Chapter IV

Mag’s Story

“Long ago, aye, very long ago, it seems now, there was a girl with a temper so bad that no one could stand her ways.”

“Oh, lass,” interrupted her father, “don’t ye say that. Let me begin the story for thee.”

Then the old man took it up in the dialect of the miners, which to the readers of this would hardly seem like English, and for their benefit must be put into plainer language.

“Yes, there was a girl,” he began, “an’ the handsomest one ever I saw. Maybe she had somewhat of a temper, but no one could look into her face and think a bit blame for what she said. An’ what a voice she had! There was not a linnet could sing like her, an’ when all went straight she was singing all the time. There was no one to look after this girl, poor lammie, for the mother of her died before she had sense to miss her, an’ left her to the care of a foolish old father, who had small enough knowledge of the proper way to bring up a little lass. He took her down into the mine with him sometimes, but it wasn’t to her taste--the darkness fretted her, she wanted more liberty. If there had been a school at the place it would have been the making of her, for she had a quick mind, an’ it was a great worry to the father that she couldn’t be put to something fitting for a little lass; but he was near daft with the advising of one an’ another. One’s wife would be for having her sent to town to be put to a trade; another’s wife was for having her sent to learn service with some great lord’s housekeeper; an’ there wasn’t a man’s wife of them all but had some plan to drive him crazy with, an’ not one of them telling of a way that had a possibility in it, or that the girl took a liking to, for she’d fly out at all the ones that came advising. Not that she was a bad lass, if you took her fair, but wilful-like, an’, maybe, too quick with her tongue when she took a turn; but that was more the father’s fault, who had never taught her the right ways for a little lass.”

Philip did not find the story as interesting yet as some of the more exciting ones his grandfather told sometimes, of the three or four years he had been at sea when he ran away from home; but he listened patiently for what was to come, glancing anxiously at his mother, who still knelt in front of the fire, with her head bent low on her breast and her hands clasped in front of her. Philip had never seen her cry before, but now, to his surprise, great tears gathered in her mournful eyes, and once he was sure he heard a stifled sob; but the story began to grow more interesting then, and in listening he forgot to watch her.

“Ay, she was a rare lassie!” pursued the old man; “an’ when she was but just at her growth, an’ not half come to her strength, she saved the lives of two of the best men in the mines.”

“Oh, grandfather, how did she do that?” interrupted Philip.

“I can’t be telling ye the whole of it, because one story inside of another spoils the both to the taste; but I’ll give ye a notion of how it was,” resumed the old man.

“There was a side shaft in those days to a vein that isn’t worked now; an’ being the nighest to some of their houses the men used to go up and down on it, though the superintendent was sayin’ all he could against their using it, because there wasn’t a very safe way of running it. There was a hand-windlass to the top to work the bucket, an’ a snubbing-post near to give the rope a turn ’round so a man could hold it back.

“Well, the lass used to come every night to watch the men getting out of that shaft, ’cause she knew the foolish father of her would be coming up wearying to see if his bairn that had to be left alone the day through was all safe. So one night she stood watching the first load of night-men going down to the mine, knowing that when the bucket came up the father’d be in it; an’ she watched the men’s faces, going down into the dark, turning up to look at her, an’ one of ’em throwing a joke at her for being like a boy bairn more than a lassie. Poor thing, with only a great rough father, an’ no one to show her the ways of women folks, what shame was it of hers? When they went down from the sight of her, she turns to the man at the rope, an’ what does she see? Just the rope paying itself out an’ no one to hold it back, an’ him grinding his chin into the earth in a fit. She looks quick to see if there is help coming, but never a man was in sight, an’ the rope slipping away. Then she knew the danger they were in, for the old shaft went far deeper than the gallery the rope left them at, an’ when the end of it ran out the bucket would drop down where the water had broken in long ago and forced them to give up the lower drift.

“She hadn’t much time to spare when the loss of a minute would mean death to the men. So what does she do then, do you think, this lassie that had none of the soft ways of a girl bairn? Why, just gives the rope a turn around her waist, an’ then braces her two feet against a stone an’ pulls against the roller, an’ waits for the jerk. An’ there was the men down below not knowing but what Michael held the rope the same as ever, getting off the bucket all safe, an’ the lassie’s own father an’ the other men climbing in an’ giving the signal to be fetched up, not knowing that the heft of ’em was dragging on the body of the poor lass, who was past feeling then, for she had fainted into a dead swoon. That’s the way the new men found her when they came to the shaft to take their turn at going down, an’ her dragged up against the post an’ held there by the weight of the bucket hanging, an’ Michael lying by groaning an’ gripping the ground still.”

“Oh, grandfather! did it kill her?” gasped Phil.

“Better if it had--better if it had!” groaned Mag, raising her bent head, but not turning around.

