by J. M. Barrie
CHAPTER IX
GALLANT BEHAVIOUR OF T. SANDYS
There were now no fewer than three men engaged, each in his own way,in the siege of Grizel, nothing in common between them except insultedvanity. One was a broken fellow who took for granted that shepreferred to pass him by in the street. His bow was also an apology toher for his existence. He not only knew that she thought him whollydespicable, but agreed with her. In the long ago (yesterday, forinstance) he had been happy, courted, esteemed; he had even esteemedhimself, and so done useful work in the world. But she had flung himto earth so heavily that he had made a hole in it out of which hecould never climb. There he lay damned, hers the glory of destroyinghim--he hoped she was proud of her handiwork. That was one ThomasSandys, the one, perhaps, who put on the velvet jacket in the morning.But it might be number two who took that jacket off at night. He wasa good-natured cynic, vastly amused by the airs this little girl puton before a man of note, and he took a malicious pleasure in lettingher see that they entertained him. He goaded her intentionally intoexpressions of temper, because she looked prettiest then, and trifledwith her hair (but this was in imagination only), and called her aquaint child (but this was beneath his breath). The third--he might bethe one who wore the jacket--was a haughty boy who was not only donewith her for ever, but meant to let her see it. (His soul cried, Oh,oh, for a conservatory and some of society's darlings, and Grizel atthe window to watch how he got on with them!) And now that I think ofit, there was also a fourth: Sandys, the grave author, whose life (intwo vols. 8vo.) I ought at this moment to be writing, without a wordabout the other Tommies. They amused him a good deal. When they weredoing something big he would suddenly appear and take a note of it.
The boy, who was stiffly polite to her (when Tommy was angry he becamevery polite), told her that he had been invited to the Spittal, theseat of the Rintoul family, and that he understood there were somecharming girls there.
"I hope you will like them," Grizel said pleasantly.
"If you could see how they will like me!" he wanted to reply; but ofcourse he could not, and unfortunately there was no one by to say itfor him. Tommy often felt this want of a secretary.
The abject one found a glove of Grizel's, that she did not know shehad lost, and put it in his pocket. There it lay, unknown to her. Heknew that he must not even ask them to bury it with him in his grave.This was a little thing to ask, but too much for him. He saw hiseffects being examined after all that was mortal of T. Sandys had beenconsigned to earth, and this pathetic little glove coming to light.Ah, then, then Grizel would know! By the way, what would she haveknown? I am sure I cannot tell you. Nor could Tommy, forced to facethe question in this vulgar way, have told you. Yet, whatever it was,it gave him some moist moments. If Grizel saw him in this mood, herreproachful look implied that he was sentimentalizing again. Howlittle this chit understood him!
The man of the world sometimes came upon the glove in his pocket, andlaughed at it, as such men do when they recall their callow youth. Hetook walks with Grizel without her knowing that she accompanied him;or rather, he let her come, she was so eager. In his imagination (forbright were the dreams of Thomas!) he saw her looking longingly afterhim, just as the dog looks; and then, not being really a cruel man, hewould call over his shoulder, "Put on your hat, little woman; you cancome." Then he conceived her wandering with him through the Den andCaddam Wood, clinging to his arm and looking up adoringly at him."What a loving little soul it is!" he said, and pinched her ear,whereat she glowed with pleasure. "But I forgot," he would add,bantering her; "you don't admire me. Heigh-ho! Grizel wants to admireme, but she can't!" He got some satisfaction out of these flights offancy, but it had a scurvy way of deserting him in the hour ofgreatest need; where was it, for instance, when the real Grizelappeared and fixed that inquiring eye on him?
