CHAPTER XIII

THE SPIRIT OF INQUIRY

Kate entered the house, at the summons of her aunt, and found that John Pooke was within, standing with his hat in his hand, in front of him, twirling it about and playing with the string that served to contract the lining band.

“I am so glad to see that you are well, Kitty.”

Kate thanked him. She was not a little vexed at being called away from conversation with the schoolmaster, whose talk was so unlike that of any other man she had met. The rector she knew and loved, but she was before him as a scholar to be instructed in spiritual concerns, and their conversation never turned on such matters as had been mooted between her and the schoolmaster. For a little while she had been translated into a new sphere, and had heard words of another order to those that had hitherto met her ears. Now she was brought back into the world of commonplace, and could not at once recover herself and accommodate herself to it. This made her shy and silent. Pooke also was shy, but he was awkward to boot.

“Have you nothing to say to me, Kate?” he asked in suppliant tone.

“Indeed, I thank you many times, Jan, for inquiring about me when I was ill. Now, as you see, I am myself again.”

“I was the cause of your illness.”

“No indeed, no blame attaches to you. We will not talk of blame--there is none.”

“Are you going to Ashburton Fair on Tuesday?”

“I do not know.”

“Yes, you do,” threw in Aunt Zerah; then to John Pooke, “She is going to the moor to her father for a change. It is her father’s wish, so that she may be soon strong again. He will meet her at Ashburton at the fair, if we can get her so far.”

“I am going to the fair,” said Pooke eagerly. “That is to say, sister Sue and I be going together there. The young man to whom she is about to be married lives at Ashburton, and will have it that she goes. There is room for a third in our trap. I should so much like to take you--I mean, sister Sue would wish it, if you would favour me--I mean sister Sue.”

“Thank you again, Jan, for another kindness,” said the girl, “but I shall be driven to Ashburton by my uncle. I really had not considered that the fair was on Tuesday.”

“Your uncle can spare you,” thrust in Zerah; “and if Jan Pooke is so civil as to invite you to go in his conveyance, it is only proper you should accept.”

“But, aunt,” said Kate, slightly colouring, “my father has settled that I am to go with Uncle Pasco, and I do not like”--

“Oh, so long as you are got to Ashburton, it doesn’t matter who takes you,” interrupted Zerah.

“If it does not matter,” said Kate, “then let me hold to my father’s arrangement.”

“That is not kind to me--I mean to sister Sue,” said Pooke dolefully.

“I intend no unkindness,” answered the girl, “but when my father has made a plan, I do not like to break it even in little matters.”

The young man twirled his hat about, and pulled out the string from the band. He paused, looked ashamed, and said, “You don’t choose to go with me, that is the long and the short of it. Your aunt will excuse you from going with Pasco Pepperill.”

“Do not tease me, Jan,” pleaded Kate, confused and unhappy. She was well aware that there had been village talk about her having been in the boat with Jan, that her aunt was desirous of thrusting her upon him. With maidenly reserve she shrank from his proposal, lest by riding in the trap with him some colour might be given to the suspicions entertained in the village, and some food should be supplied to the gossips.

The lad went to the window, and looked out on the little platform with moody eyes.

“Why,” said he, “there is that new schoolmaster there.” He stood watching him. “He’s a noodle. What do’y think he is about? He has got three or four faded buttercups, and he is putting them between the leaves of his note-book, just as though there was something wonderful in them; just as if they were the rarest flowers in the world. I always thought he was a fool--now I know it.”

Kate winced.

“I say,” pursued Jan, “have you heard about him and Jackson’s ‘Tee-dum’? The landlord went to him civil-like, and invited him to join the choir. He bragged about his violin as if he could play finer than anyone hereabouts. But when the landlord told him our chaps could play Jackson’s ‘Tee-dum,’ he ran away. I reckon Jackson’s ‘Tee-dum’ is a piece to find out the corners of a man. He daren’t face it. Kitty, if you won’t come with me to the fair, I swear I’ll offer the odd seat to Rose Ash.”

