Part 12

He was near Margaret as he spoke, and she put up her hand and stopped him.

"And you’ve got to drink too, mind," she said. "You’ve done everything as only you could do it. I never did dream of such a wonderful dinner in all my days; and to see all these beautiful wreaths and ribbons on the ceiling! I want to be thanking everybody. ’Tis almost too much kindness."

"Never!" he answered. "If I could put gold and diamonds in the food for you, I would; and them as hung up the adornments never did a bit of work with better appetite."

The wine was opened and poured into thirty glasses.

"There’s only one health, or I should say two in one, to be drunk," explained Mr. Stanbury; "and Mr. Crocker here have kindly consented to do the speechifying."

Mrs. Bowden, rather to her own surprise, grew lachrymose with the dessert. She cheered up, however, when Bartley rose to propose the health of the bride and bridegroom. To the habitually taciturn folk about him, his flow of speech appeared astounding, and not a few agreed that, though Crocker never did any work, yet his native talents were extraordinary and might have led him to any height of achievement.

"Upon my word," admitted the bridegroom’s father, "it can’t be denied that the chap--light-minded though he may be, here and there--has got amazing gifts. In fact, to be honest, he can turn his hand to anything--larn a trade, fight a great fight and run into mouth-speech as easy and flowing as a parson. He’s a wonder--though I say it to your face, ma’am."

He made this handsome criticism to Bartley’s mother, and she explained how that Sheepstor as yet knew but a fraction of the truth concerning her son. That the warrener spoke thus, however, largely warmed Nanny Crocker’s heart after her second glass of brown sherry; and she told Susan later in the day that there was rather more in Elias Bowden than met the eye.

Bartley received a cheer when he rose and a still louder round when he sat down again.

"Ladies and gentlemen," he said, "I beg leave to ask you all to drink long life and happiness to our friends David and Madge Bowden, who this day have joined hands for holy matrimony. I know ’em both and can give them both a very good character, I assure you. As for Madge, she’s just a warm, loving heart on two legs--all heart; and if you want to know what she is, don’t ask her, but ask the old people, and the terrible poor people, and them that be badly off for food and friends. They’ll tell you all about her. But you prosperous people, all sitting around here waiting to have a dash at your sherry--you don’t know nothing about her. She’s a good angel, that’s what Madge Stanbury have been ever since she could run to pick up some baby smaller than herself; and that’s what Madge Bowden will be to her dying day. As for David here, last time him and me met in company, he was the best man, I believe. No use for you to shake your head, David. Bested I was; but to-day I’m the best man and he’ve got to sing second. And I tell him to his face that he’s a right down good chap, and every good man be proud to know him. And, for my part, I think such a lot of David that I’d challenge him to fight again this day three months, but that I very well know what Madge would say about it. Besides, there’s one or two other people in the world besides David to be thought upon, and, though I know ’twould cheer Mr. Shillabeer up a lot if we could get Mr. Fogo down again and have another fight, I’m afraid we’re all too happy to want to go fighting; and we can’t all hope to have David’s luck in the ring and out. Well, he had one brave, beautiful woman in his corner when he fought me; and she helped him to beat me without a doubt; and now he has got another brave, beautiful woman in his corner, and she’ll help him to win whatever battles he may have to fight. And here’s good luck and long life and happiness and content for them and God bless the pair of ’em from this day for ever!"

Everybody rose, and David and Madge in their ignorance also rose, but were thrust back into their seats again. Immense applause welcomed Bartley’s great oratory, but for his part he kept his eyes on one face, while he drank the health that he had proposed. Rhoda, however, did not return the gaze. She had blushed faintly at the sudden allusion to herself and the cheer from the men that punctuated it; but Bartley’s craft and rhetoric quite missed her. The man seemed all of a piece to her: facile, unstable, untrustworthy--and his compliments touched her even less than he imagined. He had prejudiced himself in her eyes for ever, and it remained to be seen whether his own skill and pertinacity would prove strong enough to conquer and destroy that prejudice. It was true, as he had suspected earlier in the day, that her forgiveness was real; but her attitude towards him had been radically changed, or rather radically established, by his outrage. Before the event she had entertained no opinion, good or bad, concerning him. She was henceforth constitutionally unable to regard him as she regarded the bulk of men; and he felt this; but he also felt that he must always interest her; and there is no edifice of emotion that cannot be erected upon permanent foundations of interest.

