Chapter 19

Norah had hesitated about replying; but she now said that she really thought Dale need not be in a hurry. Billy was so clever that when he did get to school he would learn faster than other boys; and she added that his departure from home would be "a dreadful wrinch for Mrs. Dale."

"But it will be a wrench for her whenever it happens. In life one has to prepare one's self for _wrenches_--That, I fancy, is the better way of pronouncing the word. Yes, wrench after wrench, Norah--that's life; until the last great wrench comes--and, well, that _isn't_ life.... Who was that passed the window?"

Norah turned her bright young face to the window and peered out.

"It's Mr. Bates, sir. How funny he looks!"

"What d'you mean--funny?"

"Walking so slow, and leaning on his great stick--as if he was a pilgrim."

Dale had jumped off his stool; and he ran out to the road and begged the old man to come in.

"Certainly, William," said Mr. Bates.

He had cut himself a long staff from some woodland holly-tree, a rough prop that reached shoulder high, and on this he leaned heavily as soon as he stopped walking. He looked very old and very shaky.

"Good evening, Miss Veale," he said courteously as he entered the office.

"Oh, you mustn't call her _Miss_ Veale. She's Norah--one of us, you know." And as he spoke, Dale laid his hand on the back of Norah's neck to prevent her from rising. "She's our _multum in parvo_--making herself so useful to the wife and me that we can't think what we should ever do without her. Bide where you are a moment, Norah."

Dale established his visitor on a chair that faced the rapidly waning light, and addressed him again with increased deference.

"If you can spare a few minutes, there's a thing I'd like to speak to you about, Mr. Bates."

"I can spare all the minutes between now and morning," said Mr. Bates cordially, "if I can be of the least service to you, William."

As much now as in the beginning of the enterprise Bates held himself at the younger man's disposal, indeed liked nothing better than to give information and counsel whenever his prosperous successor was of a mind to accept either.

"I won't keep you as long as that," said Dale, smiling; "but will you give us the pleasure of your company at supper?"

"You're very kind, William, but I don't think I can."

"Do, Mr. Bates. The wife will be as pleased as me--as I."

The old fellow looked up at Dale hesitatingly; and Dale, looking down at his clean-shaven cheeks, bushy white eyebrows, and the long wisps of white hair brushed across his bald head, felt a great reverence. He would not look at the threadbare shabbiness of the gray cloth suit, or at the queer tints given by time and weather to the black felt hat that was being balanced on two shrunken knees.

"I, ah, don't think I'll present myself before Mrs. Dale--ah, without more preparation than this. Besides, would it not put her out?"

"No, indeed. Quite unceremonious--taking us exactly as you find us--pot-luck."

"Then be it so. You are very good. Thank you, William."

"Thank you, Mr. Bates." Dale seized upon the visitor's hat and stick. "Now you may cut along, Norah, and tell Mrs. Dale that Mr. Bates is kind enough to stay supper--without ceremony."

Norah glided across the office to the inner door, and, going out, asked if she should bring a lamp.

"Yes, bring the lamp in ten minutes--not before. There's light enough for two such old friends to chat together;" and Dale waited until she had shut the door. "Now, sir, this is kind and friendly. Give me your hand, Mr. Bates. I'd like to hold it in mine, while I say these few prelim'nary words."

"Yes, William?" The old man had immediately offered his hand, and he looked up with a puzzled and anxious expression.

"I merely wish to assure you, Mr. Bates, very sincerely, that if you at this moment could see right into my heart, you'd plainly see my respect, and what is more, my true affection for you, sir."

"I believe it, William."

"And it has always been a source of comfort to me to think that you, sir, have entertained a most kindly feeling to me, sir."

Mr. Bates had averted his eyes, and he moved his feet restlessly, his demeanor seeming to indicate that he regretted having accepted the supper invitation and was perhaps desirous of withdrawing his acceptance.

"I hope," Dale went on, "I haven't been presumptuous in my estimate of your feeling, sir."

"No." And the old man looked up again. His eyes, his whole face had grown soft, and the tone of his voice was firm, yet rather low and very sweet. "No, William, my feeling for you began in taking note of your sharpness combined with your steady ways, and it has ended in love."

"That's a large word, Mr. Bates."

"It's no larger than the truth."

"Then I say 'Thank you, sir, for the honor you have done me.'" Dale pressed the old chap's hand, dropped it, and returned to the high stool. "And now, after what has passed between us two, man to man, you'll credit me with no disrespectfulness if I make bold to let fall certain remarks."

Bates nodded his white head and stared at the floor.

"There's a thing, sir, that I particularly want to say. It is about yourself, sir--"

"Go on, William," said Mr. Bates, "and get it over. I know what you're after, of course--something about Richard. Well, I'll take it from you. I wouldn't take it from any one else."