Then he left the house.

Kate attempted to fly, for she knew what was coming, but was arrested by her aunt, who grasped her by the shoulders.

“You little fool!” she said. “Don’t you see what may come of this if you manage well, or let me manage for you? Jan Tottle came here every day to inquire when you were ill, and now you let him slip between your fingers and into the hands of that designing Rose. He is a ball that has come to you, and you toss it to her. Don’t think she is fool enough to toss him back to you. When she has him she will close her fingers on him. What is going to become of you, I’d like to know, that you should act like this? Do not reckon on anything your father will bring you; or on your uncle either. One is helping the other down the road to ruin, and we may all be nearer the poorhouse than you imagine.”

She let go her hand, for Bramber came in, and asked what he had to pay.

“Sixpence,” answered Zerah, “and what you like to the little maid. I reckon she’ll take a ha’penny.”

Kate’s head fell, covered with shame, and she thrust her hands behind her back.

Walter paid Mrs. Pepperill, and said, without looking at Kate, “The little maid and I understand each other, and the account between us is settled.”

“Now look here,” said Zerah, allowing her niece to escape, and laying hold of the young man, “I want a word with you, Mr. Schoolmaster. My husband has let you go through his accounts. I reckon he’d got that muddled himself, he didn’t know his way out, and thought you’d have led him, as well as Jack-o’-lantern leads out of a bog. The light is good enough, but when the mire is there, what can the light do but show it? It can’t dry it up. If it weren’t for the cockles and coffee as I get a few sixpences by, I reckon we’d have been stogged (mired) long ago. But Pasco, he has the idea that he’s a man of business and can manage a thousand affairs, and as ill-luck will have it, that brother o’ mine feeds his fancies wi’ fresh meat. Now I want you to tell me exactly what you found in his books.”

“I am not justified in speaking of Mr. Pepperill’s private affairs.”

“What! not to his wife?”

“Not to anyone. I was taken into confidence.”

“Bless you! he couldn’t help himself. Set a man as don’t know nothing about machinery to manage an engine, and he’ll get it all to pieces in no time. Pasco knows nothing about business, and there he is trying to run coal stores, wool, timber--all kinds o’ things. I know what it will come to, though you keep mum.”

To escape further questioning, Bramber left Coombe Cellars, and walked towards the village.

The school was closed for a week. Some painting and plastering had to be done in it before he could begin his duties. It was as well, he thought; it allowed him time to find his bearings, to get to understand something of the people amongst whom he was to be settled, and whose children he was to instruct.

As Bramber walked in the dusk, he encountered the rector, Mr. Fielding, who stopped him.

“Are you going indoors?” asked the parson; “or have you leisure and inclination for a stroll?”

“You do me an honour, sir; I shall be proud.”

“Let us walk by the water-side. This is a beautiful hour--neither night nor day--something of one, something of the other, like life. And who can say of the twilight in which he walks whether it will broaden into perfect day or deepen into utter night.”

The rector took the young man’s arm.

Mr. Fielding belonged to a type that has completely disappeared; peculiar to its time and necessarily transitory. He belonged to that school of Churchmen which had been founded by Newman and Keble; of men cultured, scholarly, refined in thought, steeped in idealism, unconsciously affected, aiming at what was impossible,--at least, fully to achieve,--and not knowing practicable methods, not able to distinguish proportion in what they sought after, ready to contend to death equally for trifles as for principles.

Mr. Fielding wore tall white collars and a white tie, a black dress coat and open black waistcoat. His hat was usually at the back of his head, and he walked with his head bent forwards and his shoulder against the wall--a trick caught and copied from Newman, caught when first under his influence, and now unconsciously followed.

Mr. Fielding was unmarried, a quiet, studious man, courteous to all, understood by none.

They walked together a little way, and talked on desultory matters. Then Walter Bramber asked the rector, “Would you mind telling me, sir, where my predecessor got into trouble? Mr. Pepperill says it was at Waterloo.”

