“You mustn’t put it like that,” she said, “for it isn’t the case. It was quite a selfish pleasure. I was all alone. And it began by his being dreadfully ill.”
“What — Georgie?”
“Yes, and I was able to nurse him a little. And after that we couldn’t do without each other. But now we shall have to try.”
He had looked at her with the last quick question, and was looking still, a new anxiety in his eyes.
“Do you mean that you are going away?” he said; and his tone did not conceal his disappointment.
“I am sorry to say I am,” replied Gwynneth, feeling all she said.
“Soon?”
“To-morrow.”
“Far?”
“Abroad.”
“But not for long!”
“A year.”
Her eyes fell at last before the frank trouble in his; and he ended the pause with a sigh. “I am very sorry,” he said. “I was hoping that you would often bring him here to see me.” Nor was any compliment taken or intended in a speech which rang with the primitive sincerity of one who had spoken very little for a very long time.
Gwynneth took the short step that brought her to the opening of the shed. She had suddenly discovered that the rain had never ceased pattering on the corrugated roof, and was wondering when the shower would stop. She wished it was fair, for more reasons than one. It was high time she took Georgie away; and she did not know what Musk would say when he heard where they had been. She only knew his opinion of parsons generally, and of all that they professed, though she had once heard him allow that they were not all as bad as this one. Besides, even Gwynneth felt natural qualms in the society of an outcast whom no one else went near, quite apart from the popular conviction that he had burnt his own church to the ground. That she had never believed. And now, when she found him all but at his work; when she saw him at close quarters, aged and bent, with tattered clothes and battered hands, yet handsome as ever, and now picturesque; and when she looked upon the gigantic work that had aged him, the finished wall here, the deliberate preparations there; then that old calumny was blown to final shreds for Gwynneth. He might have done worse, as she had sometimes heard said, but he had not done that. And the woman went to work within her: was there nothing she could do for him? Was there no little luxury she could get and send him? His clothes were torn — if only she could mend them! Alas! that she was going abroad next day.
Another moment and she was glad: how could she do anything, a young girl, when all the rest of the world held aloof? Anything that she did, or tried to do, would inevitably, if not rightly and properly, be misconstrued. Yet, after this, it would be too painful to live so near and to go on doing nothing. She had felt that long ago; and the memory of their last encounter reoccupied her thoughts. No, she could do no more now than she had been able to do then. Therefore she was glad to be going away. And all this passed through her mind in the mere minute that elapsed before the rain stopped as suddenly as it had begun.
Yet in that minute Robert Carlton had got Georgie back upon his knee, and Gwynneth caught him trying to extract a promise from the child; in another he had risen, a duskier bronze than before, and was telling her honestly what the promise was to have been.
“I wanted him to come again to see me finish that head, but not to tell his grandparents where he was going, or they would not let him. You see, I am ashamed of it already! Make allowances for one who has not spoken to either woman or child for very nearly four years.”
Gwynneth was deeply moved.
“Allowances,” she could but repeat; “allowances!”
“Allow’nces, allow’nces!” chimed Georgie, to whom a new word was necessarily humorous.
Carlton picked him up, and kissed him lightly for the last time. To Gwynneth he only bowed. And she was longing to take his hand.
“Good-bye, Miss Gleed; a good journey and a happy time to you.”
Gwynneth had to say something, since she could do nothing, to show her sympathy. “I think it’s all wonderful — wonderful!” was all she did say, with a little wave towards the sandstone walls. And yet her small speech haunted her for weeks, seeming in turns so many things that she had never meant it to be.
Georgie also waved with energy. “Good-bye, good-bye, I’ll see you in the mornin’!” was his irresponsible farewell.
And so they disappeared together, as the sun shone again through the trees with the emerald tips, now dripping diamonds too; but to Robert Carlton that little scene of his endless labours, the shed, the strewed stones, the barrow, the rising walls, the blossoming chestnuts, the jewelled elms, had never looked so drab and desolate before.