"D'you remember all you used to advise me about the danger of rats, telling me to fight 'em as if it was the devil himself, horns and tail, and not just so many stinking little avaricious rodents? You said, one rat was sufficient to mess me up."

Mr. Bates nodded.

"And you knew what you were talking about--no one better. And for why? Because it was your own story you were telling me, in the form of a parable."

"You're wrong there, William."

"Not a bit. You'd had one rat--but, by Jupiter, he was a whooping big 'un, and he'd eaten your grain, and messed you up--he'd ruined your business, and well-nigh broken your heart, and practically done for you."

"Have you finished?" asked Mr. Bates, with dignity.

"Yes, sir--almost;" and Dale in the most earnest manner besought his old friend to resist any further attacks from that wicked son. "I do implore you, sir, not to be weak and fullish. Don't take him to your boosum. He's a rat still--an' he'll gnaw and devour the little that's left to you, so sure as I sit here."

But it was all no use, as he could easily see. Mr. Bates raised his eyes, moved his feet, and then spoke gently but proudly.

"I thank you, William, for your well-meant intentions. I have listened to what you wished to say. Now shall we talk of something else?"

"Yes--but with just this one proviso added. Will you remember that I am your banker, for the full half of what the banker's worth? If the pinch comes, draw on me."

"I thank you again, William. But I shan't need help."

"I think you will."

"Then to speak quite truly, I couldn't take help, William, I really couldn't."

"Why not? Think of all you've done for me. Don't deny me the pleasure of doing something for you."

"I'll consider, William. Please let it rest there."

Dale could say no more and they both sat silent for a little while. Then old Bates spoke again.

"William," he said, "if you'll excuse me, I really won't stay. You have--to tell the truth--agitated me."

"Indeed I'm sorry, sir. But don't punish me by going."

"I am not quite up to merry-making."

Just then Norah arrived, carrying the lamp, and Dale turned to her for aid.

"Norah, speak for me. Mr. Bates says he won't stay. Tell him how disappointed we shall be."

"Oh, do stay, Mr. Bates," said Norah. "It'll be such a disappointment to Mr. Dale."

"Some other evening, Miss--ah, Norah. But you must excuse me this time."

And, having picked up his hat and stick, Mr. Bates bade them good night.

Dale and Norah went out into the road and watched him as he walked away.

"There, Norah;" and Dale, slipping his arm within hers, drew her closer to his side. "Look with all your eyes. You'll never see a better man than that."

They watched him till he disappeared in the gathering darkness; and he seemed just like a pilgrim with his staff, slowly approaching the end of a cruelly long journey.

XXV

It was perhaps a month after this when Dale heard news which plainly indicated that the wicked son had completed his horrible task. He had eaten up all that there was to eat.

Mr. Osborn said that old Bates had given his landlord notice, and he was leaving his cottage almost immediately. The matter had been brought to the pastor's knowledge because one of the Baptist congregation thought of taking the cottage, and had asked Mr. Osborn's advice.

Other people, who professed to know more than Mr. Osborn, said it was true that Bates had given notice, but it was also true that he owed two quarters' rent and that the landlord was determined to have his money. To this end everything the cottage contained would be seized and sold. And what would happen to Mr. Bates when not only his house was gone, but all his sticks of furniture too?

"It do seem a pity he ben't a young orphan female instead of a wore-out old man, for then he cud move on into Barradine Home and be fed on the best for naught."

The cottage and other cottages about Otterford Mill, although close to the Abbey estate, did not belong to it. They were the property of various small owners, and Bates' landlord, as Dale knew, was a tradesman at Old Manninglea.

Dale, having heard the news on a Sunday evening, put his check-book in his pocket very early next morning and rode over the heath to the market town. There he saw Bates' landlord, readily obtained leave to withdraw the notice, cleared off the arrears, and paid rent for a year in advance. Then he rode straight to Otterford Mill.

"Good morning, William. Pray come in. But will your horse stand quiet there?"

"Oh, yes, sir. He'll stand quiet enough. Only too glad of the chance to stand. I keep him moving, you know."

"Don't he ever get jerking at the rein, and break his bridle?"

"If he did he wouldn't run away. He'd be too ashamed of himself for what he'd done."

"Then step inside, William," said Mr. Bates once more.

He ushered Dale into a bare, sad-looking room; and the whole cottage smelled of nakedness, famine, misery.

"Now, my dear old friend," said Dale cheerily, "what's all this whispering that reaches my ears _in re_ you thinking of changing your quarters and leaving us?"

"It's the truth, William. I can't afford these premises any longer."

"Oh, come, we can't have that. We haven't so many friends that we can put up with losing the one we value most of all."

Then he told Mr. Bates what he had done at Manninglea.

The old man frowned, flushed, and began to tremble.

"You shouldn't 'a' done that, William. It was a liberty. I must write and say my notice holds good."

