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PECCAVI




BY THE SAME AUTHOR.
A BRIDE FROM THE BUSH.
UNDER TWO SKIES.
TINY LUT'I‘RELL.
THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA.
THE UNBIDDEN GUEST.
THE ROGUE'S MARCH.
TWALIE'S BUSHRANGER.
MY LORD DUKE.
YOUNG BLOOD.
SOME PERSONS UNKNOWN.
THE AMATEUR CRACKSMAN.
DEAD MEN TELL NO TALES.
THE BELLE OF TOORAK.


PECCAVI
BY
E. W. HORNUNG
LONDON
GRANT RICHARDS
Igoo


LONDON:
PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED,
STANFORD STREET mm CHARING cnoss.


8&5
II.
III.
IV.
VI.
VII.
VIII.
IX.
XI.
XII.
XIII.
XIV.
XV.
XVI.
XVI I.
XVI II.
XIX.
llS
HAN M
H’Ié’j,
CONTENTS
DUST To DUST
THE CHIEF MOURNER
A CONFESSION . .
MIDSUMMER NIGHT . .
. THE MAN ALONE .
FIRE . . . .
THE SINNER’S PRAYER .
THE LORD OF THE MANOR
A DUEL BEGINS .
THE LETTER OF THE LAW
LABOUR OF HERCULES
A FRESH DISCOVERY
DEVICES OF A CASTAWAY .
THE LAST RESORT .
HIS OWN LAWYER . .
END OF THE DUEL . .
THREE WEEKS AND A NIGHT
THE NIOIIT’S WORK
THE FIRST WINTER. .
. THE WAY OF PEACE
PAG E
12
I9
3I
49
56
72
84
108
. . 124
I35
I42
I49
I76
202
a 0 209
248
XXI.
XXII.
XXIII.
XXIV.
AT THE FLINT HOUSE
A LITTLE CIIILD
DESIGN AND ACCIDENT
GLAMOUR AND RUE.
'5 pa r\ ,1 Ii,
1-. J‘RJL 24d
269
283
. . 3:3


Contents
PAGE
XXV. SIGNS OF CHANGE . . . . . 329
XXVI. A VERY FEW WORDS . . . . 339
XXVII. AN ESCAPE . . . . . . 347
XXVIII. THE TURNING TIDE . . . . 559
XXIX. A HAVEN 0F HEARTS . . . . 373
XXX. THE WOMAN’S HOUR . . . . 388
XXXI. ADVENT EVE . . . . . . 405
XXXII. THE SECOND TIME . . . . . 418
XXXIII. SANCTUARY . . . . . . 426
,.'


I.
DUST TO Dusr.
LONG STow church lay hidden for the summer
amid a million leaves. It had neither tower nor
steeple to show above the trees; nor was the
scaffolding between nave and chancel an earnest
of one or the other to come. It was a simple
little church, of no antiquity and few exterior
pretensions, and the alterations it was undergoing
were of a very practical character. A sandstone
upstart in a countryside of flint, it stood aloof
from the road, on a green knoll now yellow
with buttercups, and shaded all day long by
horse-chestnuts and elms. The church formed
the eastern extremity of the village of Long
Stow.
It was Midsummer Day, and a Saturday, and
the middle of the Saturday afternoon. So all the
village was there, though from the road one saw
only the idle group about the gate, and on the
old flint wall a row of children commanded by
the schoolmaster to “keep outside.” Pinafores
pressed against the coping, stockinged legs
dangling, fidgety hob-nails kicking stray sparks
I i:


Peccavi
from the flint; anticipation at the gate, fascination
on the wall, law and order on the path in the
schoolmaster's person; and in the cool green
shade hard by, a couple of planks, a crumbling
hillock, an open grave.
Near his handiwork hovered the sexton, a
wizened being, twisted with rheumatism, leaning
on his spade, and grinning as usual over the
stupendous hallucination of his latter years. He
had swallowed a rudimentary frog with some
impure water. This frog had reached maturity
in the sexton’s body. Many believed it. The
man himself could hear it croaking in his breast,
where it commanded the pass to his stomach, ‘
and intercepted every morsel that he swallowed.
Certainly the sexton was very lean, if not starving
to death quite as fast as he declared ; for he had
become a tiresome egotist on the point, who, even
now, must hobble to the schoolmaster with the
last report of his unique ailment.
“ That croap wuss than ever. Would ’ee like
to listen, Mr. Jones ? ”
And the bent man almost straightened for the
nonce, protruding his chest with a toothless grin
of huge enjoyment.
“Thank you,” said the schoolmaster. “ I've
something else to do.”
“ Croap, croap, croap ! ” chuckled the sexton.
“ That take every mortal thing I eat. An' doctor
can’t do nothun for me—not he! ”
“ I should think he couldn’t.”
“Why, I do declare he be croapun now ! That
2


Dust to Dust
fare to bring me to my own grave afore long. Do
you listen, Mr. Jones; that croap like billy-oh this
very minute ! ”
It took a rough word to get rid of him.
“You be off, Busby. Can’t you see I’m
trying to listen to something else? ”
In the church the rector was reciting the first of
the appointed psalms. Every syllable could be
heard upon the path. His reading was Mr.
Carlton's least disputed gift, thanks to afine voice,
an unerring sense of the values of words, and a
delivery without let or blemish. Yet there was
no evidence that the reader felt a word of what
he read, for one and all were pitched in the
deliberate monotone rarely to be heard outside a
church. And just where some voices would have
failed, that of the Rector of Long Stow rang
clearest and most precise :~—-
“ When thou with reouhes a'ost ehasten man for
sin. thou mahest his beauty to consume away, lihe
as it were a moth fretting a garment: every man
therefore is but vanity.
“ Hear my prayer, 0 Lord, and with thine ears
consider my calling : hola' not thy peace at my tears.
“For I am a stranger with thee: and a
Sojourner, as all my fathers were.
“ O spare me a little, that I may recover my
strength: before I go hence, and be no more
seen " . . .
The sexton was regaling the children on
the wall with the ever-popular details of his
notorious malady. The schoolmaster still
3 B 2


Peccavi
strutted on the path, now peeping in at the
porch, now reporting particulars to the curious at
the gate: a quaint incarnation of conscious
melancholy and unconscious enjoyment.
“ Hardly a dry eye in the church!” he
announced after the psalm. “Mr. Carlton and
Musk himself are about the only two that fare tO
hide what they feel.”
“ And what does Mr. Carlton feel 5’" asked a
lout with a rose in his coat. “About as much as
my little finger! ” .
“ Ay,” said another, “ he cares for nothing but
his Roman candles, and his transcripts and
gargles." *
“ Come,” said the schoolmaster, “ you
wouldn’t have the parson break down in church,
would you? I’m sorry I mentioned him. I was
thinking of Jasper Musk. He just stands as
though Mr. Carlton had carved him out of
stone."
“ The wonder is that he can stand there at
all,” retorted the fellow with the flower, “ to hear
what he don’t believe read by a man he don’t
believe in. A funeral, is it? It’s as well we
know—he’d take a weddun in the same voice."
The schoolmaster turned away with an
ambiguous shrug. It was not his business to
defend Mr. Carlton against the disaffected and
the undevout. He considered his duty done
when he informed the rector who his enemies
were, and (if permitted tO proceed) what they
* Transepts and gargoyles.
4


Dust to Dust
were saying behind his back. The schoolmaster
made a mental mark against the name of one
Cubitt, ex-choirman, and, forthwith transferring
his attention to the audience on the wall, put a
stop to their untimely entertainment before
returning softly to the porch.
In Long Stow churchyard there was shade all
day, but in the church it was dusk from that
moment in the forenoon when the east window
lost the sun. This peculiarity was partly
temporary. The church was in a transition
stage; it was putting forth transepts north and
south ; meanwhile there was much boarding
within, and a window in eclipse on either side.
The surrounding foliage added its own shade;
and each time the schoolmaster stole out of the
sunlight into the porch, to peer up the nave, it was
several moments before he could see anything
at all. And then it was but a few high lights
in a sea of gloom: first the east window, as yet
unstained, its three quatrefoils filled with summer
sky, the rest with waving branches; next, the
brass lectern, the surplice behind it, the high
white forehead above. Then in the chancel
something gleamed: that was the coffin, resting
on trestles. Then in the choir seats, otherwise
deserted, a figure grew out of the shadows, a
solitary and a massive figure, that stood even
now when everybody else was seated, finely
regardless of the fact. It was a man, elderly, but
very powerfully built. The hair stood white and
5


Peccavi
thick upon the large strong head, less white and
shorter on the broad deep jowl. The head was
carried with a certain dignity, rude, savage,
indomitable. The eyes gazed fixedly at the
opposite wall; not once did they condescend to
the thing that gleamed upon the trestles. One
great hand was knotted over the knob of a
mighty stick, on which the old man leant stiffly.
He was dressed in black, not quite as a gentle-
man, yet as befitted the most substantial man but
one in the parish. And that was Jasper Musk.
The parson finished the lesson, and his white
brow bent over the closed book ; the face beneath
was bearded and much tanned, and in it there
burnt an eye that came as a surprise after that
formal voice; and the hand that closed the book
was sensitive but strong. Stepping from the
lectern, the clergyman declared his calibre in an
obeisance towards the altar, then led the way
slowly down the aisle. Bearers rose from the
shades and followed with the coffin; they were
almost at the porch before Jasper Musk took
notice enough to limp after them with much noise
from his stick. The congregation waited for him,
swarming into the aisle in the big man’s wake.
So they came to the grave.
And there broad daylight revealed a circum-
stance that came as a shock to most of those who
had followed the body from the church, but as an
outrage to the officiating clergyman: the coffin
bore no plate. Mr. Carlton colOured to the hair,
6


Dust to Dust
and his deep eye flashed upon the chief mourner;
the latter leant upon his stick and replied with a
grim glare across the open grave. For a moment
the wind washed through the trees, and every
sparrow made itself heard; then the rector’s eyes
dropped to his book, but his voice rang colder
than before. And presently the earth received
its own.
Mr. Carlton had pronounced the benediction,
and a solemn hush still held all assembled, when
a bicycle bell jarred staccato in the road; a
moment later, with a sharp word for some children
who had tired of the funeral and strayed across
his path, the rider dismounted outside the saddler’s
workshop, a tiny cabin next his house and opposite
the church. The cyclist was a lad in his teens,
dark, handsome, dapper, but small for his age,
which was that of high collars and fancy ties ; and
he rode a fancy bicycle, the high machine of the
day, but extravagantly nickelled in all its parts.
“ Well, Fuller," said he, “who are they
burying ? ” ,
Fuller, the saddler, who enjoyed a local
monopoly in the exercise of his craft, but whose
trade was the mere relaxation of a life spent in
reading and disseminating the news of the day,
was spelling through the Standard at his bench
behind the open window. He dropped his paper
and whipped the spectacles from a big dogmatic
nose.
“Gord love yer, Mr. Sidney, do you stand
there and tell me you haven’t heard ? ”
7


Peccavi
“ How could I hear when I’m only home rom
Saturdays to Mondays? I’m on my way home
now. Old Sally Webb—is it——or one of the old
Wilsons ? ”
“No, sir,” said the saddler; “that’s no old
person. “Gord love yer,” he cried again, “I
wish that was!”
" Who is it, Mr. Fuller ?”
“That's Molly Musk," said Fuller, slowly;
“ that’s who that is, Mr. Sidney.”
The boy had not the average capacity for
astonishment; he was not, in fact, the average
boy; but at the name his eyebrows shot up and
his mouth grew round.
“ Molly Musk! I thought nobody knew
where she was ? When did she turn up P”
“ Tuesday night, and died the next.”
“ But I say, Fuller, this is interesting ! ” Per-
haps the average boy would have been no more
shocked; he might not even have found it in-
teresting. This one leant his bicycle against
the wall, and his elbows on the bench within the
open window. “ Where’s she been all this time P”
he queried confidentially. “What did she die
of ? What’s it all mean ?” And there was a
knowing curl about the corners of his mouth.
“Mean?” said the saddler; “there’s more
than you want to know that, Mr. Sidney, but
want must be their master. That old Jasper, he
know, so they say; but I’m not so sure. It was
he fetched her home, poor old feller; got the
letter Monday morning, had her home by Tuesday
8