Grandfather wiped his eyes and cleared his throat once or twice, as if he found the recollection of that time overwhelming; then, after two or three long whiffs at his pipe to keep it from quite going out, began again in a tremulous voice, which grew steadier as he went on.

“I can’t say as ’twould ’a’ been better for her if she had,” said he, apparently heeding Mag’s words more than Philip’s question; “happen it might ha’ saved her worse trouble, but it wasn’t to be. She was mangled though, an’ parson came over when he heard of it, bringing the town doctor with him, an’ they found a deal of the ribs crushed and one shoulder put out of joint; an’ the wives of the men she saved an’ the mothers of them nursed and cared for her, an’ there’s not a man in the mine to this day, nor a woman belonging to him, that wouldn’t stand up for her against the world, an’ well they might. But the best is to come: the papers got the story of it, an’ the greatest gentry in the land got to know of what the little lass did for the men; an’ the Queen, God save her, sent her a gold medal. ‘For the Saving of Human Life’ was writ on to it, an’ some great society sent her another in a velvet case.

“An’ now, Maggie, woman,” said he coaxingly to his daughter, “up and tell the lad who was the little lassie, an’ let him hear no more about her.”

“Nay,” said the woman, rising and turning around with her eyes dry and glistening now, “it’s all to be told; if ye cannot tell it, I must.”

“Save us all, woman dear,” said the old man, rising and patting his daughter soothingly on the arm; “don’t get into such a wax. If the little lad must hear the whole story through, why then he must, an’ who can tell it him better nor me? But there’s no need for his hearing more.”

“Yes, father, you can tell it if you will, but ye must tell it all, an’ keep nothing back, or I shall have to tell it myself; for I am determined that my child shall know just what a wicked temper can bring one to, if it’s let to go on and get the mastery.”

As Mag said this she turned wearily to the little stand where her basket of clothes for mending stood, and seated herself by it, but not to sew. Pushing the candle and work away from her, she put her folded arms upon the table and dropped her head upon them, turning her face away from the others.

Philip had become much interested in the story of the heroic girl who had risked so much to save the miners, and he was anxious to hear more about her; but the old man seemed in no hurry to go on with the story. He knocked the ashes out of his pipe, refilled it, took an unnecessarily long time in lighting it, and made various delays, till at last an uneasy movement of his daughter made him start off on it at last.

“Well, this lass as I’m telling of,” he began, turning to Phil, “this brave one that the whole of the men was willing to lay down their lives for, got all over her hurts and bruises, and was ’round on her feet again as well as ever. They was feared, they was, both doctor an’ parson, that the spine of her back had gotten a bending that would never get out of it; but no fear for her--when she left her bed (an’ it was all the broken bones could do to keep her in it at all) she was as straight as a Maypole, an’ there couldn’t have been a face more bonny than hers, an’ it grew bonnier every day till it was more trouble than ever to me--to the father, I mean--to know a way to look after one that was like a young queen for beauty.

“She had no liking those times for going down into the mines, or, for that matter, for work of any kind. There was many an honest lad among the workmen that fair doated on the sight of her, but she had no care for one of them; an’ her father was content to have it so, for he was proud of his handsome daughter, an’ secretly he was believing in his heart that there was none quite good enough to be a husband for her.

“Well, just about the time I’m telling ye of there began to be strange stories floating around among the women-folks, about a grand young man who wore fine clothes an’ seemed to have nothing better to do than to hang around the cottage and keep the girl I’m telling ye of from doing her house-work.

“It would have been all right enough most probably, an’ spared a world of trouble to all concerned, if she had only been quite honest and spoken out to her father, telling him about her friend an’ that he meant all fair an’ square by her. But girls is odd an’ shy in their ways sometimes, an’ maybe this girl was afraid her old father would be angry, an’ rough perhaps with the young man, so she said never a word; an’ then one day when the old man came home from his work rather earlier than usual an’ not feeling extra good-humored as it happened, there was the young man just as the neighbors had said, a-sitting quite at home in the cottage, painting away on a bit of cloth stretched on a frame, an’ it took only half an eye to see that it was a picture of the girl he was making. Well, then there was a great row, the old man accusing his daughter of deceiving him, an’ calling the young man some rather unhandsome names; but I must say he kept his temper very well until the girl began to cry an’ her father said something foolish about young gentlemen making love to simple village girls an’ breaking their hearts for their own amusement. At that the young painter turned very white, an’ quick as a flash he walked straight over to the girl an’ putting his arm around her waist he said, ‘Don’t cry, dear, an’ listen to me, for in your father’s presence I ask you to become my wife as soon as the minister can say the words.’

“An’ so they were married, these two, an’ now, my girl, you must tell the rest. I know it is hard for you to do it, but I cannot bring my tongue to it.”