CHAPTER XXX
PATERNAL DISCIPLINE
"The Fair, Free, and Frisky"--as they called themselves, were not ofa violent order at all, neither treasonable, nor even disloyal. TheirClub, if it deserved the name, had not been of political, social, oreven convivial intention, but had lapsed unawares into all three uses,and most of all that last mentioned. The harder the times are, the moreconfidential (and therefore convivial) do Englishmen become; and ifFree-trade survives with us for another decade, it will be the death oftotal abstinence. But now they had bad times, without Free-trade--thatGoddess being still in the goose-egg--and when two friends met, withouta river between them, they were bound to drink one another's health, anddid it, without the unstable and cold-blooded element. The sense of thisduty was paramount among the "Free and Frisky," and without it theirfinal cause would have vanished long ago, and therewith their formalone.
None of the old-established folk of the blue blood of Springhaven,such as the Tugwells, the Shankses, the Praters, the Bowleses, theStickfasts, the Blocks, or the Kedgers, would have anything to dowith this Association, which had formed itself among them, likean anti-corn-law league, for the destruction of their rights andproperties. Its origin had been commercial, and its principlesaggressive, no less an outrage being contemplated than the purchase offish at low figures on the beach, and the speedy distribution of thatslippery ware among the nearest villages and towns. But from timeimmemorial the trade had been in the hands of a few staunch factors,who paid a price governed by the seasons and the weather, and sentthe commodity as far as it would go, with soundness, and the hope offreshness. Springhaven believed that it supplied all London, and wasproud and blest in so believing. With these barrowmen, hucksters andpedlars of fish, it would have no manifest dealing; but if the factorswho managed the trade chose to sell their refuse or surplus to them,that was their own business. In this way perhaps, and by bargains onthe sly, these petty dealers managed to procure enough to carry ontheir weekly enterprise, and for a certain good reason took a room andcourt-yard handy to the Darling Arms, to discuss other people's businessand their own. The good reason was that they were not allowed to leavethe village, with their barrows or trucks or baskets, until the nighthad fallen, on penalty of being pelted with their own wares. Such wasthe dignity of this place, and its noble abhorrence of anything low.
The vision of lofty institutions, which one may not participate,inspires in the lower human nature more jealousy than admiration.These higglers may have been very honest fellows, in all but pecuniaryquestions, and possibly continued to be so in the bosom of their ownfamilies. But here in Springhaven, by the force of circumstances theywere almost compelled to be radicals: even as the sweetest cow's milkturns sour, when she can just reach red clover with her breath, butnot her lips. But still they were not without manners, and reason, andgood-will to people who had patience with them. This enabled them toargue lofty questions, without black eyes, or kicking, or even tweak ofnoses; and a very lofty question was now before them.
To get once into Admiral Darling's employment was to obtain a vestedinterest; so kind was his nature and so forgiving, especially when hehad scolded anybody. Mr. Swipes, the head gardener for so many years,held an estate of freehold in the garden--although he had no head, andwould never be a gardener, till the hanging gardens of Babylon shouldbe hung on the top of the tower of Babel--with a vested remainder to hisson, and a contingent one to all descendants. Yet this man, althoughhis hands were generally in his pockets, had not enough sense of theirlinings to feel that continuance, usage, institution, orderly sequence,heredity, and such like, were the buttons of his coat and the texture ofhis breeches, and the warmth of his body inside them. Therefore he nevercould hold aloof from the Free and Frisky gatherings, and accepted thechair upon Bumper-nights, when it was a sinecure benefice.
This was a Bumper-night, and in the chair sat Mr. Swipes, discharginggracefully the arduous duties of the office, which consisted mainlyin calling upon members for a speech, a sentiment, or a song, and indefault of mental satisfaction, bodily amendment by a pint all round.But as soon as Dan Tugwell entered the room, the Free and Friskies withone accord returned to loftier business. Mr. Swipes, the gay Liber ofthe genial hour, retired from the chair, and his place was taken by aLiberal--though the name was not yet invented--estranged from his owngodfather. This was a hard man, who made salt herrings, and longed tocure everything fresh in the world.