Dust to Dust
night. That’s a man I never liked, Mr. Sidney.
I’ve said it to his face, and I’ll say it as long as I
live ; but, Gord love yer, I’m sorry for him now!
That’s given him a rare doing, and no mistake,
and less wonder. A trim little thing like poor
Molly Musk ! Not that I’m so surprised as some ;
a man Of my experience don’t make no mistake,
and I never did care for the breed. But there,
even my heart bleed when that don’t boil ; as for
the reverend here, he feel it as much as anybody
else, and that I know. That young jim Cubitt,
he come by just now, and says he, ‘ He’s taking
the service as if it was a wedding.’ ‘You’ve
been kicked out Of the choir,’ I says; ‘that’s
what’s the matter with you still, or you wouldn’t
want a man to be a woman._ Thank goodness
there’s one live man in the parish,’ I says, ‘though I
don’t fare to hold with him.’ And no more I do,
Mr. Sidney; but, Gord love yer, that make no
difference to men of our experience. I like the
reverend’s Popery as little as the squire like it,
and I tell him so, yet he go on bringing me the
Standard every day when he’ve done with it.
Is there another clergyman that’d do the like tO
a man that went against him in the parish?
Would the Reverend Preston at Linkworth?
Would the Reverend Scrope at Burton Mills?
Or Canon Wilders, or any other man Jack of
’em ? NO, sir, not one!”
“ But if he doesn’t read them himself," said the
boy, “it doesn’t amount to so very much.” And
he laid his hand on three more Standards, un-
9


Peccavi
opened, with the parson’s name in print upon the
wrapper.
“What I was coming to,” cried the saddler;
“only when I get on the reverend my tongue will
wag. They say he don’t feel. I say he do, and
I know: all this week I’ve had no Standard, so
this morning I was so bold as to up and mention
it, and there was all six unopened. ‘ Reverend,’
I says, ‘ you must be ill—with that there Egyptian
Question to argue about ’~—-for we’re rare ’uns to
argue, the reverend and me—‘ and no trace yet
0’ them Phoenix Park varmin ! ’ But he shake his
head. ‘ Not ill, Fuller,’ he says ; ‘but there's tragedy
enough in this parish without going to the papers
for more. And I haven’t the heart to argue even
with you,’ he says. So that’s my answer to them
as says our reverend don’t feel.”
The boy had been patiently pricking the bench
with a saddler’s- punch ; now he raised his deliberate
dark eyes and looked at the other point-blank.
“ You talk about a tragedy,” he said, “ but you
won’t say where the tragedy comes in. What
has killed the girl ? "
“ I hardly like to tell a young gentleman like
you,” said the saddler ; “though, to be sure,
y0u’1l hear of nothing else in the village.”
“ Perhaps," said the boy, with a rather sinister
smile, “ I’m not quite so innocent as I ought to
be. Come on, out with it! "
“ Well, then, the poor young thing was brought
home in trouble,” sighed the saddler. “And in
her trouble she died next night.”
10


Dust to Dust
The boy looked at the man through narrow
eyes with a knowing light in them, and the curves
cut deep at the corners of his mouth.
_ “ In trouble, eh ? So that’s why she dis-
appeared ?" he said at length. “ Molly—Musk ! ”
II


II.
THE CHIEF MOURNER.
JASPER MUSK remained some minutes at the
grave, alone, and more than ever a mark for
curious eyes; his own were raised, and his lips
moved with a significance difficult to mistake, but
in him yet more difficult to accept. The infidelity
of the man was notorious, and, indeed, the raised
face was not the face of prayer. It was flint
bathed in gall, too bitter for faith, too savage for
sorrow; it was a frozen sea of wrinkles without
a single ripple of agitation. Yet the lips moved,
and were still moving when Jasper Musk passed
through the crowd now assembled about the gate,
erect though halt, a glitter in his eyes, but that
was all. .
As the folk had waited and made way for him
in the church, so they waited and made way out-
side. Thus, as he limped down into the road,
Musk had the village almost to himself. He
turned to the right, and the west wind blew in his
face, strong and warm, with cloud upon cloud of
yellow_ dust; overhead the other clouds flew high
and white and broken, a flotilla of small sail upon
the blue. But Musk was done gazing at the sky,
neither did he look right or left as he trudged in
12


The Chief Mourncr
the middle of the road. So the saddler’s place,
and then the woody opening of the road to Link-
worth, with the white bridge gleaming through
the trees, and the ripe leaves purling in the wind
like summer surf, all fell behind on the left; as,
on the right, did the rectory gate, terminating that
same flint wall which had been the children’s grand
stand. Rectory, church and glebe stood all to-
gether, an indivisible trinity, with open uplands
east and north. Westward began the cottages,
buff-coloured, thatched; and it was cottages for
half a mile, but healthy cottages, with plenty of
space between, here a wheatfield, there a meadow ;
for every householder of Long Stow has also his
holding of land, and there is no more independent
parish in East Anglia. Of private houses that
are not cottages, however, the village has only
three: the rectory at one end, the hall near the
other, and the Flint House between the two.
The Flint House now belonged to Jasper
Musk. Report said that he had bought it outright
for nine hundred pounds, with the meadow he
was now passing on his left, and the wild garden
reaching to the river. Originallypart and parcel
of the Long Stow estate, the place had been let
for years, with a good slice of land, to London
sportsmen who spent just two months of the
twelve there. Musk had been the lessee’s bailiff,
and had feathered his nest so well that when the
whole estate changed hands, and the part went
with the whole, the ex-bailiff was in a position to
buy a house and grounds for which the new
13


Peccavi
squire had no use. None knew how he could
have come honestly by so much profit; yet he
was a man Of tried integrity, but a hard man, and
the iast to get fair treatment behind his back. A
more genuine marvel was the way in which he
had spent his money, on a house that could
scarcely fail to be a white elephant to such a
man, and a hideous house into the bargain. It
abutted directly on the road, grim and rambling,
with false windows like wall-eyes, and facets of
flint so sharp that to brush against the wall was
to rip a sleeve to ribbons. There were many
rooms, musty and mice-ridden, and now only two
Old people to inhabit them. Musk had driven
all his sons from home, thus doing his country an
unwitting service, for there was the stuff that
knits an empire in the blood. But only one
daughter had been born to him, and now he had
left her in the ground, and would wash his mind
of her for ever.
The resolution was easier than its accomplish
ment: on his very threshold a shrill small cry
assailed and insulted jasper Musk. And in the
parlour walked his wife, meek-spirited, flat—
chested, leaden-eyed; too weary for much grief,
as he was too bitter; in her thin arms an infant
not four days Old.
Musk put himself in her path.
“ Stop walking ! ”
“ That’ll set him Off again,” sighed Mrs. Musk,
though not before she had obeyed.
“I don’t care,” said Jasper. “That can cry
14


The Chief Mourner
till that die,” he added brutally, as the fit returned ;
“and the sooner the better. Hold it up a bit.
There, now! I want to have a look at the brat.
I want to see who that's like ! ”
“ It’s like poor Molly,” whimpered the grand-
mother, shedding tears that she could neither
check nor hide.
Musk thumped his stick on the floor.
“ Molly? Molly ? You let me hear that name
again! Haven’t I told you once and for all never
to lay your tongue to that name, in my hearing
or behind my back, as long as you live? Then
don't you forget it ; and none 0’ your lies. That’s
no more like her than that’s like you. But a look
of somebody it have, though I can’t for the life of
me think who. Wait a bit. Give me time.
That'll come—that’ll come ! ”
But the thin shrill screaming continued till the
little red face grew livid and wrinkled almost
beyond resemblance 'to its kind ; then Musk
relinquished his futile scrutiny, and Signed to his
wife to resume the walking, but himself remained
in the room. And he leant on his stick as he
had leant on it at the funeral; but here in his
house he wore his hat ; and from under its broad
brim he followed them, backward and forward, to
and fro, with smouldering eyes.
“ Do you know what I've vowed ?” he pre-
sently went on. “ Do you know the oath I took,
there at that open grave, when all the tomfoolery
was over, and that Jesuit jerry-builder had taken
his hook ? ”
15


Peccavi
“ I’m sure I don’t,” sighed Mrs. Musk, as the
child lay once more still against her withered
bosom.
“ I stood there,” said jasper, “ and I swore I’d
find the man. And I swore I’d tear his heart out
when I’ve found him. And I’ll do both ! ”
His voice rose so swiftly to so fierce a pitch
that the woman started violently, and the infant
wailed again. Instantly the room shook, and
with one stride, paid for by a spasm of pain, the
husband towered above the wife; and this time
it was a heavy hand upon her shrunk and shrinking
shoulder that put a stop to the walk.
“ Do you know who it is?” he cried. “My
God, I believe you do! ”
“ I don’t, indeed! ”
“She never told you ?”
“ God knows she did not.”
“ Or anybody else ? ”
“ I don’t know.”
“ But you think—you think! I see it in your
face. Who is it you think she may have told?
I’ll soon find out from him or her; trust me to
wring that out! ”
For answer, the woman subsided in sobs upon
the horsehair sofa, rocking herself and the baby in
her grief and terror. “ You’ll be that angry with
me,” she moaned ; “ you’ll be right mad ! ”
“ Oh, no, I sha’n’t,” said Musk, in a kindlier
voice. “ I’m not so bad as all that, though this
do fare to make a man crazy. Tell away, old
woman, and don’t you be afraid.”
I6


The Chief Mournel‘
“Oh, jasper, it was when you were gone to
Lakenhall for the doctor—that last time ! ”
“ Well ? ”
“She knew the end was near. Poor thing!
Poor thing ! ”
“ What did she say P"
“ That she'd die more happier if only she could
speak—if only I would send "
“ Not for Carlton ?”
The wife could only nod in her fear and
desperation.
“ You sent for that man the moment my back
was turned ?"
“Oh, I knew that’d make you right wild—I
knew—I knew ! ”
Musk controlled himself by an effort.
“ That don’t. That sha’n’t. I’ll have it out of
him, that’s all; he’s not the Church 0’ Rome yet !
Go on. Go on.”
“I went myself. No one knew. I left her
alone time I was gone.”
“ And you brought him back with you P ”
“Well, he got here first. He ran all the way."
“He knew better than to let me catch him.
Jesuit! How long was he with her P”
“ Not long, Jasper, not long indeed! ”
“ And you heard nothing? ”
“Not aword. I stayed downstairs. I had to
promise her that before I went. She had some-
thing to say to Mr. Carlton that nobody else
must know.”
“ But somebody else shall I " said Jasper grimly.