Then there was a brief but most painful conversation, Dale nearly shedding tears while he pleaded to be allowed on this one occasion to act as banker, and Bates resolutely refusing help, refusing even to admit how much help was needed.

"William," he said obdurately, "I recognize your kind intention--but you've made a mistake. You shouldn't have done it, without a word to me. I can only repeat, it was a liberty."

Dale of course apologized, but went on pleading. It was all no use. Obviously Mr. Bates' pride had been wounded to the quick. He was white, shaky, so old, so feeble, and yet firm as a rock. Never till now had he spoken to Dale in such tones of stiff reproof.

"William, we'll say no more. I have paid my way all my days, and at my present age it's a bit too late to start differently."

His last words were: "I shall write next post to confirm the notice."

And he did so.

Then the tale ran round that Mr. Bates was going to the workhouse. People declared that he had ceded all his furniture to the landlord, who could now sell it quietly and advantageously, in a manner which would yield more than enough to wipe out the debt. Perhaps there might even be a trifling balance in the debtor's favor eventually; but meanwhile the homeless and stickless old gentleman would fall as another burden on the rates to which he had so long subscribed.

It was curious, perhaps, but the humble folk spoke of him as the old gentleman, and not as the old man, all at once giving him the title which they only now began to think he had fairly earned as a master and employer, an important personage who used to drive about in gigs, wear a black coat at church, and always have a kind word for you when you touched your cap to him.

"'Tis all a pity but so 'tis, and can't be gainsaid. Th' old gentleman hev come down so low, that 'tis the Union and nought else."

"Is that for sure?"

"Oh, yes, for certain sure. He is a-goin' into workhouse to-morrow maarning."

But he did not go there.

In the morning some one came running into Dale's yard, and shouted what had happened since dark last night.

"Th' old gentleman hev a done fer hisself."

He had been found hanging from the biggest of the apple trees behind his cottage. He had set a ladder against the tree, gone up it, fixed the rope firmly, put the noose round his neck, and stepped off into the air. That was the way they did for themselves in this part of Hampshire.

XXVI

The suicide of Mr. Bates had a great effect on Dale. The sadness and regret that he felt at the time continued to tinge his thoughts for a long while afterward. He could not shake off the horror of that midnight scene, as he imagined it--the God-fearing man breaking the divine laws, the man full of years who was so near the grave and yet could not wait till it received him naturally, the poor feeble old creature taxing all his remnant of strength to knock out the small spark of life that already had begun to gleam so dimly. How long did he take to drag and raise the ladder, pausing to recover breath, holding his side and coughing, then again toiling?

Another thing that depressed Dale's spirits was the departure of Mr. Osborn, who had gone to the Midlands to take up the ministry of a large church in a large town. And never had Dale more felt the want of priestly support than at this period. The new pastor was a young man who preached eloquently, but Dale would not be able to talk to him as he had talked to Osborn.

Mavis observed again what she had not seen for ages, the gloom on her husband's face when he sat alone, or thought that he was alone. The dull brooding look that spoiled his aspect at such times was like the shadow of a dark cloud on a field; but as in the past the shadow went rapidly, and she fancied she could chase it away as surely as if she had been the sunshine. She would have been startled and pained if she could have seen his face now, as he rode from Manninglea after luncheon at the club.

It was a wet spring day, with dark clouds hanging low over the heath, a cold wind cheeping, soughing, sighing; and Dale's face was darker and sadder than the day. Before mounting his horse in the hotel yard at Manninglea he had gone to the station and bought _The Times_ newspaper; now he drew the paper out of his pocket, and sheltering it with his rain cloak, read an advertisement on the front page.

The advertisement told him that a London hospital gratefully acknowledged the receipt of one hundred pounds, being the twenty-first donation from the same hand, and making two thousand and twenty pounds as the total received to date. In accordance with the request of their anonymous benefactor, they inserted this notice, and they offered at the same time their heartfelt thanks.

Dale tore out the advertisement and threw away the rest of the paper.

To his mind, this money was the payment of a very old debt. The amount of his first charitable donation sent nearly fifteen years ago, had been twenty pounds. That, the most urgent part of the debt, represented the four bank-notes given to the wife by Mr. Barradine in London. The other twenty instalments made up the amount of the legacy that came to her at his death. Mavis had lent the money to her husband, had in due course received a similar sum of money from him, and she held it now safely invested; but, as Dale told himself, she did not in truth hold one penny of the dead man's gifts. All that she had now was the gift of him, Dale; and the money that soiled her hands in touching it, the money that had burned his brain, the filthy gold that had made him half-mad to think of, had gone to strangers whom neither of them had ever seen. He had been slow about it; but, thank God, he had done at last what he wanted to do at the very beginning.