Dan, being still a very tender youth, and quite unaccustomed to publicspeaking, was abashed by these tokens of his own importance, andheartily wished that he had stopped at home. It never occurred tohis simple mind that his value was not political, but commercial; not"anthropological," but fishy, the main ambition of the Free and FriskyClub having long been the capture of his father. If once Zeb Tugwellcould be brought to treat, a golden era would dawn upon them, and aboundless vision of free-trade, when a man might be paid for refusing tosell fish, as he now is for keeping to himself his screws. Dan knew notthese things, and his heart misgave him, and he wished that he had neverheard of the twenty-eight questions set down in his name for solution.
However, his disturbance of mind was needless, concerning those greatissues. All the members, except the chairman, had forgotten all aboutthem; and the only matter they cared about was to make a new member ofDaniel. A little flourish went on about large things (which nobody knew,or cared to know), then the table was hammered with the heel of a pipe,and Dan was made a Free and Frisky. An honorary member, with nothing topay, and the honour on their side, they told him; and every man rose,with his pot in one hand and his pipe in the other, yet able to stand,and to thump with his heels, being careful. Then the President madeentry in a book, and bowed, and Dan was requested to sign it. In thefervour of good-will, and fine feeling, and the pride of popularity, theyoung man was not old enough to resist, but set his name down firmly.Then all shook hands with him, and the meeting was declared to befestive, in honour of a new and noble member.
It is altogether wrong to say--though many people said it--that youngDan Tugwell was even a quarter of a sheet in the wind, when he steeredhis way home. His head was as solid as that of his father; which,instead of growing light, increased in specific, generic, anddifferential gravity, under circumstances which tend otherwise, with anage like ours, that insists upon sobriety, without allowing practice.All Springhaven folk had long practice in the art of keeping sober, andif ever a man walked with his legs outside his influence, it was alwaysfrom defect of proper average quite lately.
Be that as it may, the young man came home with an enlarged map of thefuture in his mind, a brisk and elastic rise in his walk, and his headmuch encouraged to go on with liberal and indescribable feelings. Inaccordance with these, he expected his mother to be ready to embracehim at the door, while a saucepan simmered on the good-night of thewood-ash, with just as much gentle breath of onion from the cover as ayouth may taste dreamily from the lips of love. But oh, instead of this,he met his father, spread out and yet solid across the doorway, withvery large arms bare and lumpy in the gleam of a fireplace uncrowned byany pot. Dan's large ideas vanished, like a blaze without a bottom.
"Rather late, Daniel," said the captain of Springhaven, with a nod ofhis great head, made gigantic on the ceiling. "All the rest are abed,the proper place for honest folk. I suppose you've been airning money,overtime?"
"Not I," said Dan; "I work hard enough all day. I just looked in at theClub, and had a little talk of politics."
"The Club, indeed! The stinking barrow-grinders! Did I tell you, or didI forget to tell you, never to go there no more?"
"You told me fast enough, father; no doubt about that. But I am notaboard your boat, when I happen on dry land, and I am old enough now tohave opinions of my own."
"Oh, that's it, is it? And to upset all the State, the King, the Houseof Lords, and the Parliamentary House, and all as is descended from theRomans? Well, and what did their Wusships say to you? Did they anointyou king of slooshings?"
"Father, they did this--and you have a right to know it;" Dan spoke witha grave debative tone, though his voice became doubtful, as he saw thathis father was quietly seeking for something; "almost before I knew whatwas coming, they had made me a member, and I signed the book. They haveno desire to upset the kingdom; I heard no talk of that kind; only thatevery man should have his own opinions, and be free to show what can besaid for them. And you know, father, that the world goes on by reason,and justice, and good-will, and fair play--"
"No, it don't," cried the captain, who had found what he wanted; "ifit had to wait for they, it would never go on at all. It goes on bygovernment, and management, and discipline, and the stopping of younkersfrom their blessed foolery, and by the ten commandments, and theproverbs of King Solomon. You to teach your father how the world goeson! Off with your coat, and I'll teach you."
"Father," said Dan, with his milder nature trembling at the sternresolution in his father's eyes, as the hearth-fire flashing up showedtheir stronger flash, "you will never do such a thing, at my age andsize?"
"Won't I?" answered Zebedee, cracking in the air the three knottedtails of the stout hempen twist. "As for your age, why, it ought to knowbetter; and as for your size, why, the more room for this!"