17 c


Peccavi
“ That was it, you may depend; you should have
listened at the door. But that make no matter.
Somebody else is going to know before he’s many
minutes older! ”
And an ugly smile broadened on the thick-set
face; but the woman gasped. Quick as thought
the child was on the sofa, the grandmother on
her feet. Trembling and terrified, she stood in
her husband’s path.
“Jasper ! You’re never going up to the
rectory ? ” '
“ I am, though—this minute!”
“Oh, Jasper!”
“ Do you let me by.”
“But I promised you should never know!
You've made me break my solemn word ! He’ll
know I've broken it ! ”
“ Yes, I’m going to learn him a thing or two.
Will you let me by P"
“She’ll know—too—wherever she has gone
to!”
“You’d better not keep me no more."
“Jasper! Jasper! On her death-bed I pro-
mised her ”
“ Out of my light ! ”

18


Peccavi
place. Like many ritualists, Carlton was a
religious aesthete; none more fastidious in the
service of the sanctuary ; on the other hand, after
the fashion of his peers in two Churches, the
trappings of his own life were severely simple.
They had nearly all been purchased second-hand,
those wire-covered shelves and the books they
bore, that oak settle, and the huge arm-chair
filled with miscellaneous lumber. Two baize-
covered forms were there for the accommoda-
tion of various classes which the rector held; a
prayer desk faced east in the one orderly corner
of the room. Only three pictures hung on
the walls; a Holy Family and Guido Reni’s
St. Sebastian, ordinary silver prints in Oxford
frames, mementoes of a pilgrimage to Rome;
and an ancient cricket eleven, faded from age,
and fly-blown for long want of a glass. There
were also a couple of tin shields, bearing the
heraldic devices of Robert Carlton’s public school
and of his Oxford college, while a crucifix hung
over the prayer desk. Among the books two
volumes on Building Construction might have
been remarked upon the settle, together with a
tattered copy of Parker’s Introduction to Got/tic
A ro/zz'teotnre ,- among the lumber, a mason’s trowel
and a cold-chisel. Lastly, the study smelt, but
did not reek, of common birdseye.
Jasper Musk, passing the open lattice, caught
the parson hastily rising from his knees, not at
the prayer desk, but beside his writing table, upon
which a large book lay open. A newspaper lay
20


Peccavi
sensitive finger brushed the brown moustache to
either side of his mouth.
“I have never advocated auricular confes-
sion,” said he, “whatever I may think. I have
_ merely said, to those in doubt, in difficulty, or in
trouble, I will help them with God’s help if
I can.”'
“In trouble!" cried Musk scornfully. “I
know one that never might have got herself into
trouble if she'd never listened to you! And
that's what brings me here; I'll beat about the
bush no more. My wife said she fetched you
the other night. I don't blame you for going, I
won’t go so far as that. What I want to know,
and what I mean to know, is this: did my—that
young woman lying there—confess to you or did
she not? ” It was a fist that he had flung in the
direction of the churchyard.
“ Confess what P ”
And the parson’s voice was cold and con-
strained, as it had been beside the grave; but
that white forehead glistened like a dead man’s.
“ The name of the father of her child ! ”
Carlton took an ivory paper-knife from his
desk, and the thin blade snapped in two between
his fingers. A pause followed. Musk stood
like granite, stick and hat in hand, frowning
down on the clergyman seated at his writing
table. At length the latter looked up.
“ I might say that is a question you have no
right to ask, Mr. Musk; what is certain, had
there been any question of confession, I should
22


A Confession
have no right to answer you. There was none.
Your daughter sent for me, to speak to me; and
speak we did; but she did not tell me that—
scoundrel’s—name.”
“ But you know ! ”
“ How dare you say that P ” cried Carlton ; and
a flash of anger played for an instant on his
pallor.
“ I see it in your face ; but I’ll have it out of
you ! I’ll have it out of you,” roared Musk, in a
sudden frenzy, striking his stick to the floor, “if
I have to tear your smooth tongue out along
with it! So smooth you could read over that
murdered girl, and know all the time who’d
murdered her, and think to keep that to yourself!
But you sha’n’t; no, that you sha’n’t; not if I
have to stand here till midnight. You know!
You know ! Deny it if you can !"
“I shall deny nothing,” retorted the other.
“ No, I shall deny nothing! ” he reiterated as if
to himself. “ But think for a minute, Mr. Musk——
I entreat you to think calmly for one minute!
Suppose I could tell you what you ask, could it
serve any good end for you to know ? ”
“ Good end ! ” cried Musk. “ Why, you know
it could. I could kill the man who’s killed my
daughter—and kill him I will—and swing for
him if they like. That’ll be a wonderful good
end all round! ”
“ Then is it for me to throw temptation in your
way? Is it for me to spoil a life, if not to end it P
For all you know, Mr. Musk, it may be a life
23


Peccavi
otherwise honest, useful, and Of good report.
Nay!" exclaimed Mr. Carlton, as if suddenly
impatient of his own reticence, “I’ll go so far as
to say that it once was all three. And the man
would do such duty—make such amends ”
A groan admitted that there were none to
make, and finished a sentence to which Musk had
not listened; the one before was sufficient for
him; and his broad face shone with the satisfac-
tion Of a point gained.
“Come,” said he, “that’s fairer! SO you do
know him, and you say so like a man. I always
took you for a man, sir, though there’s been no
love lost between us; and I’ll say I’m sorry I
spoke so harsh just now, Mr. Carlton; for I had
a hold of the wrong end 0’ the' stick—I see that
now. It was the man that confessed—it was the
man. Sir, if you’re the Christian gentleman that
I take you for, and this here Christianity 0' yours
ain’t all cant an’ humbug, you’ll tell me that man’s
name; for I can’t call to mind a single one she
so much as looked at—unless it was that young
Mellis.”
“NO, no; poor George is innocent enough,
God knows I”
“ He’s like to be, for all I hear. They say he
carries a cross for you 0’ Sundays—but I won’t
say no more about that. If he’s your right hand
in the parish, as they tell me he is, at least I
should hope he’d be straight.”
A puff Of Wind came through the open window.
It lifted the newspaper from the open book, but

24


A Confession
the rector's hand fell quickly upon both. And
there it rested. And his wretched eyes rested
upon his hand.
“So I’ve never thought twice about George
Mellis. I’d as soon think 0’ you, sir. Then who
can it be P ”
Mr. Carlton bounded to his feet, white as his
collar, and quivering to his nostrils.
“You want to know P"
“ I mean to know, sir.”
“ And to kill him—eh P ”
“ I reckon I'll go pretty near it.”
“ Ah, don't do it by halves ! " cried Carlton in
a strange high voice. “Kill him now!” His
hands fell open at his side ; his head fell forward
on his breast; and he who had sinned grossly
against God and man, yet was not born to
be a hypocrite, stood defenceless, abject, self-
destroyed. '
Moments passed ; became minutes; and all the
sound in the rectory study came from the rattling
of its inner door, or through the outer one from
the garden. Then by degrees a hard breathing
broke on Robert Carlton’s ears; but he himself
was the next to speak, flinging back his head in
sudden misery.
“ l/Vhy don’t you strike P ” he cried out.
“ You've got your stick; strike, man, strike ! ”
It seemed an hour before the answer came, in
a voice scarcely recognisable as that of Jasper
Musk, it was so low and calm; yet there was an
intensity in the deep, slow tones that matched the
25


Peccavi
fearful intensity of the fixed light eyes; and the
massive face was still and livid from the short
steel heard to the virile silver hair.
“Oh, yes, I’ll strike!” hissed Musk. “I’ll
strike! I’ll strike! ” And he struck with his eyes
until the other’s fell once more; until the guilty
man collapsed headlong in his chair, his arms
upon the table, and his face upon his arms. “ But
I’ll strike in my own way, thank you,” Musk went
on, “and in my own good time. You shall smart
a bit first—learn what it’s like to suffer—taste hell
upon earth in case there’s no hell for bloody
murderers beyond! How I wish you could see
yourself! How I wish your precious flock could
see you—and they shall. Whited sepulchre . . .
filthy hypocrite . . . living lie!”
Deliberately chosen, with long pauses between,
with many a rejection of the word that came
uppermost—the worse word that was too strong
to sting—these measured epithets carved round
the heart that unbridled abuse would have stabbed
and stunned. Carlton could hide his face, but he
quivered where he sprawled, and the other nodded
in savage self-esteem.
“ Not that I had ought to be surprised,” con-
tinued Musk ; “it’s what might have been expected
of a Jesuit in disguise; the only wonder is I
didn’t suspect you from the first. I never set up
for being a charitable man ; but that seems I was
a damned sight too charitable towards you. I
thought no wrong, whatever else I may have
thought of you and your ways. No; I may
26


A Confession
have jeered, I may have been vexed, but my
mind wasn’t nasty enough for that. God ! that I
can keep my stick off you, when I remember the
choir practices, and the organ practices, and the
Bible classes, and the Young Women’s Christian
Association. Sounds well, don’t it? Young
Women's Christian Association! Now we know
what it meant ; now we know what it all means,
church and parsons, religion and all ; a sink
of iniquity and a set of snivelling, whining,
licentious ”
“ Stop! ” cried Carlton, manned at last, and on
his feet to enforce the word. “Say what you
please of me, do what you will to me. Nothing
is too bad for me—I deserve the very worst.
But abuse my Church you shall not, in my
hearing.” '
“ His Church ! ” sneered Musk. “ A lot
you’ve done to make me respect it, haven’t you ?
My God, can you stand there looking at me as if
I were in the wrong instead 0’ you? Do you
know what you’ve done, and confessed to doing?
You’ve murdered my girl, just as much as though
you’d taken and cut her throat, you have: more,
you’ve murdered her body and soul, you that
snivel about the soul ! And you can stand there
and whine about your Church ! Is that all you’ve
got to say for yourself—to the father of the woman
you’ve ruined to her grave P "
“ That is all I have to say to you, Mr. Musk.
I will not insult you by asking your forgiveness,
much less by attempting to make the shadow of

27


Peccavi
an excuse; there could be none; nor can there
be any forgiveness for me from you or your wife ;
nor do I look for any mercy in this parish, or this
world. Go, spread the news, and ruin me in my
turn; it’s what I deserve, and mean to bear.”
“ Not so fast,” said Musk—“ not so fast, if you
please. 50 I’m to spread the news, am I ? And
do you think I’m so proud that’s the reverend?
By your leave, Mr. Carlton, I’ll keep that same
news to myself till I’ve had all I want from it.”
“ Any refinement you like,” said Carlton. “It
will not be too bad for me—or too much—please
God!”
Jasper Musk put on his hat, but came close up
to the clergyman before taking his leave.
“I wish I knew you better! ” he ground out
through his teeth. “I wish I’d made up to you
like the women, instead of giving you the wide
berth I have. Do you know why? Because I’d
have known how to hit you hardest,” said Musk,
hissing like a snake; “because I’d have known
where to hurt you most ! ”
Carlton stood a trifle more upright : his enemy’s
malice ministered subtly to his remnant of self-
respect.
“I wish I’d been a church-goer,” continued
Musk ; “but it’s never too late to mend ! I may
be there to-morrow to hear you preach; maybe
I’ll have a word to say myself; maybe I shall
not. You’ll know when the time comes, and not
before.”
Carlton quailed, for the first time at a threat,
28


A Confession
and his visible terror seemed to intoxicate the
other. Seizing him by the shoulder as he had
seized his wife, clutching him like a wild beast,
and thrusting his great face to within an inch
of that of the unhappy clergyman, jasper Musk
spat lewd names, and foul insult, and wanton
blasphemy, until breath failed him. All the
vileness he had heard in sixty years, and could
recall in half as many seconds, poured from him
in a very transport of insensate ribaldry; words
that had never left his lips before crowded to
them now; and were still ringing in a swimming
head when Robert Carlton woke to the fact that
he was once more alone.
His first sensation was one of overwhelming
nausea. His very Vitals writhed; and he reeled
heavily against an open bookcase, casting an arm
along one of the upper shelves, and resting his
face upon the sleeve. For a few moments all his
weight was upon that arm; then he opened his
eyes, and the titles of the books engaged his dazed
attention. None was apt, but all were familiar,
and the familiarity maddened the stricken man.
He stood glaring from one low wall to another,
filled with those doubts which are the cruel
satellites Of transcendent anguish. Had it really
happened after all? The room was so unchanged,
from the few things on the walls to the many in
the chair! All was so homely, so intimate, so
reassuring; and no visible trace Of Musk! Had
he ever been there at all ?
Ah, yes, for he had gone! In the distance a
29