Yet, long after it was really dark, the lonely man still hovered about the spot, now standing where the child had stood with his brown pinafore and his browner legs; now sitting empty-kneed in the empty barrow; now handling the rough stone head that he had hewn in a few minutes for little Georgie.
XXIII
DESIGN AND ACCIDENT
Next morning he was early at his arch, and had soon finished the voussoir which he had been roughing out when this vital interruption occurred. But he was not satisfied with the stone, and wasted much time in turning it over and over and wondering whether it would do or not. Now this was a point upon which Carlton usually knew his mind in a twinkling. Indecision of any sort was, indeed, among the last of his failings; but that man is not himself who has not closed an eye all night; and Robert Carlton had only closed his in prayer.
Later in the morning his case was worse. He would think of the boy until the chisel went too deep and spoilt another stone. Or, just when he was beginning to get on, he would drop his tools and wheel round suddenly, half hoping to see a second little apparition in a sailor hat with the brim turned down. But these things do not happen twice, much less when looked and longed for, as Carlton knew very well. And yet his knowledge did not help him in the matter; on the other hand, it drove him again and again to his gate, to gaze wistfully up and down the road he never traversed; and this was the most disastrous habit of all.
Once more the work stood still; for the first time in three whole years, it stood practically still for days.
Meanwhile, at the Flint House, there had never been any secret as to what had happened between showers at the church. Gwynneth had told Mrs. Musk, and Mrs. Musk had deemed it better to tell Jasper himself than to let him gather the truth from Georgie’s prattle. And in the event Musk took it better than his wife had dared to hope, merely vilifying quick and dead with renewed rancour, and grimly undertaking that the incident should not occur again.
So Georgie saw more of his grandfather than he had ever seen before, and rather more than he cared to see after his close association with Gwynneth, whose wonderful letter from Leipzig was small comfort to so small a soul, though Mrs. Musk had to read it to Georgie many times a day.
“Oh! I wish I would go and see workman,” the boy would exclaim without fear. “I wish I would! I wish I would!”
“I daresay you do,” Jasper would growl from his chair.
“Then can I; can I, I say, grand-daddy?”
“No, you can’t.”
“Oh! why can’t I?”
“Because I tell you.”
“But, you see, grand-daddy, he was making me such a lovely, lovely face. I must go back for it. Really I must. He did say he finish fen I go back. So of course I must go. See? See? See?”
Thus pestered, Jasper once thundered:
“Oh, yes, I see! I know him — I know him. I see hard enough! But if ever you do go I’ll — I’ll — I’ll give ye what ye never had afore and’ll never want again!”
“Oh, don’t be angry wif me,” Georgie whimpered. “Oh, I wish my lady would come back!”
“I daresay you do,” said Jasper, calming. “And I don’t.”
But a child forgets; at all events Georgie did; and so surely as his ennui in the garden, within strict sight of the terrible old man in the chair, reached a ce
rtain pitch, so surely did the treasonable aspiration rise to his innocent lips.
“I wish I would go and see workman. I wish I would!”
But at last one day the old man rose, stick and all; and at this even Georgie trembled; for it was long since he had seen his grandfather on his feet. Over the grass he came hobbling, ungainly, abnormal, frowning down upon the buttercups. Georgie crept aside. But Musk passed him without a word. Three times he limped the length of the overgrown lawn, muttering, frowning; and the third time his lameness was palpably less.
“Why, Jasper,” cried Mrs. Musk, running out, “you’re getting better!”
“No, I ain’t,” he roared. “You mind your own business and get away indoors.”
Mrs. Musk was meekly obeying, and Georgie escaping at her skirt, when a second roar recalled the child. Jasper was leaning with both hands on the stick before him, his frown gone, but in its place a surely devilish smile, since the child mistook it for the real thing.
“So you’re still longun to go back and see the workman, as you call him, at the church?”
“Oh, yes, I are!”
And round eyes kindled at the thought.