It never came into Daniel's head that he should either resist or runaway. But into his heart came the deadly sense of disgrace at beingflogged, even by his own father, at full age to have a wife and evenchildren of his own.
"Father," he said, as he pulled off his coat and red striped shirt, andshowed his broad white back, "if you do this thing, you will never seteyes on my face again--so help me God!"
"Don't care if I don't," the captain shouted. "You was never son ofmine, to be a runagate, and traitor. How old be you, Master Free andFrisky, to larn me how the world goes on?"
"As if you didn't know, father! The fifteenth of last March I was twentyyears of age."
"Then one for each year of your life, my lad, and another to make aman of thee. This little tickler hath three tails; seven threes istwenty-one--comes just right."
When his father had done with him, Dan went softly up the dark staircaseof old ship timber, and entering his own little room, struck a light.He saw that his bed was turned down for him, by the loving hand of hismother, and that his favourite brother Solomon, the youngest of theTugwell race, was sleeping sweetly in the opposite cot. Then he caught aside view of his own poor back in the little black-framed looking-glass,and was quite amazed; for he had not felt much pain, neither flinched,nor winced, nor spoken. In a moment self-pity did more than pain,indignation, outrage, or shame could do; it brought large tears into hissoftened eyes, and a long sob into his swelling throat.
He had borne himself like a man when flogged; but now he behaved inthe manner of a boy. "He shall never hear the last of this job," hemuttered, "as long as mother has a tongue in her head." To this end hefilled a wet sponge with the red proofs of his scourging, laid it whereit must be seen, and beside it a leaf torn from his wage-book, on whichhe had written with a trembling hand: "He says that I am no son of his,and this looks like it. Signed, Daniel Tugwell, or whatever my nameought to be."
Then he washed and dressed with neat's-foot oil all of his wounds thathe could reach, and tied a band of linen over them, and, in spite ofincreasing smarts and pangs, dressed himself carefully in his Sundayclothes. From time to time he listened for his father's step, inasmuchas there was no bolt to his door, and to burn a light so late wasagainst all law. But nobody came to disturb him; his mother at the endof the passage slept heavily, and his two child-sisters in the roomclose by, Tabby and Debby, were in the land of dreams, as far goneas little Solly was. Having turned out his tools from their flat flagbasket, or at least all but three or four favourites, he filled it withother clothes likely to be needed, and buckled it over his hatchet-head.Then the beating of his heart was like a flail inside a barn, as hestole along silently for one terrible good-bye.
This was to his darling pet of all pets, Debby, who worshipped thisbrother a great deal more than she worshipped her heavenly Father;because, as she said to her mother, when rebuked--"I can see Dan,mother, but I can't see Him. Can I sit in His lap, mother, and lookinto His face, and be told pretty stories, and eat apples all the time?"Tabby was of different grain, and her deity was Tim; for she was ofthe Tomboy kind, and had no imagination. But Debby was enough to make asound and seasoned heart to ache, as she lay in her little bed, withthe flush of sleep deepening the delicate tint of her cheeks, sheddingbright innocence fresh from heaven on the tranquil droop of eyelid andthe smiling curve of lip. Her hair lay fluttered, as if by play with theangels that protected her; and if she could not see her heavenly Father,it was not because she was out of His sight.
A better tear than was ever shed by self-pity, or any other selfishness,ran down the cheek she had kissed so often, and fell upon her coaxing,nestling neck. Then Dan, with his candle behind the curtain, set a longlight kiss upon the forehead of his darling, and with a heart so full,and yet so empty, took one more gaze at her, and then was gone. With thebasket in his hand, he dropped softly from his window upon the pileof seaweed at the back of the house--collected to make the wallswholesome--and then, caring little what his course might be, was ledperhaps by the force of habit down the foot-path towards the beach. Solate at night, it was not likely that any one would disturb him there,and no one in the cottage which he had left would miss him before themorning. The end of October now was near, the nights were long, and heneed not hurry. He might even lie down in his favourite boat, the bestof her size in Springhaven, the one he had built among the rabbits.There he could say good-bye to all that he had known and loved so long,and be off before dawn, to some place where he might earn his crust andthink his thoughts.
Springhaven: A Tale of the Great War Page 30