Peccavi
gate had squealed, and shut with a. rattle; the
sound had lain in his ear ; now it sank to the
brain. Now, too, another sound, intermittent all
this time, but meaningless hitherto, assumed a like
significance. This was the continued rustling of
a newspaper, as the wind whisked in at the open
door and out by the open window in invisible
harlequinade. The man's mind fled back a little
lifetime of minutes. And he recalled the last puff
and rustle, and the quick falling of his own hand
upon the paper, which lay on his desk, as the last
event of a past era of his existence—the last act
of Robert Carlton, hypocrite!
And what was the peril that had made the final
demand upon his caution and his cunning P It was
a new irony to perceive at once that it had existed
chiefly in guilty imagination ; to remove the paper,
and to reveal nothing more incriminating than
the parish register of deaths, with an unfinished
entry in his own hand, a spatter of ink in place of
a name, and some round white blisters lower down
the leaf. Yet this it was that had brought Carlton
to his knees an hour ago ; and it brought him to
his knees again, not at the desk of formal prayer,
but here at his table as before.
“ Father have mercy on me,” he prayed, “ for
I neither deserve nor desire any mercy from
man ! ”


IV.
MIDSUMMER NIGHT.
AND while he knelt the situation was developing,
with unforeseen and truly merciful rapidity, in an
utterly unsuspected quarter; thus an aggressive
knock at the inner door came in a sense as an
answer to the prayer it interrupted.
The rectory servants consisted at this time of a
small but entire family employed wholesale out of
pure philanthropy. And this was the mother,
red-hot in her cheap crape, to say that she had
heard everything—could not help hearing—and
that house was no longer any place for respect-
able women and an honest lad—no, not if they
had to sleep in the fields. So the lad had got
their boxes on a barrow, but he would bring it
back. And they would go, all of them, to Laken-
hall Union, sooner than stay another hour in
that house of shame.
Mr. Carlton produced his cash-box without a
word, and counted out a month’s wages for each
in addition to arrears. The poor woman made a
gallant stand against the favour, but, submitting,
returned to her kitchen of her own accord, and
to her master’s study in a quarter of an hour, to
SI


Peccavi
tell him she had laid the table, and there was a
wire cover over the meat.
“And may God forgive you, sir ! ” cried she at
parting. “I couldn’t have believed it if I hadn’t
heard it from your own lips with my own ears ! ”
There was much that Carlton himself could not
believe. He sat half stupefied in his deserted
rectory, like a man marooned, his one acute
sensation that of his sudden solitude. What was
so hard to realise was that people knew I that the
whole parish would know that night, and his own
family next week, and the whole world before
many days. He was well aware of the certain
consequences of this scandal and its disclosure;
he had faced them only too often during the
nightmare of the past week, imagining some,
ascertaining others. What seemed so incredible
was that he had made the disclosure himself,
that the very father had not suspected him to
the end !
The last reflection convulsed him with self-
contempt. What a hypocrite he must be ! What
an unconscious hypocrite, the worst kind of all !
Here he was eating his supper; he had no
recollection of coming to the table ; yet, now that
he had caught himself, the food did not choke
him, he was not sick with shame; he only
despised himself—and went on.
It was dusk. He must have lit the lamp him-
self; as he lifted it from the table, having risen,
he caught sight of its reflection and his own in
the overmantel, and set the lamp upon the
32


Midsummer Night
chimneypiece, and by its light had abetter look at
himself than he could remember having taken in
his life before. There was no vanity in the man ;
he was studying his face out of sheer curiosity,
from a new and quite impersonal point of view, as
that of an enormous hypocrite and voluptuary.
Human nature was very strange: he himself
would never have suspected such a face. The
forehead was so broad and high, the deep-set eyes
so steadfast, and yet so fervid! They were the
eyes of a zealot, but no visionary: wisdom and
understanding were in that bulge of the brow
over each. But the evil writing is lower down,
unless you look for positive crime or madness;
yet these nostrils were sensitive, not sensual;
and the mouth, yes, the mouth showed between
the short brown beard and the heavy brown
moustache; but What it showed was its strength.
N o ; neither weakness nor wickedness were there ;
even Robert Carlton admitted that. But to be
strong, and yet to fall; to mean well, and do
evil ;' to look one thing, and to be another:
all that was to embody a type for which he him-
self had ever entertained an unbridled loathing
and contempt.
He carried the lamp to his study, and as he
entered from within there was a knock at the
outer door. One was waiting to see the rector,
one who had waited and knocked there oftener
than any other in the parish.
Carlton drew back, and the impulse of flight
was strong upon him for the first time. It needed
33 D


Peccavi
all his will to shut the inner door behind him,
and to cry with any firmness, “ IS that George
Mellis ?”
In response there burst into the room a lad in
knickerbockers, broad-shouldered, muscular, yet
smooth-faced, and mild-eyed all his nineteen
years; but this was the supreme moment of
them all; and his woman’s eyes were on fire as
he planted himself before the rector and his lamp,
pale as ashes in its rays.
“ Is it true? ” he gasped. “ Is it true ?”
This lad was Carlton’s chief disciple, his
admirer, his imitator, his enthusiastic champion
and defender; his right hand in all good works;
nay more, his acolyte, his lieutenant of the
sanctuary; and, before a broad chest so agitated,
and innocent eyes so wild, the culprit’s courage
failed him at last, so that the truth clove to his
tongue.
“ It’s all over the village,” the lad continued in
gasps. “You know what I mean. They’re all
saying it. They say you’ve admitted it; for
God’s sake say you haven’t! Only deny it, and
I’ll go back and cram their lies down their
throats ! ”
But by this Mr. Carlton had recovered him-
self, and was looking his last upon the anxious
eager face of the lad who had loved and honoured
him: his final pang was to see the eagerness
growing, the anxiety lessening, his look misunder~
stood. And this time the admission was halt and
hoarse.
34


Midsummer Night
What followed was also different; for, with
scarcely a moment’s interval, young Mellis burst
into tears like the overgrown child that he was,
and, flinging himself into the rector’s chair, sobbed
there unrestrainedly with his smooth face in his
strong red hands. Carlton watched him by a
prolonged effort of the will; he would Shirk no
part of his punishment; and no part to come
could hurt much more than this. His fixed eyes
were waiting for the boy's swimming ones when
at length the latter could look up.
“ You, of all men! ” whispered Mellis. “ You
who have kept us all straight—me for one. Why,
the very thought of you has helped me to resist
things ! You, with your religion: no more
religion for me ! ”
At that the other broke out; his religion he
could still defend; or thought he could, until he
came to try, and his own unworthiness slowly
strangled the words in his throat.
“ Say what you like,” said Mellis ; “it was you
brought me to church; it’s you who turn me
away ; and I’ll go to no other after yours. Only
to think——”
And he plunged into puerile reminiscences of
their religious life in common, quoting extreme
points in the rich ritual in which he had been
privileged to assist, as though they aggravated
the case, and made it more incredible than it was
already.
“If our Lord Himself——”
It did not need the rector’s finger to check that
35 D 2


Peccavi
blasphemy ; but the thing was said ; the thonght
was there.
“ Yes; better go,” said Carlton, as the lad
leapt up. “ Go ; and let no one else come near
me who ever believed in me ; for I can better face
my bitterest enemies. Yet you—you must be
one of them! After her own father, no man
should hate me more ! ”
And there was a new pain in his voice, a new
agony of remorse, as memory stabbed him in a
fresh place. But the boy shook his head, and
hung it with a blush.
“You think I cared for her,” he said. “I
thought so, too, until she went away. I should
have cared more then! It troubled me for a
time; but I got over it; and then I knew I was
too young for all that. Besides, she never looked
at me after you came ; that’s another thing I see
now ; and I know I ran less after her. Yes, I was
too young to love a woman," cried this village
lad, “but I wasn’t too old to love you, and look
up to you, and follow you in all you did. I tell
you the honest truth, Mr. Carlton,” and his
great eyes flashed their last reproach: “I’d
have died for you, sir, I would! ‘ And I’d die
now—thankfully—if .it could make you the man
I thought you were !”
This interview left Carlton’s mind more a
blank than ever. It might have been an hour
later, or it might have been in ten minutes, that
the thought occurred to him—if his dearest dis-
ciple felt thus, what must the enemy feel? And
36


Midsummer Night
he was a man with enemies enough in the parish,
having followed the old order of country parson,
and that with more vigour than diplomacy. In
eighteen months his reforms had been manifold
and drastic beyond discretion. It is true that his
preaching had won him more followers than his
priestcraft had turned away. Yet a more acute
ecclesiastic would have tapped the wedge in-
stead of hammering it; the consummate priest
would have condescended further in the direction
of a more immediate and a wider popularity.
Carlton had gone his own way, consulting none,
attracting many, offending not a few. And
he expected the speedy settlement of many a
score.
Nor had he long to wait. Lamp in hand, he
was locking up the house as mechanically as he
had fed his body; but one thing had pricked
him in the performance, and he tingled still
between gratitude and fresh grief. He had a
Scotch collie, Glen by name, a noble dog, that
was for ever at its master’s heels. 50, during
any service, the chain was a necessary evil; but
straight from his vestry, in cassock and biretta,
the rector would march to his backyard to release
the dog. To-day he had forgotten; nor was
it till the master’s round brought him to the
back premises that the poor beast barked itself
into notice. Then, indeed, the dazed man
realised that his outer ear had been calmly
listening to the barking for some time ; and, with
a small thing to be sorry for again, and one friend
37


Peccavi
behind him, he continued his round, a sentient
being once more.
It was upstairs that the dog barked afresh,
causing Carlton to snatch his head from the basin
of cold water in which he had sought to assuage
its fever, and to go over to his open window,
towel in hand. No sooner had he reached it than
he started back, and stood very still with the
water dripping from his beard. When he did dry
his face it was as though he wiped all colour
from it too. And it was six feet of quivering clay
that returned on tip-toe to that open window.
The new moon was setting behind the trees
towards Linkworth; there was no need of its
meagre light. Lanterns, bright lanterns, were
closing in upon the rectory: at first the unhappy
man had seen lanterns only, swinging close to
the ground, swilling the lawn with light. Stealthy
legs, knee-deep in this light, he remembered after
his recoil. But not till he had driven himself
back to the window did he see the set faces, or
realise the fury of his people, kindled against him
by his own confession of his own guilt.
When he saw this his nerve went, and he
stood with clasped hands, the perspiration bursting
from his skin. And the lanterns shook out into a
chain along the edge of the lawn, and were held
up to search the face of the house, all as yet
without a word.
“That’s his room,” whispered one at last;
“ that—where the light is ! ”
It was the voice of the schoolmaster, himself a
"8
O


Midsummer Night
churchwarden, and withal an honest creature who
was merely as many things as possible to as
many men. His part had been a little difficult
lately. “This has simplified it,” thought the
rector; and the twinge Of bitterness did him
good.
He was a man again for one moment; the
next, “He’s in his room,” cried another, aloud;
“ that’s him standing at the window ! ”
And there burst forth a howl Of execration,
that rose to a yell as the delinquent disappeared ‘
and in his panic put out the light.
“ You coward ! ”
“ Ah, you Skunk ! ”
“ Bloody Papist ! ”
“ Hypocrite ! ”
They were the better names; each shot his
own, and capped the last; the schoolmaster, mad
with excitement, blaspheming with the best.
“ Come down out of that, ye devil ! ”
“ DO you Show yourself, you cur ! ”
And this command Robert Carlton obeyed,
his manhood rising yet again. But no sooner
was he at the window than both panes crashed to
powder over his head, and the surrounding bricks
rang with the volley. The clergyman had a
scratch from the falling glass, and a stone stung
him on the hand. The blood bubbled in his
veins.
“ Cowards and curs yourselves!” he shouted
down, Shaking his fists at the crowd ; and in ten
seconds he was at the front door, with a couple
39


