CHAPTER XXIV

THE PILGRIMS

Spring comes to Beachbourne as it comes to no other city of earth, however fair; say those of her children who after long sojourning in other lands come home in the evenings of their days to sleep.

The many-treed town that lies between the swell of the hills and the foam and sparkle of the sea sluicing deliciously the roan length of Pevensey Bay unveils her rounded bosom in the dawn of the year to the kind clear gaze of heaven and of those who to-day pass and repass along its windy ways. Birds thrill and twitter in her streets. There earlier than elsewhere the arabis calls the bee, and the hedge-sparrow raises his thin sweet pipe to bid the hearts of men lift up: for winter is passed. Chestnut and laburnum unfold a myriad lovely bannerets on slopes peopled with gardens and gay with crocuses and the laughter of children. The elms in Saffrons Croft, the beeches in Paradise, stir in their sleep and wrap themselves about in dreamy raiment of mauve and emerald. The air is like white wine, the sky of diamonds; and the sea-winds come blowing over banks of tamarisk to purge and exhilarate.

On the afternoon of such a day of such a spring in May, 1914, at Beachbourne station a little group waited outside the barrier that led to the departure platform.

The group consisted of Joe Burt, Ernie, and Ruth.

Ruth was peeping through the bars on to the platform, at the far end of which was a solitary figure, waiting clearly, he too, for the Lewes train, and very smart in a new blue coat with a velvet collar.

"It's Alf," she whispered, keen and mischievous to Joe, "Ain't arf smart and all."

Joe peered with her.

"He's the proper little Fat," said the engineer. "I'll get Will Dyson draw a special cartoon of him for the _Leader_."

Ruth preened an imaginary moustache in mockery of her brother-in-law.

"I'm the Managing Director of Caspar's Touring Syndicate, I am, and don't you forget it!" she said with a smirk.

"Where's he off to now?"

"Brighton, I believe, with the Colonel. Some meeting of the League," replied Ernie dully.

Just then Mr. Geddes joined them, and the four moved on to the platform.

The train came in and Alf disappeared into it.

A few minutes later the Colonel passed the barrier. He marked the little group on the platform and at once approached them.

Something unusual about the men struck him at once. All three had about them the generally degagé air of those on holiday bent. The minister wore a cap instead of the habitual wide-awake; and carried a rucksack on his back. Joe swung a parcel by a string, and Ernie had an old kit-bag slung across his shoulder. Rucksack, parcel, and kit-bag were all distinguished by a red label. The Colonel stalked the party from the rear and with manifold contortions of a giraffe-like neck contrived to read on the labels printed in large black letters, ADULT SCHOOL PEACE PARTY. Then he speared the engineer under the fifth rib with the point of his stick.

"Well, what y'up to now?" he asked sepulchrally.

"Just off to Berlin, Colonel," cried the other with aggressive cheerfullness, "Mr. Geddes and I and this young gentleman"--thrusting the reluctant Ernie forward--"one o your soldiers, who knows better now."

The Colonel began to shake hands all round with elaborate solemnity.

"Returning to your spiritual home while there is yet time, Mr. Geddes," he said gravely. "Very wise, I think. You'll be happier there than in our militarist land, you pacifist gentlemen."

The minister, who was in the best of spirits, laughed. The two men had not met since the affair of St. Andrew's Hall: and each was relieved at the open and friendly attitude of the other.

"Cheer up, Colonel," he said. "It's only a ten-days' trip." They moved towards the train and Ernie got in.

Mr. Geddes was telling the Colonel something of the origin and aims of the Adult School Union in general and of the Peace Party in particular.

"How many of you are going?" asked the Colonel.

"Round about a hundred," his informant answered--"working men and women mostly, from every county in England. Most trades will be represented." They would be billeted in Hamburg and Berlin on people of their own class and their own ideals. And next year their visit would be returned in strength by their hosts of this year.

"Interesting," said the Colonel. "But may I ask one question?--What good do you think you'll do?"

"We hope it will do ourselves some good anyhow," Joe answered in fine fighting mood. "Get to know each other. Draw the two peoples together.

_Nation to nation, land to land._

"Stand oop on the seat, Ernie, and sing em your little Red-Flag piece.--He sings that nice he do.--And I'll give you a bit of chocolate."

Ernie did not respond and the Colonel came to his rescue.

"Well, I wish you luck," he sighed. "I wish all well-meaning idealists luck. But the facts of life are hard; and the idealists usually break their teeth on them.--Now I must join my colleague."

He moved on, catching up Ruth who had prowled along the platform to see if Alf was tucked safely away. The Colonel had not seen his companion since her husband had been up before the Bench.

"Well, how's he getting on?" he asked; and turned shrewdly to Ruth. "Have you been doing him down at home?" Something suppressed about Ernie had struck him.

Ruth dropped her eyelids suddenly. For a moment she was silent. Then she flashed up at him swift brown eyes in which the lovely lights danced mischievously.

"See I've hung him on the nail," she murmured warily; and nodded her head with the fierce determination of a child. "And I shan't take him off yet a bit. He's got to learn, Ern has." She was in delicious mood, sportive, sprightly, as a young hunter mare turned out into May pastures after a hard season.