He folded the scrap of paper that was his receipt or quittance, put it in his breast pocket, and rode on at a foot-pace. He was absolutely alone, not a soul in sight wherever he turned his eyes, not a beast, not a bird moving, the desolate brown heath and the sad gray sky alike empty of life; straight ahead, about a mile distant, lay the Cross Roads, the tavern, and the small hamlet of cottages, but as yet they were hidden by a rise of the intervening ground; only the fringe of cultivated land at the point where it met the barren waste indicated the work or proximity of mankind. His face grew still darker as he approached these fields and saw the cluster of houses on their edge. He looked at the deep ditch that surrounded the outermost field; then turning his head looked again at the heath, its bleak contours mounting gradually till they showed an ugly ridge beyond which the downs swelled up soft and vague against the hanging curtain of clouds. And he thought of what lay on the far side of this long grass rampart of down country--the fat-soiled valley, the other railway line, the trains from the West of England, full of queer people, running by night as well as by day.

As he passed the Barradine Arms, he saw three louts leaning against a dry bit of wall under the eaves of an outhouse. They stared at him stupidly, not speaking or touching their caps, just loutishly staring; and he stared at them with black severity. He thought how he himself had been like one of those oafs, living in a cottage not so many miles from this spot. No one now seemed to remember his humble birth, his unhappy youth, his sordid home. Other people forgot everything; while he could forget nothing.

At the Cross Roads he drew rein for a moment, as if undecided as to which way to turn. Before going home he had to pay a business call, and his destination was straight ahead of him, about four miles off as the crow flies. The quickest way to get there, the line nearest to the crow's line, would be to leave the road here and ride through Hadleigh Wood, under the bare beeches, among the somber pines, along the gloomy rides; and the alternative route would be to turn to the right, hold to the open road, and follow its deflected course past the Abbey gates and park, and all round the wild forest. That way would be three miles longer than the other way. He turned his horse's head to the right; and as he went on by the road, he was thinking of the terrible chapter in his life that closed with the death of Mr. Barradine.

Nearly fifteen years ago; yet in all that time, although dwelling so near to the tragic fateful wood, he had been into it only once--and then he had gone there with the hounds and jolly loud-voiced riders, cub-hunting, on a bright September morning. The wood symbolized everything that he wished to forget. And he thought that if he were really a rich man--not a poor little well-to-do trader, but a fabulous millionaire--he'd buy all this woodland, cut down every tree, chase away every shadow, and grow corn in the sunlight. He would buy woodland and parkland too--he would burn Aunt Petherick's hidden cottage, the Abbey with its inner, outer and middle courtyards, yes, and its church also; he would burn and fell, and grub and plough, and then plant the seeds of corn that symbolize the resurrection of life; and the sun should shine on a wide yellow sea, with waves of hope rippling across it as the ripened ears bowed and rose; and there should be no trace or stain to mark the submerged slime that had held corruption and death. Then, if he could do that, he would have nothing to remind him of all he had gone through in the past.

Nothing to remind him?

It made no difference whether the Abbey towers and the North Ride chimneys were visible or invisible; no screen of trees, whether leafless as now or carrying the full weight of foliage, could really screen them from him; they were inside him, together with all that they had once signified, a part of himself. If he did not look at them with introspective eyes, if he ignored their existence, if he succeeded in not thinking of them, there was always something else, inside him or outside him, to carry his thoughts back into the black bad time.

At this moment it was the Orphanage, with its wet red roofs and dripping white verandas. His road took him close in front of it--a lengthy stretch of building composed of a central block that contained the hall and schoolrooms, and two lesser and lower blocks connected by cloisters. He glanced at these blocks--long and low, only a ground floor and an upper story--and noticed the veranda and broad balconies. The girls slept here, as Mavis had told him; the younger in one block and the older in the other block. The whole institution had an air of old-established order and unceasing care; all the paint was new and clean; the gardens and terraces, with hedges and shrubs that had grown high and thick, were beautifully kept; not a weed showed in borders or paths; the copper bell in the belfry turret was so well polished that it seemed to shine, even though no glint of sunlight touched it. As he rode by he heard the sound of children's voices, and, raising himself in his stirrups, looked over the clipped yew hedge that guarded the lower garden from the roadway. A dozen or fifteen small blue-cloaks were romping joyously under one of the verandas, and perhaps twenty of the bigger blue-cloaks were soberly parading two by two in a cloister.

Nothing carried him back so promptly and surely as the sight of these blue-cloaked girls, and scarcely a day ever passed without his seeing them. Two by two they were incessantly tramping the roads for miles round. He could not walk, ride, or drive without meeting them. When he heard their footsteps and knew that they were coming marching by Vine-Pits, he turned his back to the office window, or went into the depths of granary or stable. He had hated that day when Mavis brought them off the road and into the heart of his home.

With the sound of their shrill cries and merry laughter lingering in his ears he rode on.