reason for one feverish hour. Will walked blindly forward, now with his eyes upon the window under Newtake's dark roof below him, now turning to catch sight of the grey cross uplifted on the hill above. A great sweeping sea of change was tumbling through his intellect, and old convictions with scraps of assured wisdom suffered shipwreck in it. His mind was exalted before the certainty of unutterable blessing; his soul clung to the splendid assurance of a Personal God who had wrought actively upon his behalf, and received his belated atonement.

Far behind, Mr. Blee was improving the occasion for benefit of young Ted Chown.

"See how he do stride the hill wi' his head held high, same as Moses when he went down-long from the Mount. Look at un an' do likewise, Teddy; for theer goes a man as have grasped God! 'Tis a gert, gay day in human life when it comes."

Will Blanchard hurried through the farm gate, where it swung idly with its sacred support gone forever; then he drew a great breath and glanced upwards before proceeding into the darkness of the unlighted house. As he did so wheels grated at the entrance, and he knew that Doctor Parsons must be just behind him. Above stairs the sick-room was still unlighted, the long-necked kettle still puffed steam, but the fire had shrunk, and Will's first word was a protest that it had been allowed to sink so low. Then he looked round, and the rainbow in his heart faded and died. Damaris sat like a stone woman by the window; Phoebe lay upon the bed and hugged a little body in a blanket. Her hair had fallen down; out of the great shadows he saw the white blur on her face, and heard her voice sound strange as she cried monotonously, in a tone from which the first passion had vanished through an hour of iteration.

"O God, give un back to me; O God, spare un; O kind God, give my li'l bwoy back."