Peccavi
of walking-sticks snatched from the stand. But
he himself had turned the key and shot the bolt
within the last few minutes, and this gave him
time to think.
“ Quiet, sir—quiet ! " he cried t0 the dog at his
heels. “ They’ve right on their side,” he groaned,
“after all! Quiet, old doggie; come back; it’s
all deserved. And it’s only the beginning of
what we’ve got to bear ! "
So he bore it, sitting on the stairs, where no
window overlooked him, and soothing Glen with
one hand, restraining him with the other; and
yet, for his sin, despising his forbearance, even
while he continued telling himself it was his duty
to forbear.
And now breaking glass and barking dog made
night a nightmare in the dark and empty house:
the infuriated villagers were smashing the rectory
windows one by one. Where the blind was up,
the glass spread, and the stone flew far into the
room; where the blind was down, stone and
glass rattled against it, and fell in one heap with
one clatter. So dining-room and drawing-room
were wrecked in turn, at Short range, with the
heaviest available metal, and much interior
damage. And still the master of the house sat
immovable within, nodding grimly at each crash;
wincing more at the curses; and once releasing
the dog to stop his ears altogether.
It was no use; curiosity compelled him to
listen; he was forbidden to shirk one stripe.
And that was a communicant, that cursing
4o


Midsummer Night
demon; this was the schoolmaster, yelling like
one of his own boys; the other Palmer, of the
Plough and Harrow, a very old enemy, hoarse as
a. crow with drink and triumph. Young Cubitt,
again, who cheered each crash, was one of the
disaffected; but till to-night most of this howling
mob had been his flock. Now all the good work
was undone, was stultified, the good seed poisoned
in the ground; and not for the first, and not for
the fiftieth time that week, the confessed rake
asked himself whether more harm than good
would not come of his confession.
Meanwhile, of all the voices that he heard and
could distinguish, only one diverted his self-con-
tempt for an instant. This was the soft, passion-
less voice of a young gentleman, evidently not
himself engaged in the stone~throwing, pointing
out panes still to break to those who were. This
was the voice of Sidney Gleed.
The thing had gone on for ten minutes or more
when the outcry altered in character: an interrup-
tion had occurred: was it the police? No, the
rector of the parish was too well acquainted with
the character of its solitary constable. He would
come up when all was over. Then who could
this be P
The shower of stones had ceased as suddenly
as it had begun. New oaths were flying in a
new direction, and a voice hitherto unheard was
heaping abuse on the abusers; with a strange
thrill, the clergyman recognised it as the voice of
Tom Ivey, the young contractor who was building
41


Peccavi
the transepts ; and he could remain no longer on
the stairs. Stealing into the drawing-room, he
stumbled across a crackling drift of glass, and,
unnoticed now, stood in the wrecked bow-window,
with the fresh air upon his face once more.
Lanterns were skipping right and left, their
erratic rays giving momentary glimpses of a
stalwart figure in pursuit, a stick whirling about
his ears, and resounding on the backs and
shoulders of the retreating rabble. Some stayed
to stone the new foe before they ran; and one,
Palmer the publican, set his lantern on the
gravel and squared up in style. Robert Carlton
never saw what followed; for at this moment
his maddened dog, which had been tearing about
the house in search of an outlet, bounded
past him through the shattered window; and,
when the rout was complete, the innkeeper’s
lantern was a solitary star in the nether darkness.
Then the gate clattered, a swinging step ap-
proached, and Tom Ivey caught up the lantern in
his stride.
Carlton sprang through the window to meet
him, every other emotion sunk for the moment in
one of overflowing gratitude.
“Tom,” he cried, “how can I thank
you———?”
“ Keep your thanks to yourself.”
“But—Tom ”

“ Don’t ‘ Tom ’ me! Keep your distance too.
Do you think I haven’t heard about it ? Do you
think I’d lift a finger for you—let alone a stick?
42


Midsummer Night
No, sir, I’d liefer take that to your own back;
but I fare to mind when the Rector of Long Stow
was a good man, who didn’t preach too tall, but
acted up to what he did preach ; and I won’t see
the house he lived in wrecked and ruined because
a blackguard’s followed him.”
“ I am all that,” said Mr. Carlton. “ Go on ! ”
The other stared, not so much disarmed as
confounded.
“ I’m sorry to open so wide, and you know
I’m sorry,” he at length burst out. “’Tain’t for
me to call you over, sir, and I won’t tell you no
more lies. I couldn’t bear to see them snarling
curs setting on you the moment you was down,
and that’s the truth ! But it wasn’t what I come
back to say,” continued Ivey doggedly. "‘I
come back to say you can get another party to
go on with that there building, for I won’t work
no more for you. The plant’s yours ; you found
that for the job; you can find more men. I
throw up the contract : take the law of me if you
like.”
Robert Carlton was back in his study. It was
the one front room which had escaped inviolate ;
the open lattice had saved it; not a pebble
added to the old disorder. The rector sighed
relief as he held up the lamp on entering; then
he shot the rubbish out of the big arm-chair, and
himself lay back in it like the dead. A bloody
smear, where the glass had grazed his cheek,
enhanced his pallor; his eyes were closed; no
muscle moved. And yet his wits clung to him
43
'u
’1


Peccavi
like wolves, till presently the white brow wrinkled,
the heavy eyelids twitched.
“ May I come in, reverend ? ” said the saddler’s
voice.
Carlton assented with a sigh, but did not raise
himself to greet the visitor, who came in mopping
his forehead, reversed the chair at the writing table,
and seated himself with ominous deliberation.
Then he mopped again, and was slow to speak ;
but his scornful expression prepared the clergyman
for more of that which he was resolved to bear.
“ Pharisees ! ” cried Fuller at last. “ Humbugs
and hypocrites l”
The words were precisely those which Robert
Carlton expected and must endure, but against the
plural number he felt bound to protest. “ We are
not all alike, Mr. Fuller,” he said; “thank God,
I am but one out of many thousands.”
“ You ? ” cried the saddler. “ Gord love yer,
reverend, did you think I meant you .? No, sir,
it’s the stupid fools and canting cowards I mean,
that take and hit a man as soon as ever he’s
down ; not the man they hit.”
'Mr. Carlton sat silent, astounded, and tingling
between pain and pleasure. He fancied he had
run through the gamut of the emotions, but here
was a new one that he feared to dissect.
“ Not the man,” proceeded the saddler in
raised tones—“ not the man who is worth the
rest of the parish put together—saint or sinner—
guilty or innocent ! ”
Yes, it was pleasure! It was pleasure, acute
44


Midsummer Night
and lawless, wicked, ungovernable, and yet to be
governed. To have one man’s sympathy: how
sweet it was, but how shameful in a guilty heart
that would be contrite too! It had brought a
colour to his face, a light to his eyes ; ere the one
had faded, and the other failed, Robert Carlton’s
will had frozen that tiny rill of comfort at its
fount.
“ You mustn’t say that,” was his belated reply ;
but it came curt and cold enough to please
himself.
“ But I do say it,” cried old Fuller, “and I will
say it, and I won’t say a word more than I mean.
Let there be no mistake between us, reverend : I
don’t deny I felt what is felt when first I heard;
but when I come to think of it, that fared to
break my heart more’n to make that boil; and
when I thought a bit deeper, I see how easy that
is to make bad worse. Not as it ain’t right bad ;
but that wasn’t for us to make it worse. 50 it
was me fetched TOm Ivey. And now he tells me
what he ups and says himself when all was over.
‘ Gord love yer, Tom,’ says I, ‘you’ll be ashamed
of that when you’re a man of my experience!
You forget the good our reverend’s been doing
amongst us all his time, and you think only 0’
this here evil. I’ll go up,’ says I, ‘and I’ll Show
him there’s one fair-minded, level-headed man
0’ the world in this here hotbed o’ fools and
Pharisees.’ ”
“But Tom was right, and you were wrong.”
“Don’t tell me, reverend,” said the saddler,
45


Peccavi
edging his chair nearer to the long limp figure
under the lamp. “You can’t undo the good
you’ve once done, not if you try. Leave religion
out of it, and look at all you’ve done for the poor:
look at the coal club, and the book club, and the
dispensary, and the Young Man’s———”
“Unhappily, Fuller, all this is beside the
question.”
And the cold tone was no longer put on ; neither
did it cover an emotion which called for conscien-
tious suppression; for these officious sallies only
fretted the spirit they were intended to soothe.
“ Well, then,” rejoined Fuller, “ if you prefer it.
and for the sake of argument, look at a poor old
feller like me. What should I ha’ done without
you, reverend? I don’t come to church, yet you
take no offence when I tell you why, but you
argue the point like a rare ’un, and you lend me
the paper just the same. The Reverend Jackson
wouldn’t ha’ done it, though I durs’n’t stay away
in his day ; he’d have stopped my livelihood in a
week. So don’t you fare to make yourself out
worse than you are, reverend ; you’ve done wrong,
I allow, but so did Solomon, and so did David;
and weren’t so quick to own up to it, either!
Like them, you’ve done good, too, and plenty of
it, and that sha’n’t be forgotten if I can help it.
As for the poor young thing that’s gone "
“ Don’t name her, I beg ! ”
“ Very well, sir, I won’t. I’m as sorry as the
rest 0’ the parish; but we shouldn’t be unfair
because we’re sorry. They may say what they

46


Peccavi
He broke off, and stood at his door till the
quick steps stopped, and the gate clattered, and
the steps died away. The night was dark, and
this end of the village already very still: the
Plough and Harrow was nearer the other. The
wind had not fallen; a murmur of very distant
thunder came with it from the west. Nearer
home a peewit called, and Robert Carlton caught
himself wondering whether there would be rain
before morning.
48


V.
THE MAN ALONE.
AT midnight he was still alone, and the slow
torture of his own thoughts was still a relief. As
the dining-room clock struck—he noted its pre-
servation—and the thin strokes floated through
those broken windows and in at that of the Study,
he gave up listening for the next step. His
privacy seemed secure at last. He could abandon
his spirits to its proper torments; he could
enter upon another night in hell. Yet, even
now, the worst was over, and there would be no
more nights Of secret grief, secret remorse, secret
shame. He had confessed his sin, and thereby
earned his right to suffer. NO more to hide!
No more deceit! He could not realise it yet;
he only knew that his heart was lighter already.
He felt ashamed of the relief.
Yet another night came back to him as he
paced his floor: a last year’s night when the full
moon shone through ragged trees. It also had
been worse than this: it was the inner life that
lay in ruins then. He remembered pacing till
sunrise as he was pacing now: such a still
night but for that; one had but to stand and
49 E


Peccavi
listen to hear the very fall of the leaf. He
remembered thus standing, there at the door, in
the moonlight, and a line that had buzzed in his
head as he listened.
“And yet God has not said a word!”
God had spoken now.
And the man was glad.
Glad! He almost revelled in his disgrace;
it produced in him unexpected sensations—the
sensations of the debtor who begins to pay.
Here was an extreme instance of the things that
are worse to dream of than to endure. He felt
less ignominious in the hour of his public
ignominy than in all these months of secret
shame. He was living a single life once more.
The wind roamed at will through the damaged
house as through the ribs of a wreck; and its
ruined master drew himself up, and his stride
quickened with his blood. He was no longer
lording it in his pulpit, the popular preacher of
the countryside, drawing the devout from half a
dozen parishes, a revelation to the rustic mind, a
conscious libertine all the while, with a tongue of
gold and a heart of lead. More than all, he was
no longer the one to sit secure, in loathsome
immunity, in sickening esteem: he, the man!
The woman had suffered; it was his turn now.
Woman? The poor child . . .the poor, dead,
murdered child . . .Well! the wages of his
sin would be worse than death ; they were worse
already. And again the man was glad; but his
50