So he hoped on and when Mr. Charles Moses, to please Mrs. Crocker, and to show the company that others of the hamlet also possessed a pretty gift of words, arose to propose the good health of Bartley himself, he listened in the best possible humour and made a reply that was full of rough and ready fun.

Health drinking became the feature of the wedding feast, despite the fact that it had been intended to eschew it. Everybody found himself or herself toasted, and every man of the company was tempted or chaffed on to his legs in turn. The wine running out, Mr. Shillabeer insisted upon a personal contribution in this sort, and sent a pot-boy for certain claret that had hung fire for some years and yet, owing to intrinsic poverty of nature, could not be said much to improve with age. Nobody liked it as well as the more generous and mellow brown sherry; but the liquid was wine and free of cost: therefore the folk consumed it, thanked the giver and invited him also to say a few words. Several shook their heads at the prospect and foresaw that the ample spectre of Mrs. Shillabeer must instantly rise to cast a chill upon the spirit of the hour; but it was Mr. Bowden himself who urged the host to speak, and Reuben straddled his legs, heaved a mighty sigh, crossed his arms and addressed the company.

"Why for you want me to say anything, Elias Bowden, I’m sure I don’t know; but I must do my share with the rest, I suppose, and I’m sure I hope, as we all hope, that this here wedding will be the beginning of a happy united life for bride and bridegroom. We, as have been in the state and had the fortune to draw a prize, like Mr. and Mrs. Bowden here, and Mr. and Mrs. Stanbury, and Mrs. Crocker, though she’s lost her prop and stay these many years, and me--we know what marriage is. But them as draw a blank, ’tis hidden from them, and the bachelor men and spinster women sprinkled about--they don’t know neither. But perhaps nobody in this company--widows or them as be still happily joined together--ever felt to marriage what I felt to it. Time and again I said to my dead partner that ’twas too good to last, and she’d laugh at me and say I was the sort that always met trouble half way. And I seed her fading out week after week; and I seed the wonnerful bulk of her dwindling; and yet I couldn’t realise what was coming till it did come. The last words she said to me--or rather she whispered ’em, for she was got far beyond speech--the last words was, ’Don’t you take on too much, Reuben. We shall meet again in the Better Land.’ And I’m sure I hope it may be so, though I’m an unworthy creature. And I hope you won’t think that I say these things to cast down any joyful member amongst us. Far from it. I only want for these young people to remember that the more they love, the worst must they suffer if things fall out contrariwise. But whether David goes, or Margaret here be plucked off untimely, ’twill be the joy and gladness of the one that’s left to remember what it was to have a well-loved partner. And so, whatever haps, they’ll never regret this day’s work. And I hope everybody have eaten and drunken to their liking."

Then the bride insisted that Reuben should himself have some dinner.

"If ’twas anybody else proposed it, I should certainly refuse," he said; "but since you want for me to do it, and my inwards are hollow as a drum, I’m quite agreeable to pick a bone and drink a quart."

Bartholomew Stanbury now spoke. He thanked everybody for coming, praised the dinner and the wine, declared it to be the second most joyful day in his life, and explained that the first had been when he himself was married. He confirmed Mr. Shillabeer’s view of matrimony, staggered the publican by advising him to look round and find a second; and concluded by proposing the health of Mr. Charles Moses, who was among the oldest and best thought upon residents of Sheepstor, and who to-day had specially distinguished himself by lending his famous shop for the wedding breakfast. "Free of charge he done it, mind you," explained Mr. Stanbury, "just out of the goodness of his heart he turns all his tools and leather and what not out of this here place, and lets me have it for the feast; and I wish to publicly thank the man afore you, neighbours, and let everybody know the sort he is."

