Part 11

She went out and left him—left him with the port. She left him with the sherry; she left him with the claret, with the old, old claret, with the comet year, with the wine that had rounded the Cape, with the Cognac, with the Chartreuse, with the syrupy Curaçoa and the Eau de Dantzic, and with the Scotch whiskey that Mr. Tullingworth–Gordon sometimes drank in despite of plain American Rye.

She left him with the structure of a lifetime shattered; with the love of twenty years nipped in its late–bourgeoning bud. She left him alone, and she left him with a deadly nepenthe at hand.

He fell upon those bottles, and, for once in his quiet, steady, conservative life, he drank his fill. He drank the soft, sub–acid claret; he drank the nutty sherry; he drank the yellow Chartreuse and the ruddy Curaçoa. He drank the fiery Cognac, and the smoky Scotch whiskey. He drank and drank, and as his grief rose higher and higher, high and more high he raised the intoxicating flood.

At two o’clock of that night, a respectable butler opened a side–door in the mansion of Mr. Tullingworth–Gordon, and sallied forth to cool his brow in the midnight air.

He was singing as they brought him back on a shutter, in the early morning; but it was not wholly with drunkenness, for delirium had hold of him. Down to the south of the house were long stretches of marsh, reaching into the Great South Bay, and there he had wandered in his first intoxication. There he had stepped over the edge of a little dyke that surrounded Mr. Tullingworth–Gordon’s pike–pond—where all the pike died, because the water was too salt for them—and there they found him lying on his back, with one of the most interesting cases of compound fracture in his right leg that has yet been put on record, and with the flat stones that topped the dyke lying over him.

They took him to his room over the stable, and put him to bed, and sent for the doctor. The doctor came, and set the leg. He also smelt of Mr. Bilson’s breath, and gazed upon Mr. Bilson’s feverish countenance, and said:

“Hard drinker, eh? We’ll have trouble with him, probably. Hasn’t he got anybody to look after him?”

This query found its way up to the manor–house of the Tullingworth–Gordons. It came, in some way, to the ears of Sophronia. Shortly after dinner–time she appeared in the chamber of Bilson.

Bilson was “coming out of it.” He was conscious, he was sore; he was heavy of heart and head. He looked up, as he lay on his bed, and saw a comely, middle–aged Englishwoman, sharp of feature, yet somehow pleasant and comforting, standing by his bed.

“Sophronia!” he exclaimed.

“Hush!” she said; “the medical man said you wasn’t to talk.”

“Sophronia—’tain’t you!”

“P’r’aps it ain’t,” said Sophronia, sourly; “p’r’aps it’s a cow, or a ’orse or a goat, or anythin’ that is my neighbor’s. But the best I know, it’s me, an’ I’ve come to ’ave an eye on you.”

“Sophronia!” gasped the sufferer; “‘tain’t noways proper.”

“‘T’s goin’ to be proper, Samuel Bilson. You wait, an’ you’ll see what you’ll see. ’Ere ’e comes.”

Mr. Bilson’s room was reached by a ladder, coming up through a hole in the floor. Through this hole came a peculiarly shaped felt hat; then a pale youthful face; then a vest with many buttons.

“To ’ave and to ’old,” said Sophronia. “‘Ere ’e is.”

The head came up, and a long, thin body after it. Pale and gaunt, swaying slightly backward and forward, like a stiff cornstalk in a mild breeze, the Reverend Mr. Chizzy stood before them and smiled vaguely.

The Reverend Mr. Chizzy was only twenty–four, and he might have passed for nineteen; but he was so high a churchman that the mould of several centuries was on him. He was a priest without a cure; but, as some of his irreverent friends expressed it, he was “in training” for the Rectorship of St. Bede’s the Less, a small church in the neighborhood, endowed by Mr. Tullingworth–Gordon and disapproved of by his Bishop, who had not yet appointed a clergyman. The Bishop had been heard to say that he had not yet made up his mind whether St. Bede’s the Less was a church or some new kind of theatre. Nevertheless, Mr. Chizzy was on hand, living under the wing of the Tullingworth–Gordons, and trying to make the good Church–of–England people of the parish believe that they needed him and his candles and his choir–boys.