He went to the Spittal several times, Elspeth with him when she caredto go; for Lady Rintoul and all the others had to learn and rememberthat, unless they made much of Elspeth, there could be no T. Sandysfor them. He glared at anyone, male or female, who, on beingintroduced to Elspeth, did not remain, obviously impressed, by herside. "Give pleasure to Elspeth or away I go," was written all overhim. And it had to be the right kind of pleasure, too. The ladies mustfeel that she was more innocent than they, and talk accordingly. Hewould walk the flower-garden with none of them until he knew forcertain that the man walking it with little Elspeth was a person to betrusted. Once he was convinced of this, however, he was very much attheir service, and so little to be trusted himself that perhaps theyshould have had careful brothers also. He told them, one at a time,that they were strangely unlike all the other women he had known, andheld their hands a moment longer than was absolutely necessary, andthen went away, leaving them and him a prey to conflicting andpuzzling emotions.
Lord Rintoul, whose hair was so like his skin that in the familyportraits he might have been painted in one colour, could never ridhimself of the feeling that it must be a great thing to a writing chapto get a good dinner; but her ladyship always explained him away withan apologetic smile which went over his remarks like a piece ofindia-rubber, so that in the end he had never said anything. She was aslight, pretty woman of nearly forty, and liked Tommy because heremembered so vividly her coming to the Spittal as a bride. He evenremembered how she had been dressed--her white bonnet, for instance.
"For long," Tommy said, musing, "I resented other women in whitebonnets; it seemed profanation."
"How absurd!" she told him, laughing. "You must have been quite asmall boy at the time."
"But with a lonely boy's passionate admiration for beautiful things,"he answered; and his gravity was a gentle rebuke to her. "It was all along time ago," he said, taking both her hands in his, "but I neverforget, and, dear lady, I have often wanted to thank you." What he wasthanking her for is not precisely clear, but she knew that theartistic temperament is an odd sort of thing, and from this time LadyRintoul liked Tommy, and even tried to find the right wife for himamong the families of the surrounding clergy. His step was sometimesquite springy when he left the Spittal; but Grizel's shadow was alwayswaiting for him somewhere on the way home, to take the life out ofhim, and after that it was again, oh, sorrowful disillusion! oh, worldgone gray! Grizel did not admire him. T. Sandys was no longer a wonderto Grizel. He went home to that as surely as the labourer to hisevening platter.
And now we come to the affair of the Slugs. Corp had got a holiday,and they were off together fishing the Drumly Water, by Lord Rintoul'spermission. They had fished the Drumly many a time without it, andthis was to be another such day as those of old. The one who woke atfour was to rouse the other. Never had either waked at four; but oneof them was married now, and any woman can wake at any hour shechooses, so at four Corp was pushed out of bed, and soon thereafterthey took the road. Grizel's blinds were already up. "Do you mind,"Corp said, "how often, when we had boasted we were to start at fourand didna get roaded till six, we wriggled by that window so thatGrizel shouldna see us?"
"She usually did see us," Tommy replied ruefully. "Grizel alwaysspotted us, Corp, when we had anything to hide, and missed us when wewere anxious to be seen."
"There was no jouking her," said Corp. "Do you mind how that used tobother you?" a senseless remark to a man whom it was botheringstill--or shall we say to a boy? For the boy came back to Tommy whenhe heard the Drumly singing; it was as if he had suddenly seen hismother looking young again. There had been a thunder-shower as theydrew near, followed by a rush of wind that pinned them to a dike,swept the road bare, banged every door in the glen, and then sanksuddenly as if it had never been, like a mole in the sand. But now thesun was out, every fence and farm-yard rope was a string of diamonddrops. There was one to every blade of grass; they lurked among thewild roses; larks, drunken with song, shook them from their wings. Thewhole earth shone so gloriously with them that for a time Tommy ceasedto care whether he was admired. We can pay nature no highercompliment.
But when they came
to the Slugs! The Slugs of Kenny is a wild crevicethrough which the Drumly cuts its way, black and treacherous, into alovely glade where it gambols for the rest of its short life; youwould not believe, to see it laughing, that it had so lately escapedfrom prison. To the Slugs they made their way--not to fish, for anytrout that are there are thinking for ever of the way out and ofnothing else, but to eat their luncheon, and they ate it sitting onthe mossy stones their persons had long ago helped to smooth, andlooking at a roan-branch, which now, as then, was trailing in thewater.