In reply, Mr. Moses, who usually became reminiscent after successful feeding, traced briefly the history of Sheepstor in so far as his own family helped to make that history. In addition to being a staunch Church of England man, Mr. Moses unconsciously subscribed to a still more venerable creed. He worshipped his ancestors, and now detailed the great and picturesque part played by his great-grandfather, his grandfather and his father in the development and elevation of the village.

"Once," said he, "we were merely a little bit of a hamlet at Dartymoor edge, and scarce a man farther off than Tavistock knew ought about us. But my forbears and others like ’em rose up in our midst and toiled and laboured for the good of the town, and each did his appointed part, until--well--all I say is, look at us now! Sheepstor stands as high as any other place of note that ever I heard about in the kingdom, and we be carrying on the good work in the good old way."

With the recollections of Mr. Moses, which were much protracted, light began to wane, and certain prominent members of the party prepared to wend homewards, while yet their wild roads might be seen. All rose, and there began great hand-shaking and well-wishing, together with some laughter and some shedding of tears. Reuben broached a bottle of whisky for the men and tea was brought in for the women. All the young people had long since departed, because the entertainment from their standpoint ended with the eating. Now nearly a score of pipes began to glow, and the wedding guests set out on many roads. The adult Bowdens departed homewards, and Elias carried his wife on his arm and strove to cheer her. Her son, Drake, had unhappily intruded himself largely upon these final emotional moments, and she refused to be comforted. With a quintessential distillation of pessimism worthy of Mrs. Stanbury’s self, Sarah declared that somehow during Mr. Shillabeer’s speech it had been borne in upon her that Margaret’s firstborn would prove a failure.

"Stuff and nonsense--silly woman! ’Tis your digestion," said the master of the Warren House. "I very well knowed how ’twould be when I seed you taking that sour purple muck they call claret atop of the good old-fashioned sherry. No stomach could be expected to endure one on top of t’other, and you’re fairly paid out for it."

Mrs. Stanbury was very silent on the way home, but Bart and his father did the talking. Both assured Constance that the entertainment might be considered absolutely and brilliantly successful from first to last. She, however, expressed a multiplicity of doubts.

"The loin of pork was done to rags, and the stuffing tasted of nought," she said. "’Tis things like that are remembered months after all that went right be quite forgotten. And I hope to God they’ve got the cottage walls dry, and that leak over the ope-way made good. When I was up there a fortnight agone to see the wall-papers, you’d never have said mortals could live in the place inside two weeks."

"Madge vowed ’twas all right when I drove her over with her boxes a bit ago," declared Bart. "The house will be very vitty after they’ve lived in it a week or two."

Of course, the first to leave Sheepstor were bride and bridegroom. In a trap hired from ’The Corner House’ David carried Margaret off to her home. Their possessions were already stored at ’Meavy Cot.’ Fires had been burning for a week and everything was made ready for the married pair.

David’s last words were addressed to Rhoda.

"Mind," he said, "a fortnight from to-day us shall be ready; and I’ll come up to Ditsworthy in my new cart for you and your box. But we all shall meet afore then, no doubt."

He drove his wife away under a wild evening sky, amid blessings and cheers and cries of "Godspeed." Some of the voices were shrill and tearful, some merry, some deep and gruff. The trap trundled along; Madge flashed a white handkerchief; then she and her husband were swallowed up by the roaming, red light that misted under the sunset.

"A happy omen, souls," said Mr. Stanbury. "For the sun have been shining ever since it rose. A cloudless marriage day is all to the good, I believe; and though the sky may offer for rain afore midnight, nought of the day can be marred now."

*CHAPTER V*

*ARRIVAL OF RHODA*

A fortnight after her marriage there came a day when Madge roamed restlessly and rather nervously about her little house. She was very happy, yet with a clouded happiness, because this ideal bliss of dwelling with David alone drew to its close. Real life had yet to begin at ’Meavy Cot,’ and real life included Rhoda Bowden. On this day David started early to fetch his sister. Among his other possessions was a horse and a light cart; and with these he set out in the chill half-light of six o’clock on a November morning for the Warren House.