The Man Alone
momentary and strange exultation had ended in
an agony.
The poor, poor girl . . .
No; nothing was too bad for him—not even
the one thing that he would feel more than all
the rest in bulk. He put his mind on that one
thing. He dwelt upon it, wilfully, not in
conscious self-pity, but as one eager to meet his
punishment half-way, to shirk none of it. The
attitude was characteristic. The sacrificial spirit
informed the man. In another age and another
Church he had done barbaric violence to his own
flesh in the name of mortification. Living in
the latter half of the nineteenth century, a mere
Anglican, he was content to play tricks with a
fine constitution in Lent.
“ I will look my last upon it,” he said aloud:
“it would be insulting God and man to attempt
to take another service after this; I have held
my last, and laid my last stone. Let me see
what I have sown for others to reap.”
And he picked his way through the darkness
to the church.
The path intersected a narrow meadow with
the hay newly cut, and lying in tussocks under
the stars ; a light fence divided this reef of glebe
from the churchyard; and, just within the latter,
a lean-to shed faced the scaffolding of the north
transept, its back against the fence. The shed
was flimsy and small, but it had come out of the
rector’s pocket; the transepts themselves were
to be his gift, because the living was too good for
51 1; 2


Peccavi
a celibate priest, and it was his sermons that had
made the church too small. So he had paid for
everything, even to the mason’s tools inside the
shed, because Tom Ivey had never had a con-
tract before and lacked capital. And the out-
door interest of the building had formed a healthy
complement to the engrossing affairs of the
sanctuary; and, indeed, they had developed side
by side. Perhaps the material changes had
proved the more absorbing to one who threw
himself headlong into whatsoever he undertook.
Of late, especially, it had been remarked that the
reverend was taking quite an extraordinary part in
these proceedings : cultivating a knack he had of
carving in stone; neglecting cottages for his
mason’s shed ; and tiring himself out by day like
a man who dreads the night. How he had
dreaded it none had known, but now all might
guess.
Yet he had loved his work for its own sake, not
merely as a distraction from gnawing thoughts;
there was in him something of the elemental
artist: the making of anything was his passionate
delight. And now the scene of his industry
inflicted a pang so keen that he forgot to appre-
ciate it as part of his deserts; and, for the
moment, priest and sinner disappeared in the
grieving artist, bidding good-bye not only to his
studio, but to art itself. It was very dark; the
place was strewn with uncut boulders, poles,
barrows, heaps of rubble; but he knew his way
through the litter, and, in the double darkness of
52


The Man Alone
the shed, could lay his hand on anything he
chose. He took something down from a shelf.
It was a gargoyle of his own making, meant for
the vestry door in the south transept. He stood
with it in both hands, and his thumbs felt the eyes
and his palms the cheeks, at first as gently as
though the stone were flesh, then suddenly with
all his strength, as if to crush the grotesque head
to powder. It was not a useful thing: no water
could spout from the sham mouth which he had
wrought with loving pains. It was only his idea
for finishing off the label moulding of the vestry
door; it was only something he had made him.-
self—for others to throw away, or to keep and
show as the handiwork of the immoral 'Rector of
Long Stow. He restored it to his place; and
retraced his sure steps through the rubbish, artist
no more. Good-bye to that!
He crossed over to the church, went round to
the porch, and entered by the only door in use
during the alterations. Eighteen months ago he
would have found it locked. It was he who had
opened the House of God to all comers at all
hours, and made every sitting free. He stole .up
the aisle as one seeing in the dark. His feet fell
softly on the matting, where in early days they
had clattered on bare flags, and yet more softly
when they had mounted a step without stumbling.
The matting in the aisle was his addition, the rich
carpet in the chancel was his gift. All his innova-
tions had not provoked dissension. Presently he
lit a lamp, a Syrian treasure, highly wrought, that
53


Peccavi
hung over the lectern: he had bought it at
Damascus, years before, for his church when he
should have one. Yes; he had given freely to
God’s House, to make it also the House Beautiful,
though he took no trouble to adorn his own.
And this was to be the end ! For events could
take but one course now: a complaint to the
bishop (all the parish would Sign it), a summons
to the palace, a trial at the consistory court ; sus-
pension, certainly; deprivation, perhaps; he had
been at some pains to inform himself on the
subject. The bishop would be sore. He had
taken such an interest in everything at the con-
firmation, his sympathy had been so full and
unexpected, his approval so stimulating, so hearty
and frank! Carlton was ashamed of thinking Of
his bishop instead Of praying to God upon his
knees. He longed to kneel and pray, for the last
time, there at the table which he chose to call the
altar, but which he had found ugly and bare, and
was leaving richly laden and richly hung. In the
small and distant light of the lectern lamp he stood
gazing at the damask hangings, the green frontal,
the silver candlesticks, the flowers from his own
garden—the flowers he grew for this. He
longed to kneel, but could not. He could not
pray. He could not weep. His heart was a
grave, and the grave filled in and the weight Of
the earth upon his spirit. He had been quite
wrong an hour ago. T his was the blackest hour
of all. To have done and given SO much, and to
lose it all! To have set his whole soul for years
54


The Man Alone
towards the light, to have striven so to turn the
souls of others; and to be thrust into outer
darkness for one sin!
This wave of bitterness, of blind rebellion and
human egotism, bore him out of his church, for
the last time, in a passion of defiance and self-
defence: a sudden and deplorable change in such
a man at such an hour. Happily, it was short-
lived. His angry stride brought him tripping
into fresh earth, and he started back, aghast at
his egotism, stunned afresh by his sin, and over-
whelmed by such a flood of penitence and
remorse as even he had not endured before.
Under his eyes the new grave was growing
clearer in the starlight, and not less cruel, and
not less cold. An hour later he was still
kneeling over it, and his tears had not ceased
to flow.
U!
U!


VI.
FIRE.
\VITNEssss have differed as to the exact hour at
which the inhabitants of Long Stow, sound asleep
after excitement enough for one night, were
frightened from their beds by a sudden and
violent ringing of the church bells. The mid-
summer night was as dark as ever, and so it
remained or seemed to remain for a considerable
time. It cannot have been more than two o’clock.
A few minutes before the alarm, Robert Carlton
had forced himself to his feet, to be struck with
fresh shame at two apparent evidences of the mood
in which he had quitted the church. He had left
the door wide open and the church lit up. Every
stone showed on the path, in the stream of light
poured upon it from the porch, into which, how-
ever, it was impossible to see from where the
rector stood. The porch projected from the
south side, while the new grave was directly
opposite the west window, every square of which
stood out against the glare within. An instant’s
reflection showed Carlton that this could not be
the light which he had left; he went to see what
it was. A sudden heat upon his face broke the
56


Fire
truth to him in the porch, and in a stride he knew
the worst. A little fire was raging in the church:
two or three pews were in flames.
Robert Carlton stood inactive for a score of
seconds. It looked the kind of fire that a
vigorous man might have beaten out with his
coat. Yet one in the full vigour of his manhood
stood thinking a score of thoughts while the
flames bit through the varnish into the wood.
Nor was this the fascination of horror: the fire
looked such a little fire at the first glance. It was
rather the obsession of an astounding puzzle:
what in the world could have caused a fire at all?
A guilty feeling came in answer: he must have
dropped the match with which he lit that lamp.
The feeling escaped in the simultaneous discovery
that the lamp in question had been extinguished,
but that it and others were slightly awry, and one
or two still swaying on their chains, as though all
the lamps had been rudely meddled with. And
now horror came. The flames were spreading
with curious facility, shooting their blue tongues
over the woodwork before the yellow fangs took
hold, but all so quickly that the burning area
seemed to have doubled itself in these few
seconds, while from the heart of it there came
the crisp crackle of quicker fuel, culminating in a
blaze as though a rick had caught; and, sure
enough, as these flames leapt high, their source
was revealed in a pile of the rector’s new
straw hassocks.
The puzzle was one no more: plainer work of
57


Peccavi
incendiary was never seen. Through the smoke
now swinging in black coils to the roof, the east
window showed in holes made within the last
hour, obviously to promote the draught that blew
in Carlton’s face as he rushed back to the open
door and laid hold of all the bell-ropes at once.
The bells were small and jangling ; a new peal,
and a tower to hang them in, were among the
things which the rector had said that he would
have some day. But as the old bells clanged for
the last time, in the dead of that summer night,
they were heard at Linkworth, a mile and a half
across the wind, but down the wind they rang up
half Bedingfield, which is three good miles from
Long Stow.
The first inhabitant to reach the scene was the
fleet and sturdy Tom Ivey, whose mother kept the
post-office in the middle of the village ; as he ran
the ringing stopped, and the first glass smashed
with the heat, flame and smoke making a mouth-
piece of the mullioned window in the north wall
as Tom dashed up by the short cut through the
rectory garden. He was greatly alarmed at
finding no one in the churchyard, and rushed
into the church with the full expectation of
discovering the ringer senseless at his post.
What he did find was the rector standing within
the church, to windward of the conflagration, his
back to the door, absorbed, as it seemed, in a
perfectly passive contemplation of the fire.
“ Mr. Carlton ! ” shouted Tom.
Before replying, the clergyman spun something
58


Fire
into the heart Of the flames; in the thickening
smoke it was impossible to see what; but the
same second he was round upon his heel, cough-
ing and choking, his face black, his eyes fires
themselves, purpose and determination in every
limb.
“ Tom? Thank God it’s you ! We must get
this under. Out of it before we suffocate!”
And with his own rush he carried the builder into
the open air.
“ What’s done it, Sir ? ”
“ Done it? Wait till we’ve undone it! We
can if we work together. Ah ! here are more of
you. Buckets, men—buckets ! ” cried Carlton,
rushing to meet a half-dressed medley at the
gate, and commanding them as though there had
been no other meeting earlier in the night.
“You who live near, run for your own ; the rest
into my kitchen and find what you can; buckets
are the thing! One of you pump ; the rest form
line from my well to the church, and keep passing
along. You see to it, Mr. jones ! ”
And for a while the schoolmaster and church-
warden, carried away as usual by his feelings and
self-importance, was as busy enforcing the rector’s
orders as he had made himself in breaking his
windows an hour or two before.
“Let one man ride or run for the Lakenhall
engine; not you, Tom!” exclaimed the clergy-
man, seizing Ivey by the arm. “They’ll be all
night coming, and I can’t spare you.”
“ I’ll stay, sir.”
59


Peccavi
“Water’s no use to windward of a fire; it’s
spreading straight up the church. We want to
be on the other side to stop it.”
“ The aisle’s not afire ! ”
“ But they couldn’t get the water to us, even if
we got through alive. No ; where the walls are
down for the transepts—that’s the place. Which
side’s boarded strongest P”
“ Both the same, sir.”
“ Then we’ll hack through the nearest! A
saw and an axe, and we’ll be through by the time
the first bucketful’s ready for us.” ,
And, friends again, but both unconscious of the
change, they rushed together to the shed of which
Robert Carlton had so lately taken leave : in the
fever of the moment even that leave-taking was
forgotten.
It was the north transept which faced the shed.
Already the walls were a dozen feet high, but
a doorway had been left. The greater gap
between transept and nave was vertically boarded
over within the church, and on these boards fell
the rector with his axe, to make an opening for
Tom’s saw. They had light enough for their
work. The interstices between the boards were
as the red-hot strings of a colossal harp; quickly
a couple were cut, and the boards beaten in; and
it was as though the wind had come down a
smoking chimney. The pair fell back on either
side of the black stream that gushed out like
water. Then cried Carlton in his voice of
command :
6o


Peccavi
“You see that ?” said Mr. Carlton, pointing to
this moisture.
“ What is it ?”
“Paraffin! Look at the lamps; he’s simply
emptied them ”
“Who, sir—who ? ”
“God knows, and may God forgive him! I
have enemies enough this morning, though not
more than I deserve. If only they will be my
friends for one hour, for the sake of the church!
Are they never coming with that water? Run
and tell them a bucketful would make a difference
now, but cartloads will make none in ten more
minutes! And tell them what I said just now:
bid them for God’s sake think of nothing but the
fire till we get it under.”
He was thinking of nothing else himself, con-
fident still of some measure of success, only fret-
ting for his water. In Ivey’s absence be stripped
to the waist, and with his long coat essayed to
beat the little flames out as they spread and
leapt, the blue and yellow surf of the encroaching
tide; but for one he extinguished he fanned a
hundred, so he retreated before he was flayed
alive. And they found him stooping near the
opening, half-naked, scorched, begrimed, but not
disheartened; a strange figure in the place that
knew him best in vestments, if any of them
thought of that.
The first man had a bucket in each hand, but
had spilt freely from both in his haste. Carlton
would not let him in, but received the buckets