“Very well. You may.”
Georgie could scarcely believe his ears.
“Fen may I? Now? Now, I say?”
“When you like, so long as you don’t bother me.”
Georgie jumped and shouted in his joy.
“Goin’ to see workman, goin’ to see workman! Oh, my Jove, my Jove! Goin’ to see workman makin’ lovely, lovely faces all for me — every bit!”
“Hold your noise,” said Jasper, roughly; “and go, if you’re going.”
Carlton had given up expecting him, divining at last that Musk knew of their one interview, and would never let them have another. So once more Georgie surprised him at his work; but this time he had to hail his friend; for now Carlton was making up for lost time, and at the moment, up on a scaffolding, was all absorbed in the exciting task of fitting the finished voussoirs over the wooden centre which supported the arch until the keystone should complete it. And the keystone was actually in one hand, a trowel full of mortar in the other, when the first sound of Georgie’s voice drove all else from his mind.
“I say, I say, I say!” he ran up shouting. “Workman, workman!”
But now the workman was only collecting himself, and thanking God with quivering lips, before he could trust himself upon his ladder.
“So here you are at last,” he said, swinging the child off his legs without endearment. Yet all his being yearned towards the merry independent little boy. The straight strong legs seemed browner and rounder already. It might have been the same holland pinafore; it was the same sailor hat.
“Yes, here I are,” said Georgie, “and I wish you would make lovely, lovely faces out of bwick.”
“Not run away again, I hope?”
“No, ‘cos I came by my own self.”
Carlton asked no more questions. Any minute the child might be missed and sent for; every moment was precious meanwhile. It was a heavenly day in early June, the elms in full leaf at last against the blue, the churchyard dappled with light and shade, the fresh sandstone yellow as gold where the sun caught it fairly. And in the sunlight stood its own incarnation — sturdy champion of the golden age — laughing child of June.
Carlton could see nothing else.
“Come on, I say,” urged Georgie; “come an’ make faces, quick, sharp!”
And he dragged the sculptor to his rude studio.
“There it is, there it is,” shouted Georgie, spying the unfinished head high up on the shelf. “You did say you finish fen I come back. Finish — finish — quick, sharp!”
Carlton brought the thing outside, for the shed was close, and went to work at the foot of his ladder, with Georgie sitting on the lowest rung. And any merit which the rough attempt had possessed was speedily removed by an over-elaboration on which Georgie insisted, and which certainly served its purpose by earning his vociferous applause.
“Oh, his eyes! What funny eyes! Make them open and shut, I say — can you?”
A doll, which Gwynneth had unearthed, before she knew her Georgie very well, had retained this accomplishment even when the head was off its body.
“I’m afraid I can’t do that,” said Carlton.
“Try — try.”
So Carlton gouged in the soft stone till the holes for the eyeballs had disappeared.
“Now open them again!”
And fresh holes were made: they were the most sunken eyes ever seen before Georgie was tired of the game. Next he must have ears, which were supposed to be concealed by the very heavy head of hair; and when the ears arrived, they were not worth having without ear-rings; but there the sculptor was nonplussed, and struck.
“All right,” said Georgie, cheerfully; “then I’ll carry it home without.”
“What, run away directly it’s done?”
The cold-blooded ingratitude of infancy was new to Carlton, as his hurt face was to Georgie, who eyed it with some compassion.
“All right,” said he; “I’ll stay a little bit if you like.”
“And sit on my knee, Georgie.”
“All right.”
But there was no sentiment about Georgie to-day; it was mere magnanimity, and he showed it.
“Quite comfy, Georgie?”
“No,” sighed the boy, screwing about on the one thin thigh; “I think it’s only a little comfy.”
“That better?”
And, the other leg being slipped under his small person, Georgie said it was.
“Are you sure, Georgie, that you want to take that head home at all?”
“Course I are,” said Georgie, decidedly. “I must take it, you see; course I must.”