Behind Mr. Chizzy came two limp little girls, hangers–on of the Tullingworth–Gordon household by grace of Mrs. Tullingworth–Gordon’s charity. In New England they would have been called “chore–girls.” The Tullingworth–Gordons called them “scullery maids.”

Bilson half rose on his elbow in astonishment, alarm and indignation.

“Sophronia ’Uckins,” he demanded, “what do this ’ere mean? I ain’t a–dyin’, and I ain’t got no need of a clergyman, thank ’eaven. And no more this ain’t a scullery, Mrs. ’Uckins.”

“This,” said Sophronia, pointing at the clergyman as though he were a wax–figure in a show, “this is to wed you and me, Samuel Bilson, and _them_” (she indicated the scullery maids,) “them witnesses it.”

“Witnesses _wot_?” Mr. Bilson inquired, in a yell.

“Witnesses our marriage, Samuel Bilson. Nuss you I can not, both bein’ single, and nussed you must and shall be. Now set up and be marri’d quiet.”

Mr. Bilson’s physical condition forbade him to leap from the bed; but his voice leaped to the rafters above him.

“Marri’d!” he shouted: “I’ll die fust!”

“Die you will,” said Sophronia, calmly but sternly, “if married you ain’t, and that soon.”

“Sophronia!” Bilson’s voice was hollow and deeply reproachful; “you ’ave throwed me over.”

“I ’ave,” she assented.

“And ’ere I am.”

“And there you are.”

“Sophronia, you ’ave not treated me right.”

“I ’ave not, Samuel Bilson,” Miss Huckins cheerfully assented; “I might ’ave known as you was not fit to take care of yourself. But I mean to do my dooty now, so will you ’ave the kindness to button your clo’es at the neck, and sit up?”

Mr. Bilson mechanically fastened the neck–band of his night–shirt and raised himself to the sitting posture.

“Mrs. Huckins,” Mr. Chizzy interrupted, in an uncertain way; “I didn’t understand—you did not tell me—there does not appear to have been the usual preliminary arrangement for this most sacred and solemn ceremony.”

Sophronia turned on him with scorn in her voice and bearing.

“Do I understand, sir, as you find yourself in a ’urry?”

“I am not in a hurry—oh, no. But—dear me, you know, I can’t perform the ceremony under these circumstances.”

Miss Huckins grew more profoundly scornful.

“Do you know any himpediment w’y we should not be lawfully joined together in matrimony?”

“Why,” said the perturbed cleric, “he doesn’t want you.”

“‘E doesn’t know what ’e wants,” returned Sophronia, grimly; “if women waited for men to find out w’en they wanted wives, there’d be more old maids than there is. If you’ll be good enough to take your book in your ’and, sir, I’ll see to ’im.”

Bilson made one last faint protest.

“‘Twouldn’t be right, Sophronia,” he wailed; “I ain’t wot I was; I’m a wuthless and a busted wreck. I can’t tie no woman to me for life. It ain’t doin’ justice to neither.”

“If you’re what you say you are,” said Sophronia, imperturbably, “and you know better than I do, you should be glad to take wot you can get. If I’m suited, don’t _you_ complain.”

“Mrs. Huckins,” the young clergyman broke in, feebly asserting himself, “this is utterly irregular.”

“I know it is,” said Sophronia; “and we’re a–waitin’ for you to set it straight.”

The two chore–girls giggled. A warm flush mounted to Mr. Chizzy’s pale face. He hesitated a second; then nervously opened his book, and began the service. Sophronia stood by the bedside, clasping Bilson’s hand in a grasp which no writhing could loosen.

“Dearly beloved,” Mr. Chizzy began, addressing the two chore–girls; and with a trembling voice he hurried on to the important question:

“Wilt thou have this woman to be thy wedded wife?—“

“N—yah!”

Bilson had begun to say “No;” but Sophronia’s firm hand had tightened on his with so powerful a pressure that his negative remonstrance ended in a positive yell.