They had come to Alf's carriage. He had taken his seat in a corner and pretended not to see them. Ruth tapped sharply at the window just opposite his face.

"Hullo, Alf!" she called and fled.

The little chauffeur rose and followed her swift and retreating figure down the platform. Far down the train Joe who was leaning out of a window exchanged words with her as she came up.

"I don't like it, sir," Alf said, low. "Dirty business I call it. Somebody ought to interfere if pore old Ern won't."

Joe now looked along the train at him with a scowl.

"Ah, you!" came the engineer's scolding voice, loud yet low. "Dirty tyke! Drop it!"

"Well, between you she ought to be well looked after," muttered the Colonel getting into the carriage.

A fortnight later the Colonel was being driven home by Alf from a meeting of the League at Battle. Mrs. Lewknor, whose hostel was thriving now, had stood him the drive and accompanied him. It was a perfect evening as they slid along over Willingdon Levels and entered the outskirts of the town. Opposite the Recreation Ground Alf slowed down and, slewing round, pointed.

On a platform a man, bareheaded beneath the sky, was addressing a larger crowd than usually gathered at that spot on Saturday evenings.

"What is it?" asked Mrs. Lewknor.

"The German party back," answered Alf. "That's Burt speaking, and Mr. Geddes alongside him."

The engineer's voice, brazen from much bawling, and yet sounding strangely small and unreal under the immense arch of heaven, came to them across the open.

"We've ate with em; we've lived with em; we've talked with em; and we can speak for em. I tell you _there can't be war and there won't be war with such a people_. It'd be the crime of Cain. Brothers we are; and brothers we remain. And not all the politicians and profiteers and soldiers can make us other."

The Colonel and Mrs. Lewknor got down and joined the crowd. As they did so the engineer, who had finished his harangue, was moving a resolution: That this meeting believes in the Brotherhood of Man and wishes well to Germany.

"I second that," said the Colonel from the rear of the crowd.

Just then Alf, who had left his car and followed the Colonel, put a question.

"Did not Lord Roberts say in 1912 at Manchester that Germany would strike when her hour struck?"

The man on the platform was so furious that he did not even rise from his chair to reply.

"Yes he did!" he shouted. "And he'd no business to! Direct provocation it was."

"Will not Germany's hour have struck when the Kiel Canal is open to Dreadnoughts?" continued the inquisitor smoothly. "And is it not the fact that the Canal is to be opened for this purpose in the next few days?"

These questions were greeted with booings mingled with cheers.

Mr. Geddes was rising to reply when Joe Burt leapt to his feet, roused and roaring.

He said men had the choice between two masters--Fear or Faith?--Which were we for?--Were we the heirs of Eternity, the children of the Future, or the slaves and victims of the Past?

"For maself A've made ma choice. A'm not a Christian in the ordinary sense: A don't attend Church or Chapel, like soom folk. But A believe we're all members one of another, and that the one prayer which matters--if said from the heart of men who believe in it and work for it--is _Our Father_: the Father of Jew and Gentile, English and German. And ma recent visit to Germany has confirmed me in ma faith in the people, although A couldna say as much for their rulers. Look about you! What do you see?--The sons and daughters of God rotting away from tuberculosis in every slum in Christendom, and the money and labour that should go to redeeming them spent on altar-cloths and armaments. Altar-cloths and armaments! Do your rulers never turn their thoughts and eyes to Calvary? There are plenty of em in your midst and plenty to see on em if you want to."

The engineer sat down.

"Muck!" said Mrs. Lewknor in her husband's ear.

"I'm not sure," replied the Colonel who had listened attentively; but he didn't wholely like it. Joe had always been frothy; but of old beneath the froth there had been sound liquor. Now somehow the Colonel saw the froth but missed the liquor. To his subtle and critical mind it seemed that the speaker's fury was neither entirely simulated nor entirely real. Habit was as much the motive of it as passion. It seemed to him the expression of an emotion once entirely genuine and now only partly so. An alloy had corrupted the once pure metal. He saw as clearly as a woman that Joe was no longer living simply for one purpose. _Turgid_ his wife had once called the engineer. For the first time the Colonel realised the aptness of the epithet.

Then he noticed Ruth on the fringe of the crowd. He was surprised: for it was a long march from Old Town, and neither Ernie nor the children were with her.

"Come to be converted by the apostles of pacifism, Mrs. Caspar?" he chaffed.

"No, sir," answered Ruth simply, her eyes on the platform. "I just come along to hear Joe. That's why I come." Her face lighted suddenly, "There he is!" she cried.

The engineer had jumped down from the platform and was making straight for her. Ruth joined him; and the two went off together, rubbing shoulders.

The Colonel strolled back towards the car: he was thoughtful, even grave.

Mrs. Lewknor met him with a little smile.

"It's all right, Jocko," she told him. "She's only playing with the man."

The Colonel shook his head.

"She's put up the shutters, and said she's out--to her own husband. It's a dangerous game."

"Trust Ruth," replied the other. "She knows her man."

"Perhaps," retorted the Colonel. "Does she know herself?"