There were no fish to catch, but there was a boy trying to catch them.He was on the opposite bank; had crawled down it, only other boys cantell how, a barefooted urchin of ten or twelve, with an enormousbagful of worms hanging from his jacket button. To put a new worm onthe hook without coming to destruction, he first twisted his legsabout a young birch, and put his arms round it. He was after a bigone, he informed Corp, though he might as well have been fishing in atreatise on the art of angling.
Corp exchanged pleasantries with him; told him that Tommy was CaptainUre, and that he was his faithful servant Alexander Bett, both ofEdinburgh. Since the birth of his child, Corp had become something ofa humourist. Tommy was not listening. As he lolled in the sun he wasturning, without his knowledge, into one of the other Tommies. Let uswatch the process.
He had found a half-fledged mavis lying dead in the grass. Rememberalso how the larks had sung after rain.
Tommy lost sight and sound of Corp and the boy. What he seemed to seewas a baby lark that had got out of its nest sideways, a fall of halfa foot only, but a dreadful drop for a baby. "You can get back thisway," its mother said, and showed it the way, which was quite easy,but when the baby tried to leap, it fell on its back. Then the mothermarked out lines on the ground, from one to the other of which it wasto practise hopping, and soon it could hop beautifully so long as itsmother was there to say every moment, "How beautifully you hop!" "Nowteach me to hop up," the little lark said, meaning that it wanted tofly; and the mother tried to do that also, but in vain; she could soarup, up, up bravely, but could not explain how she did it. Thisdistressed her very much, and she thought hard about how she hadlearned to fly long ago last year, but all she could recall forcertain was that you suddenly do it. "Wait till the sun comes outafter rain," she said, half remembering. "What is sun? What is rain?"the little bird asked. "If you cannot teach me to fly, teach me tosing." "When the sun comes out after rain," the mother replied, "thenyou will know how to sing." The rain came, and glued the little bird'swings together. "I shall never be able to fly nor to sing," it wailed.Then, of a sudden, it had to blink its eyes; for a glorious light hadspread over the world, catching every leaf and twig and blade of grassin tears, and putting a smile into every tear. The baby bird's breastswelled, it did not know why; and it fluttered from the ground, it didnot know how. "The sun has come out after the rain," it trilled."Thank you, sun; thank you, thank you! Oh, mother, did you hear me? Ican sing!" And it floated up, up, up, crying, "Thank you, thank you,thank you!" to the sun. "Oh, mother, do you see me? I am flying!" Andbeing but a baby, it soon was gasping, but still it trilled the sameecstasy, and when it fell panting to earth it still trilled, and thedistracted mother called to it to take breath or it would die, but itcould not stop. "Thank you, thank you, thank you!" it sang to the suntill its little heart burst.
With filmy eyes Tommy searched himself for the little pocket-book inwhich he took notes of such sad thoughts as these, and in place of thebook he found a glove wrapped in silk paper. He sat there with it inhis hand, nodding his head over it so broken-heartedly you could nothave believed that he had forgotten it for several days.
Death was still his subject; but it was no longer a bird he saw: itwas a very noble young man, and his white, dead face stared at the skyfrom the bottom of a deep pool. I don't know how he got there, but awoman who would not admire him had something to do with it. No sunafter rain had come into that tragic life. To the water that had endedit his white face seemed to be saying, "Thank you, thank you, thankyou." It was the old story of a faithless woman. He had given her hisheart, and she had played with it. For her sake he had striven to befamous; for her alone had he toiled through dreary years in London,the goal her lap, in which he should one day place his book--a poor,trivial little work, he knew (yet much admired by the best critics).Never had his thoughts wandered for one instant of that time toanother woman; he had been as faithful in life as in death; and nowshe came to the edge of the pool and peered down at his staring eyesand laughed.