Now Margaret’s preparations were complete. A dish of cakes kept hot upon the hearth; and aloft in Rhoda’s room the severe simplicity of the rosy-washed walls, low roof and little iron bedstead seemed to echo Rhoda’s maiden mind. But her sister-in-law was not content with the unadorned chamber. She had nailed an illuminated text or two upon the walls; she had hung there also an old grocer’s almanac with a picture of a deerhound’s head upon it, because she thought this portrait of a dog would please Rhoda; and she had made a little bouquet of wild berries and set it with a sprig of ivy in a vase on the chest-of-drawers. A few of Rhoda’s own possessions had already arrived. On the floor of the room lay no carpet; but the white deal boarding was broken by some skins--black, brindled and tawny. These memorials were all that remained of certain defunct dogs who had owned Rhoda as mistress during their bustling and eventful lives. She was wont to preserve the pelt of any special favourite; and her nature received a placid satisfaction in possession and use of these remains. The rough coats that had often-times received caress or chastisement as occasion demanded, now felt only her naked feet at morn and evening.

Margaret began to fear for the tea, but David was a punctual man, and at five minutes past the appointed time a light flashed in the outer darkness, a cart creaked and jolted over the rough way, a dog barked and Rhoda’s deep tones answered it. She was soon beside Margaret, and they shook hands and kissed affectionately.

"Come and see your room," said Madge, "while David puts up the horse and cart. I’m afraid you was jolted a bit at the finish. The new road round the hill be terrible rough travelling for wheels."

Rhoda was not cheerful and had little to say. She produced some parcels and one from Mrs. Bowden; but it seemed that some trouble sat upon her. She brightened up, however, on reaching her room and much admired it.

"Like your kind heart to think of all these things," she said.

"You’ll see the sun of a fine morning rise ’twixt Hessary and Cramber," explained Margaret. "And I’m afraid the noise of the waterfall may keep you waking a bit till you’m used to it. ’Tis quiet to-night, but after heavy rain Meavy comes down like thunder."

"Nought keeps me awake," declared Rhoda. She altered the position of the fragments on the floor. "That was the best collie ever I had," she said, drawing a black and orange skin to her bedside; "a terrible fine dog, and only in his prime when he died. Father said he was going mad, though I never thought it. However, he was queer and snapped at the childer in a way very unlike himself, and father would not risk it, but put a charge of shot into his head when I was out of the way. You’d hardly believe it, Madge, but I cried! On my honour I cried--and a girl of near eighteen at the time."

Rhoda had brought a few of her special treasures and Margaret now helped her to arrange them to advantage. Her library was trifling and included a Bible and prayer-book, an anthology of verses, which Madge saw for the first time and felt astonishment at seeing, and a work on canine diseases.

"You can have they rhymes if you’ve got any use for them," said Rhoda. "They was given me by my gossip, old Martha Moon, when I was confirmed, but I don’t understand poetry, though you may."

Then Rhoda admired the dog almanac, and she was still doing so when David’s voice below brought the women down together.

He was thirsty and wanted his tea.

Rhoda produced one of the famous Bowden cakes, famed alike for size and wealth of ingredients; but the meal, while lacking nothing of goodness, warmth and variety, awoke no answering glow in the master’s mind. He was clearly troubled, and Rhoda’s passing brightness also gave place to a taciturn demeanour before her brother’s concern. Margaret thereupon rated David and he explained his annoyance.

"What ever has come over you?" she asked. "So glumpy and glowry as you are! What’s amiss with him, Rhoda? But I’ll wager I know. It all looked so cosy and homelike at the Warren House that David felt homesick and didn’t want to came back to me!"

David was bound to laugh at this absurd theory.

"Homesick!" he said. "I’m only homesick when I’m out of the sight of our brave chimney; and well you know it."

"’Tis Dorcas," explained Rhoda. "She’s giving mother and father a lot of trouble for the minute. She’ll see sense come presently, we’ll hope."