62


Peccavi
already he had Shaken the dust of Long Stow
from his feet for good.
Thus, of the three types, as far removed from
one another as the points of an equilateral triangle,
who had put in their individual word of reproach,
of denunciation, and of sympathy more insuffer-
able than either, only one was present On this lurid
scene; but that one was doing the wOrk of ten. '
“ That there Tom Ivey," said one of a group
on the safe side of the rectory fence, “he fares
all of a wash. Yet I do hear as how he come
up to the rectory when he’d cleared the garden
and called Carlton over somethun wonderful.”
“ I lay it was nothun to the calling over he had
from jasper.”
“Where is jasper ?”
“Been indoors ever since: a touch of the
old trouble, the missus told jones when he
called.”
“That’s a pity.
sore.”
One or two observed that that fared to soothe
theirs ; for there was no reaction on the safe side
of the fence. But the worst said in the Suffolk
tongue was invariably capped by a different order
of voice, which chimed in now.
“ The best thing Carlton can do is to cockle up
with his church. The governor’ll build you a
new church and find a new man to fill it. There’s
nobody keener on a change as it is. I should
like to be there when he hears . . .”
The speaker was smoking a cigarette on a
This would’ve soothed his
I
O
b
64


Fire
barrow wheeled from the shed. He might have
been watching a display of fireworks, and one
which was beginning to bore him. His unmoved
eye sought change. It found the sexton hobbling
in the glare.
“ Hi, Busby ! Come here, I want you.
What the dickens do you mean by setting fire to
' the church?”
“ Me set fire to it, Master Sidney P Me set a
church afireP He! he! you allus fare to have
yer laugh.”
“ It will be no laughing matter for you when
you’re run in for it, Busby.”
“ Go on, Master Sidney; you know better
than that.”
“ I wish I did. They hang for arson, you
know ! But I say, Busby, how’s the frog?"
The wizened face grew grave, but only as the
screen darkens between the pictures ; next instant
it was alight with the ineffable joy of gratified
monomania. The sexton hobbled nearer, clawing
his vest.
“Oh, that croap away; that’s at that now!
Would ’ee like to listen, Master Sidney P”
“ No, thanks, Busby; don’t you undo a button,”
said the young gentleman, hastily. “I can hear
it from where I am.”
The sexton went into senile raptures.
“ You can hear it P You can hear it? Do you
all listen to that: he can hear it, he can hear it
from where he sit. The little varmin, to croap so
loud ! That must be the fire. That fare to
65 F


Peccavi
make him blink) An’ Master Sidney, he can
hear him from where he sit!”
The sexton hurried off to spread his triumph ;
but he boasted to deaf ears. There was a sudden
light below the sharp horizon between black roof
and slaty sky, yet no flame rose above the roof.
It was as though the southern eaves had caught.
Ivey rushed out of the north transept. Mr.
Carlton followed, axe in hand. His chest and
arms were smudged and inflamed, his blinking
eyelids were burnt bare, and the sweat stood
all over him in the red light leaping from the
shivered windows.
“It’s no use, lads!” he called to those still
running with the buckets; “the boards have
caught on the other side. Come and help me
smash them in, and we may save the chancel yet!
Every man who is a man,” he shouted to the
group across the fence, “come—lend a hand to
save God’s sanctuary! ”
And he led the way with his axe, stinging to
the waist in the open air, but drunk with battle
and the battle’s joy. And there was no more
talking behind the rectory fence; not a man was
left there to talk; even Sidney Gleed had dropped
his cigarette to follow the inspired madman with
the axe.
The south transept was a stage less advanced
than the north. Carlton got upon one low wall,
ran along it to that of the nave, and swung his
axe into the burning wood to his right. A rent
was quickly made ; he leapt into the transept and
66


Fire
improved it, his axe ringing the seconds, the
muscles of his back bulging and bubbling beneath
the scorched skin. Men watched him open-
mouthed. It seemed incredible that such nerve,
such sinew, such indomitable virility, should have
hidden from their vengeance that very night.
“ A ladder ! ” he cried. “There’s one behind
the shed."
The wood screen was rent, but not to the top.
Below, the fire was checked, but above it still
crawled east. Waiting for the ladder, Carlton
employed himself in widening the gap that he
had made; when it came, he had it held vertically
against the eaves, left intact above the boarding,
and ran up to finish his own work with the axe
held short in his left hand. A couple of planks
were smashed in unburnt. He stayed on the
ladder to see whether the flames would leap the
completed chasm, stayed until the rungs smoked
under his nose. When the burning boards fell in
on his left, and those on his right did not even
smoulder, he returned quickly to the ground.
Throats which had groaned that night were
parching for a cheer. The time was not ripe. A
shrill cry came instead: the boarding upon the
other side had ignited in its turn.
“Round with the ladder,” cried the rector;
“we’ll soon have it out. We know more about
it now. We’ll save the chancel yet! Find
another axe; we’ll begin top and bottom at
once.”
And now the scene was changing every minute.
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Peccavi
A sky of slate had become a sky of lead. The
tens who had witnessed the first stages of the fire
had multiplied into hundreds. Frightened birds
were twittering in the trees; frightened horses
neighed in the road; every kind of vehicle but a
fire-engine had been driven to the scene. Among
the graves stood a tall and aged gentleman, with
the top-hat of his youth crammed down to his
snowy eyebrows, and an equally obsolete top-
coat buttoned up to his silver whiskers, in con-
versation with Sidney Gleed.
“The damned rascal!” said the old gentle-
man. “ But how the devil did it come out ? ”
“ Musk seems to have smelt a rat, and went to
him after the funeral. And he owned up as bold
as brass; the servants heard him. There he
goes, up the ladder again on this side. Keeps the
fun to himself, don’t he? Who’s going to win
the Leger, doctor ? Shotover again ?”
“Damn the Leger,” said Dr. Marigold, whose
sporting propensities, bad language, and good
heart were further constituents in the most
picturesque personality within a day’s ride. “ To
think I should have stood at her death-bed,”
he said, “and would have given ten pounds to
know who it was; and it’s your High Church
parson of all men on God’s earth! The infernal
blackguard deserves to have his church burnt
down ; but he’s got some pluck, confound him.”
“Sucking up,” said Master Sidney: “playing
to the gallery while he’s got the chance.”
“ H’m,” said the doctor ; “looks to me pretty
68


Fire
badly burnt about the back and arms. If he
wasn’t such a damned rascal I’d order him
down.”
“He’s doing no good,” rejoined the young
cynic, “and he knows it. He’s only there for
effect. Look ! There’s the roof catching, as
any fool knew it must; and here’s the Lakenhall
engine, in time for ‘God save the Queen.’”
Dr. Marigold swore again : his good heart con-
tained no niche for the heir to the Long Stow
property. He turned his back on Sidney, his face
to the sexton, who had been at his elbow for some
time.
“ Well, Busby, what are you bothering about ?”
“The frog, doctor. That croap louder than
ever.”
“You infernal Old humbug ! Get out! ”
“ But that’s true, doctor—that’s Gospel truth.
DO you stoop down and you’ll hear it for yourself.
Master Sidney, lze heard it where he sit.”
“ Did he, indeed l Then he’s worse than you.”
“ But that steal every bit I eat; that do, that
do,” whined the sexton. “I’ve tried salts, I’ve
tried a ’metic, an’ what else can I try? That fare
to know such a wunnerful lot. Salts an’ ’metics,
not him ! He look t’other way, an’ hang on
like grim death for the next bit 0’ meat. That’s
killin’ me, doctor. That’s worse nor slow poison.
That steal every bite I eat.”
“Well, it won’t steal this,” said the doctor,
dispensing half-a-crown. “ Now get away to bed,
you Old fool, and don’t bother me.”
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Peccavi
And neither thanks nor entreaties would divert
his eyes from the burning church again.
The antiquated doctor was one of Nature’s
sportsmen: his inveterate sympathies were with
the losers of up-hill games and games against
time; and this blackguard parson had played his
like a man, only to lose it with the thunder of
the fire-engine in his ears. The roof had caught
at last ; in a little it would be blazing from end to
end ; and half-a-dozen country fire-engines, and half
a hundred Robert Carltons, could do no good
now. Carlton came slowly enough down his
ladder this time, and stood apart with his heard
on his chest.
“Hard lines, hard lines ! ” muttered Dr. Mari-
gold in his top-coat collar; and “ Those slow
fools! Those sleepy old women!” with his
favourite participle in each ejaculation.
A sky of lead had turned to one of silver.
Across the open uplands, beyond the conflagra-
tion, a kindlier glow was in the east. And in the
broad daylight the fire reached its height with
as small effect as the firemen plied their water.
Nothing could check the roof. Ceiling, joists,
and slates burnt up like good fuel in a good
grate. Now it was a watershed of living fire;
now an avalanche of red-hot ruin; now a column
of smoke and sparks, rising out of blackened
walls ; -a column unbroken by the Wind, which
had fallen at dawn with a little rain, the edge of
a shower that had shunned Long Stow.
When the roof fell in there were few of the
70


Fire
hundreds present who had not retreated out of
harm’s way. Only the helmed firemen held their
ground, and two others with bare heads. Of the
pair, one was standing dazed, with his beard on
the rough coat thrown about him, and an ear deaf
to his companion’s entreaties, when the crash
came and the sparks flew high and wide through
rent walls and gaping windows. The sparks
blackened as they fell. The first smoke lifted.
And the dazed man lay upon his face, the other
kneeling over him.
Dr. Marigold came running, for all his years
and his long top-coat.
“ Did anything hit him, Ivey ? ”
“ Not that I saw, sir; but he fared as if he’d
fainted on his feet, and when the roof went, why,
so did he.”
Marigold knelt also, and a thickening ring
enclosed the three.
“ He’s rather nastily burnt, poor devil.”
And the old doctor lifted a leaden wrist, felt
it in a sudden hush, examined a burn upon the
same arm, and looked up through eyebrows like
white moustaches.
“But not dangerously, damn him ! ”
71


VII.
THE SINNER’s PRAYER.
THE bishop of the diocese sat at the larger of
the two desks in the palace library. It was
the thirteenth of the following month, and a wet
forenoon. At eleven o’clock his lordship was
intent upon a sheet of unlined foolscap, with
sundry notes dotted down the edge, and the
rest of the leaf left blank. The bishop’s sight
was failing, but against glasses he had set his face.
So his whiskers curled upon the paper; and the
wide mouth between the whiskers was firmly
compressed; and this compression lengthened a
clean-shaven upper lip already unduly long. But
the pose displayed a noble head covered with
thin white hair, and the broad brow that was
the casket of a broad mind. Seen at his desk,
the massive head and shoulders suggested both
strength and stature above the normal. Yet the
bishop on his legs was a little man who limped.
And the surprise of this discovery was not the
last for an observer: for the little lame man
had a dignity independent of his inches, and a
majesty of mind which lost nothing, but gained in
72


The Sinner’s Prayer
prominence, by the constant contrast of a bodily
imperfection.
The bishop stood up when his visitor was
announced, a minute after eleven, and supported
himself with one hand while he stretched the
other across his desk. Carlton took it in con-
fusion. He had expected that shut mouth and
piercing glance, but not this kindly grasp. He
was invited to sit down. The man who complied
was the ghost of the Rector of Long Stow, as his
spiritual overseer remembered him. His whole
face was as white as his forehead had been on the
day of the fire. It carried more than one still
whiter scar. Yet in the eyes there burnt, brighter
than ever, those fires of zeal and of enthusiasm
which had warmed the bishop’s heart in the past,
but which somewhat puzzled him now.
“I am sorry,” said his lordship, “that you
should have such weather for what, I am sure,
must have been an undertaking for you, Mr.
Carlton. You still look far from strong. Before
we begin, is there nothing ”
Carlton could hear no more. There was nothing
at all. He was quite himself again. And he spoke
with some coolness ; for the other’s manner, despite
his mouth and his eyes, was almost cruel in its un-
expected and undue consideration. It was less than
ever this man’s intention to play upon the pity of
high or low. He had an appeal to make before he
went, but it was not an appeal for pity. Mean~
while his back stiffened and his chest filled in the
intensity of his desire not to look the invalid.