He had got thus far when a shout from Corp brought him, dazed, to hisfeet. It had been preceded by another cry, as the boy and the saplinghe was twisted round toppled into the river together, uprooted stonesand clods pounding after them and discolouring the pool into which thetorrent rushes between rocks, to swirl frantically before it divesdown a narrow channel and leaps into another caldron.
There was no climbing down those precipitous rocks. Corp was shouting,gesticulating, impotent. "How can you stand so still?" he roared.
For Tommy was standing quite still, like one not yet thoroughlyawake. The boy's head was visible now and again as he was carriedround in the seething water; when he came to the outer ring down thatchannel he must infallibly go, and every second or two he was in awider circle.
Tommy was awake now, and he could not stand still and see a boy drownbefore his eyes. He knew that to attempt to save him was to face aterrible danger, especially as he could not swim; but he kicked offhis boots. There was some gallantry in the man.
"You wouldna dare!" Corp cried, aghast.
Tommy hesitated for a moment, but he had abundance of physicalcourage. He clenched his teeth and jumped. But before he jumped hepushed the glove into Corp's hand, saying, "Give her that, and tellher it never left my heart." He did not say who she was; he scarcelyknew that he was saying it. It was his dream intruding on reality, asa wheel may revolve for a moment longer after the spring breaks.
Corp saw him strike the water and disappear. He tore along the bank ashe had never run before, until he got to the water's edge below theSlugs, and climbed and fought his way to the scene of the disaster.Before he reached it, however, we should have had no hero had not thesapling, the cause of all this pother, made amends by barring the waydown the narrow channel. Tommy was clinging to it, and the boy tohim, and, at some risk, Corp got them both ashore, where they laygasping like fish in a creel.
The boy was the first to rise to look for his fishing-rod, and he wassurprised to find no six-pounder at the end of it. "She has broke theline again!" he said; for he was sure then and ever afterwards that abig one had pulled him in.
Corp slapped him for his ingratitude; but the man who had saved thisboy's life wanted no thanks. "Off to your home with you, wherever itis," he said to the boy, who obeyed silently; and then to Corp: "He isa little fool, Corp, but not such a fool as I am." He lay on his face,shivering, not from cold, not from shock, but in a horror of himself.I think it may fairly be said that he had done a brave if foolhardything; it was certainly to save the boy that he had jumped, and he hadgiven himself a moment's time in which to draw back if he chose, whichvastly enhances the merit of the deed. But sentimentality had beenthere also, and he was now shivering with a presentiment of the lengthto which it might one day carry him.
They lit a fire among the rocks, at which he dried his clothes, andthen they set out for home, Corp doing all the talking. "What a townthere will be about this in Thrums!" was his text; and he wassurprised when Tommy at last broke silence by saying passionately:"Never speak about this to me again, Corp, as long as you live.Promise me that. Promise never to mention it to anyone. I want no oneto know what I did to-day, and no one will ever know unless you tell;the boy can't tell, for we are strangers to him."
"He thinks you are a Captain Ure, and that I'm Alexander Bett, hisservant," said Corp. "I telled him that for a divert."
"Then let him continue to think that."
Of course Corp promised. "An
d I'll go to the stake afore I break mypromise," he swore, happily remembering one of the Jacobite oaths. Buthe was puzzled. They would make so much of Tommy if they knew. Theywould think him a wonder. Did he not want that?
"No," Tommy replied.
"You used to like it; you used to like it most michty."
"I have changed."
"Ay, you have; but since when? Since you took to making printedbooks?"
Tommy did not say, but it was more recently than that. What he wassurrendering no one could have needed to be told less than he; themagnitude of the sacrifice was what enabled him to make it. He wasalways at home among the superlatives; it was the little things thatbothered him. In his present fear of the ride that sentimentalitymight yet goad him to, he craved for mastery over self; he knew thathis struggles with his Familiar usually ended in an embrace, and hehad made a passionate vow that it should be so no longer. The bestbeginning of the new man was to deny himself the glory that would behis if his deed were advertised to the world. Even Grizel must neverknow of it--Grizel, whose admiration was so dear to him. Thus hepunished himself, and again I think he deserves respect.