Carlton was again tormented by the ignoble inclination which he had overcome by impulse rather than by will at the last interview. Was a child of four too young to keep a secret? If only this one could be induced to go and come back, and back, and back, without ever saying a word to anybody! The proposition had shamed him before; and did now; but the new love within him was stronger than his shame.
“You wouldn’t show it,” suggested Carlton, “to your grandfather, would you?”
“Course I’ll show it to him,” said Georgie, for whom the stipulation was too oblique.
“But he’ll be angry!”
“Course he won’t,” said Georgie, more superior than ever, and with the air of one who does not care to argue any more.
“But you know he was before,” said Carlton, drawing his bow.
“Oh, bovver!” exclaimed Georgie, losing patience. “Well, then, he won’t be angry to-day, I know he won’t.”
“How do you know, Georgie?”
“‘Cos he did tell me I could come.”
“Not here?”
Georgie nodded solemnly.
“Yes, he did. I know he did.”
What could it mean? The child was strangely dependable for his years; indeed, it was impossible to look in those great and candid eyes and to doubt the testimony of the equally candid little tongue. Then what could it mean? Had Musk relented? Was he relenting? Carlton’s heart leapt at the thought, and with his heart his eyes; and in the same second he had his answer.
Close at hand in the sunlight, where Georgie had stood last, brimming over with delight, there now stood Jasper Musk himself, huge with hate, livid with rage, vindictive, remorseless — but not surprised. Carlton saw this at the first glance, in the triumphant lightning flashing from the fixed eyes, and playing over the heavy, grim, inexorable face. And that was his answer; furthermore it prepared him for all, and more than all, that was to come.
“Put the boy down,” said Jasper Musk, with sinister self-control.
Instinctively the child slipped to the ground; but there his courage failed him, so that he turned his back upon the terrible old man, and hid his face in the lap that he had left.
“Come here, George!”
But Carlton held him firmly with both hands.
Musk bore down on them in a series of little shuffling steps, his great face wincing with the pain of each. His voice had already risen; now it was so terrible to hear, so hoarse and high with passion, that in an instant Carlton had his thumbs in the small boy’s ears.
“Snivelling hypocrite! Whited sepulchre! Do you hand the child over to me, or I’ll break this stick across your back. So I’ve caught ye, temptun him here to make up to him behind my back! But you don’t — no, you don’t — not while I’m alive to stop that. He’s nothun to you and you’re nothun to him, and do you meddle with him again at your peril. I’ve taken the trouble to learn the law of it, so I know. God damn ye! will you take your hands off him, or am I to break your blasted head?”
“You can do what you like,” said Carlton; “but the boy shall not hear you using that language to me. So you will never get a better opportunity than you have.” And his nostrils curled as he bent his defenceless head over that of the boy, and pressed a little harder with his thumbs.
The other gnashed his teeth, and his great hand tightened on his stick. But he could not strike like that. And his enemy knew it; trust him to know when he was safe!
“I’m not going to prison for ye,” said Musk, “if that’s what you want. I daresay you’d think that worth a crack on the head to get me locked up for a bit; well, then, you shan’t. Do you leave go o’ the kid, and I won’t swear no more.”
The effort at self-control was plain enough, as Carlton looked up, without complying all at once.
“One moment,” he said. “You sent him here yourself, I think?”
“What, the child?”
“Yes.”
“I didn’t send him. He was pestering me to come. So at last I gave him leave to do as he liked.”
“In order that you might follow and abuse me in front of him!”
“I’ll tell no lies,” said Musk, sturdily. “I meant to let him hear what I thought of you, and I won’t deny it.”
Carlton looked a little longer upon the broad face between the steely bristles and the silvery hair; it had aged nothing in these years which had been as twenty to himself; and for the moment there was all the old rugged dignity in its independent purpose and honest unrelenting hate. A bargain had been in Carlton’s mind, but at the last he decided to trust his enemy instead.
Complete Works of E W Hornung Page 201