“Waterloo? dear me, no; it was at Wellington.”

“I knew it could not be at Waterloo, but he insisted on it, and that it was in England.”

“There was, you see, a connection of ideas. There is always that, in the worst blunders. Did you correct him?”

“Yes; I said Waterloo was not in England.”

“You should have let it pass, till you knew how to enlighten him as to where the place really was. Never show a man he is wrong till you can show him how he can be right. Also, never let a man see you are pulling him out of a ditch, always let him think he is scrambling out of it himself. A man’s self-respect is his best governing motive, and should not be wounded.”

They paced along together a little way.

“You are a young man,” said the rector, “and a young man is sanguine.” He paused, and walked on without saying anything for a minute, then he added, “I was sanguine once. That arises from confidence in one’s self, and confidence in one’s cause, and confidence in mankind. You have a noble cause--the priest and the schoolmaster have the greatest of missions: to educate what is highest in man, spirit and intellect. You have no reason to be shaken by any doubt, to feel any hesitation in adhesion to the cause of education. ‘Let there be light!’ was the first word God spake. There is the keynote of creation, the moral law laid down for the whole intelligent world. We walk in the twilight that we know is brightening into day.”

He paused again; then after a dozen paces he proceeded, “You have confidence in yourself. You have enthusiasm, you have ability, you know what you have to teach, and you long to impart to others what you value yourself. Is it not so?”

“It is so indeed.”

“Discouragement will come, and it is my duty to prepare you for it. You have confidence in human nature. You think all will be as eager to drink in instruction as you are eager to dispense it. You may be mistaken, and will be disappointed. It has taken me some years, Mr. Bramber, to learn a fact which I will communicate to you, as a caution against losing heart. You will remember that when the sower went forth to sow, though all his seed was good, yet only one-fourth part came to anything. We must work for the work’s sake, and not for results. In your patience possess ye your souls. That is one of the hardest of lessons to acquire.”

“I will try not to expect too much.”

“Expect nothing. Look to the work, and the work only. One sows, another reaps, a third grinds, a fourth bakes, but it is the fifth who eats the loaf and tastes how good it is. Did you ever hear what Mme. de Maintenon said of the carps, that had been transferred to the marble basins of Marly, in which they died? ‘Ah!’ said she, ‘they are like me, they regret their native mud.’ You will find that your pupils do not want to be translated to purer fountains, that in them there is a hankering after their native ignorance. That there will be little receptiveness, no enthusiasm after the light, no hunger after the bread of the Spirit--that is what you must be prepared to find. I have found it so, and am now content with the smallest achievements--to make them take a few crumbs from my palm, to accept the tiniest ray let into their clouded minds. Be content to do your work, and do not be asking for results. Do your duty, leave results to another day and to the reapers. You and I are the humble sowers, enough for us to know that, but for us, there would be no golden harvest which we shall not see.”

The rector withdrew his hand from the arm of Bramber.

“There is a saying, ‘Except ye be as little children’--You know the rest. What does that mean? Not the simplicity of children--simplicity springs out of inexperience; not the innocence--which arises from ignorance--but the inquisitiveness of the child, which is its characteristic. The child asks questions, it wants to know everything, often asking what it is inconvenient to answer. Mr. Bramber, unless we have this spirit of inquiry, we cannot enter into any kingdom above that of animal life. There is the intellectual kingdom, and when there is eagerness to know, then there is advance into that realm, and you will be the great prophet and mystagogue who will lead the young of this village into that kingdom. Then, secondly, there is the spiritual kingdom, but of that I will not now speak. I hope you will find some pupils apt to learn, but the many will, I fear, be listless.”

“A single swallow does not make a summer,” said the schoolmaster; “but I have already met with one here who verily hungers and thirsts after knowledge.”

“Ah!” Mr. Fielding looked round, and his face lightened. “You have met--talked to Kitty.”

“Yes, sir; she is full of eagerness.”

“Oh that we had many other minds as active! Alas! alas! I fear in that she is, as they call her, Kitty Alone.”