“Ah, _really_,” broke in Mr. Chizzy; “I can not proceed, M—M—Miss—ah, what’s your name?—I positively can’t!”

“_Mrs. Bilson_,” returned the unmoved Sophronia. “Are you intending for to part ’usband and wife at this point, sir? Excuse me; but we’re a–waitin’ of your convenience.”

Mr. Chizzy was a deep red in the face. His pallor had given place to a flush quite as ghastly in its way. The blood was waltzing in giddy circles through his brain as he read on and on.

No church—no candles—no robes—no choiring boys. Only this awful woman, stern as death, commanding him and Bilson. Why had he yielded to her? Why had he permitted himself to be dragged hither? Why was he meekly doing her bidding? Mr. Chizzy felt as though he were acting in some ghastly, nightmarish dream.

“_Then shall the Minister say_: Who giveth this Woman to be married to this Man?”

That roused Mr. Chizzy from his trance. It came late; but it seemed to open a way out of the horribly irregular business. He paused and tried to fix an uncertain eye on Sophronia.

“Have you a Father or a Friend here?” he demanded.

“Jim!” said Sophronia, loudly.

“Ma’am?” came a voice from the lower story of the stable.

“Say ‘I do.’”

“Ma’am?”

“Say ‘I do’—an’ say it directly!”

“Say—say?—what do you want, Miss Huckins?”

“_Jim!_” said Sophronia, sternly, “open your mouth an’ say ‘I do’ out loud, or I come down there immejit!”

“I do!” came from the floor below.

“‘Ere’s the ring,” said Sophronia, promptly; “‘I, M., take thee, N.’—if you’ll ’ave the kindness to go on, sir, we won’t detain you any longer than we can ’elp. I’m give away, I believe; an’ I’ll take ’im, M.”

“Forasmuch as,” began the Reverend Mr. Chizzy, a few minutes later, addressing the chore–girls, “Samuel and Sophronia have consented together in holy wedlock—“

He stopped suddenly. Up through the opening in the floor arose the head of a youthful negro, perhaps fourteen years of age. Mr. Chizzy recognized him as the stable–boy, a jockey of some local fame.

“What you want me to say I done do?” he inquired.

“Mrs.—Mrs.—Bilson!” said Mr. Chizzy, with a tremulous indignation in his voice; “did this negro infant act as your parent or friend, just now?”

“‘E give me away,” replied the unabashed bride.

Mr. Chizzy looked at her, at Bilson, at Jim, and at the chore–girls. Then he opened his book again and finished the ceremony.

* * * * *

The Tullingworth–Gordons were angry when they heard of the marriage. They missed the two mainstays of their domestic system. But—well, Bilson was growing old, and Sophronia was growing tyrannical. Perhaps it was better as it was. And, after all, they had always wanted a Lodge, and a Lodge–keeper, and the old ice–house stood near the gate—a good two hundred feet from the house.

It was nearly a year before Bilson could walk around with comfort. Indeed, eighteen months later, he did not care to do more than sit in the sun and question Fate, while Mrs. Bilson tried to quiet a noisy baby within the Lodge.

“‘Ere I am laid up, as I should be,” said Bilson; “an there’s an active woman a–goin’ around with a baby, and a–nussin’ of him. If things was as they should be, in the course of nachur, we’d ’ave exchanged jobs, we would.”

“THE RUNAWAY BROWNS,”

by H. C. Bunner, illustrations by C. J. Taylor; publishers, Keppler & Schwarzmann. The experiences of Paul Brown and his wife, who escape a tame, adventureless life, with a view of having “things happen to them,” and to this end leave a pleasant home to be gone a year and a day, are just the reading for a Summer’s afternoon, and there is still enough of Summer in the air to make it enjoyable to its fullest. How the Browns fell in with a band of barn–storming professionals; how they became tin peddlers; how they took charge of a lone hotel, and how they finally and gladly reached their trim cottage, is told in these clever and amusing pages, and will bring more than one hearty laugh even from those unused to smile.

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