"Billy Screech?"

Rhoda nodded.

"She’ll come round; but for some cause us common folk can’t fathom, she’s in love with the man. So she says, anyhow, though ’tis hard to believe it."

"As to that," declared Margaret, "Billy ban’t particular ugly. He’ve got a long, sharp nose, I grant you--"

"Yes," interrupted David, "and he’ve been told to keep that nose away from the Warren House; and the mischief is he won’t obey father’s commands. Two nights agone the moon was full, and Rhoda went out for to breathe the air and see if there was a fox down by the fowl-house. And a fox there was--long nose and all, and his name was Billy Screech."

He looked at his sister and she continued the narrative.

"I hate spying," she said, "and God, He knows I didn’t go afield to seek that man, or any other man. And I thought Dorcas was to bed, for she’d gone off after supper with a faceache. But travelling quick and silent, as my way is, over the close surf of the warrens, I came round a rock right on top of ’em. And--" Rhoda grew hot at the unpleasant recollection and broke off.

"And he was sitting on a stone, and she was sitting on his lap," said David, who spared his sister the details. "Little red-headed fool! I wish I’d found ’em, for I’d have thrashed the man to jelly afore her eyes, and cured her that way."

"What did you do, Rhoda?" asked Margaret.

"I made her come in. As her elder sister I had the right. She wasn’t in the least ashamed of herself seemingly. I boxed her ears, when the man had gone, and she forgot herself and tried to bite my hand."

"She’s like a rat in a trap over this business," said David. "Never would you have guessed or dreamed ’twas in her to show her teeth so."

"All laughter and silly jokes till this miserable man came after her," continued his sister. "And now--I blush for her. ’Tis very horrid and shameful to think that any girl can demean herself so."

David here left the room and Madge continued to Rhoda.

"She feels ’tis her great chance for a home of her own, I expect. Us all gets that hope sometimes, so why not Dorcas?"

But the other did not sympathise with this theory.

"Us don’t all feel it," she declared. "A many women never do. And if all of us was to marry, the work of the world would stand still. There’s a great deal for free women to do that nobody else can do so well as them; and it seems to me that the first thing a female does, after she’s brought childer into the world, be to look about and try to find an unmarried woman to help her do her work. There’s scores of spinsters spending their lives messing about with their sisters’ babbies."

"Babbies ban’t everything, I grant that," said Margaret; but she said it doubtfully. In her heart children certainly took the first place. Indeed, Madge felt a little guilty of being untrue to herself in the last sentiment. Therefore she modified it.

"All the same, they mean a lot to most women, and I long for ’em cruel and ban’t ashamed to say it."

"The likes of you would; and so do David; and when they come, you’ll want for me to look after some young things beside puppies," said Rhoda. She smiled, but did not laugh. There was a saying at Warren House that none had ever heard her laugh.

"As to that," answered her sister-in-law, boldly, "you talk like an old maid a’ready, and you but a few and twenty. We’ll soon larn you different! When you see what ’tis to have a li’l home of your very own, and a man of your very own, I’m sure you’ll begin to find that marriage is good. Now come and look at my parlour and tell me if there’s not something there that you’d wish away."

She lighted a candle and exhibited the glory of her best room to Rhoda’s gaze.

"’Tis everything it should be, and you’ve arranged it beautiful, I’m sure," declared Rhoda; "and the presents do look better far than they did afore. This here, that me and Sophia bought for you"--she indicated a little looking-glass in an ornate gold frame--"why, it’s ever so much finer than ever I thought it in the shop at Tavistock where we bought it; and father’s sideboard do look splendid."

"You must see the pictures by daylight," said Madge. "They be proper painted pictures that David picked up in a sale. He got the four for seven shillings, and the auctioneer said the frames were worth the money."

Rhoda admired very heartily and again congratulated Margaret on her skill and taste.

"What should I wish away?" she asked. "I can’t sec nothing that isn’t just where it should be, I’m sure."

"Look round again."

But the other, after a further scrutiny, only shook her head.