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Peccavi
“In that case,” resumed the bishop, “I am
glad that you have seen your way to keeping the
appointment I suggested. In cases of complaint——
more especially a complaint of the grave character
indicated in my letter—I make it a rule to see the
person complained of before taking further steps.
That is to say, if he will see me; and I don’t
think you will regret having done so, Mr. Carlton.
It may give you pain-—”
Carlton jerked his hands.
“ But you shall have fair play l ”
And his lordship looked point-blank at the
bearded man, as he had looked in his day on
many a younger culprit; and his voice was the
peculiar voice that generations of schoolboys had
set themselves to imitate, with less success than
they supposed.
Carlton bowed acknowledgment of this
promise. ,
“In the questions which Ifeel compelled to
put "—and the bishop glanced at his Sheet of fools-
cap—“you will perhaps give me credit for study—
ing your feelings as far as is possible in the
painful circumstances. I shall try not to leave
them more painful than I find them, Mr. Carlton.
But the complaint received is a very serious one,
and it is not made by one person; it has very
many signatures; and it necessitates plain speak-
ing. It iS a fact, then, that you are the father
of an illegitimate child born on the twentieth of
last month in your own parish ?”
“ It is a fact, my lord.”
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The Sinner’s Prayer
“And the woman is dead ?”
“The young girl—is dead.”
The bishop’s pen had begun the descent of
the Clean part of his page Of foolscap; when the
last answer was inscribed, the writer looked up,
neither in astonishment nor in horror, but with
the clear eye and the serene brow of the ideal
judge.
“Of course,” said he, “I am informed that
you have already made the admission. Let there
be no affectation or misunderstanding between
us, on that or any other point. But as your
bishop, and at least hitherto your friend, I desire
to have refutation or confirmation from your own
lips. You are at perfect liberty to deny me
either. It will make no difference to the ultimate
result. That, as you know, will be out of my
hands.”
“ I desire to withhold nothing, my lord,” said
Robert Carlton in a firm voice.
“Very well. I think we understand each
other. This poor young woman, I gather, was
the daughter of a prominent parishioner ? ”
“ Of a prominent resident in my parish——
yes.”
“ But She herself was conspicuous in parochial
work? Is it a fact that she played the organ in
church ? ”
“ It is.”
The fact was noted, the pen laid down; and
the little old man, who looked only great across
his desk, leant back in his chair.
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Peccavi
“I am exceedingly anxious that you should
have fair play. Let me say plainly that these are
not my first inquiries into the matter. I am
informed—I wish to know with what truth—that
the young woman disappeared for several months
before her death P "
“ It is quite true."
“ And returned to give birth to her child ? ”
“And to die!" said Carlton, in his grim
determination neither to shield nor to spare him-
self in any of his answers. But his hands were
clenched, and his white face glistened with his
pain.
The bishop watched him with an eye grown
mild with understanding, and a heart hot with
mercy for the man who had no mercy on himself.
But the tight mouth never relaxed, and the
peculiar voice was unaltered when it broke the
silence. It was the voice of justice, neither kind
nor unkind, severe nor lenient, only grave,
deliberate, matter-of-fact.
“ My next question is dictated by information
received, or let me say by suspicions communi-
cated. It is a vital question; do not answer
unless you like. It is, however, a question that
will infallibly arise elsewhere. Were you, or
were you not, privy to this poor young woman’s
disappearance P”
“ Before God, my lord, I was not ! ”
“I understand that her parents had no idea
where she was until the very end. Had you none
either ? ”
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The Sinner’s Prayer
“ N o more than they had. We were equally
in the dark. We believed that she had gone to
stay with a friend from the village—a young
woman who had married from service, and was
settled near London. It was several weeks
before, we discovered that her friend had never
seen her.”
“And all this time you did not suspect her
condition ? ”
“ Yes; then I did; but not before.”
“ She made no communication before she
went away ? ”
“ None whatever to me—none whatever to
my knowledge.”
“ And this was early in the year? ”
“She left Long Stow in January, and we had
no news of her till the middle of June, when
strangers communicated with her father.”
Again the bishop leant over his foolscap.
“ Did you ever offer her marriage ?” he asked
abruptly.
“ Repeatedly! ”
The clear eyes looked up.
“ Did you not tell her father this ? "
“ N o; I couldn’t condescend to tell him,” said
Carlton, flushing for the first time. “ My lord, I
have made no excuses. There are none to make.
That was none at all.”
His lordship regarded the changed face with
no further change in his own.
“ So you loved her,” he said softly, after a
pause.
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Peccavi
“ Ah ! if only I had loved her more ! ”
“If excuse there could be . . . love . . . is
some.”
It was the old man murmuring, as old men
will, all unknown to the bishop and the judge.
“ But I want no excuses ! ” cried Carlton,
wildly. “ And let me be honest now, whatever I
have been in the past; if I deceived myself and
others, let me undeceive myself and you! Oh,
my lord, that wasn’t love! It’s the bitterest
thought of all, the most shameful confession of
all. But love must be something better; that
can’t be love! It was passion, if you like; it
was a passion that swept me away in the pride of
my strength; but, God forgive me, it was not
love ! ” - \
He hid his face in his writhing hands; and,
with those wild eyes off him, the bishop could no
longer swallow his compassion. The lines of his
mouth relaxed, and lo, the mouth was beautiful.
A tender light suffused the aged face, and behold,
the face was gentle beyond belief.
“ Love is everything,” the old man said ; “ but
even passion is something, in these cold days of
little lives and little sins. And honesty like yours
is a great deal, Robert Carlton, though your sin
be as scarlet, and the Blood of our Blessed Lord
alone can make you clean.”
Carlton looked up swiftly, a new solicitude in
his eyes.
“ In me it was scarlet: not in her. She loved
. . . she loved. Oh, to have loved as well—to have
78


The Sinner’s Prayer
that to remember! . . . She thought it would spoil
my life; and I never guessed it was that! But now
I know, I know! It was for my sake she went
away . . . poor child . . . poor mistaken heroine!
She died for me, and I cannot die for her. Isn’t
that hard ? I can’t even die for her! ”
His bodily weakness betrayed itself in his
swimming eyes; in the night of his agony no
tear had dimmed them before men. But his will
was not all gone. \Vith clenched fists, and locked
jaw, and beaded brow, he fought his weakness,
while the good bishop sat with his head on his
hand, and closed eyes, praying for a brother in the
valley of despair. When he opened his eyes, it
was as though his prayer was heard ; for Robert
Carlton was bearing himself with a new bravery ;
and the incongruous unquenched fires, which had
caused surprise at the outset of the interview, burnt
brightly as before in the younger eyes. The Old
man met them with a sad, grave scrutiny. But
the lines of his mouth remained relaxed. And,
when he spoke again, his voice was very gentle.
“You may think that I have put you to
unnecessary pain,” he said, “when I give you
fair warning that your case must form the subject
of further proceedings in another place. But I
had heard that your conduct was indefensible,
root and branch, from beginning to end. Of that
I am now able to form my own opinion. Yet
my individual opinion can make no difference in
the result, since absolute deprivation I had never
contemplated in your case, and it is only the
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Peccavi
extreme penalty which rests with me. On the
other hand, it will be my duty to set the ecclesias-
tical law in motion; and the ecclesiastical law
must take its course. I take it that you do not
propose to defend your case P”
A grim light flickered for an instant in Robert
Carlton’s eyes. “Have I defended it hitherto,
my lord P”
“ Then there can onlybe one result ; and you
must make up your mind, as you have doubtless
already done, to suspension for a term of years.
If word of mine can lessen that term, it shall be
spoken in your favour, both out of consideration
of the great work that you were doing, and have
done, and in view of certain circumstances which
our conversation has brought to light.”
“ But can you want me back in the Church P”
cried Carlton; and his heart beat high with the
question; but turned heavier than before in the
interval of prudent deliberation which preceded
any answer.
“ I would punish no man beyond the letter of
the law,” declared the bishop at length, “even if
it were in my power to do so. The Act debars
suspended clergymen from all exercise of their
divine calling and from all pecuniary enjoyment
of their benefice until the term of such suspension
is up. I would not, if I could, prolong the period
of disability by throwing further let or hindrance
in the way of an erring brother who repents him
truly of his sin. I would rather say, ‘ Come back
to your work, live down the past, and, by your
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The Sinner’s Prayer
example in the years that may be left you, pluck
up the tares that your bad example has surely
sown. Retrieve all but the irretrievable. Undo
what you can.’ ”
Carlton’s eyes melted in gratitude too great for
speech, but plain as the benediction which his
trembling lips left eloquently unsaid.
“That,” continued the bishop, “is what I
should say to you—because I think we understood
each other. You have not sought to palliate your
offence; nor are you the man to misconstrue the
little I may have said concerning the offence
itself. What is there to be said? You know
well enough that I lament it as I lament its
mournful result, and deplore it as I deplore the
blot on the whole body of Christ’s Church militant
here on earth. You have committed a great sin,
against humanity, against God, and against your
Church; yet he would commit a greater who
sought on that account to hound you from that
Church for ever. Courage, brother ! Pray with-
out ceasing. Look forward, not back; and do
not despair. Despair is the devil’s best friend;
better give way to deadly sin than to deadlier
despair! Remember that you have done good
work for God in days gone by ; and live for that
brighter day when you have purged your sin, and
may be worthy to work for Him again.”
“And meanwhile?” whispered Carlton, for
fear of shouting it in his passionate anxiety. “ Is
there nothing I may do meanwhile—among my
own poor people—before the tares come up P”
St G


Peccavi
“If you are suspended you will be unable to
hold any service; and I hardly think you will
care to go among your parishioners while that
is so.” '
“But I shall not be forbidden my own
parish ? ”
“ Not forbidden.”
“ Nor my rectory ?”
“No; so far as I am aware, at least, you
retain your right to reside there; but I can hardly
think that it would be expedient.”
“And the church! They must have their
church back again. Who is going to rebuild it
for them ?”
Carlton was on his feet in the last excitement.
The bishop regarded him with puzzled eyebrows.
“I have heard nothing on that subject as
yet; it is a little early, is it not ? But I have no
doubt that it will be a matter for subscription
among themselves.”
“ Among my poor people ? ”
I “With substantial aid, I should hope, from
men of subsrance in the neighbourhood.”
“But why should they pay?” cried Carlton,
impetuously. “ The church was not burnt down
for my neighbours’ sins, nor for the sins of the
parish, but for mine alone . . . Oh, my lord, if I
could but go back among my people, and be their
servant, I who was too much their master before!
I was not quite dependent—thank God, I had a
little of my own—but every penny should be
theirs ! ”
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The Sinner’s Prayer
And the profligate priest stood upright before
his bishop—his white hands clasped, his white
face shining, his burning eyes moist—zealot and
suppliant in one.
“ You desire to spend your income——-—’
“ N o, no, my capital ! ”
“On the poor of your parish? I-I fail to
understand.”
“And I scarcely dare make you!” confessed
Carlton, his full voice failing him. “I so fear
your disapproval ; and I could set my face against
all the world, but against you never, much less
after this morning . . . Oh, my lord, I have set
my poor people a dastardly example, and brought
cruel shame upon my cloth; for its sake and for
theirs, if not for my own, let me at least leave
among them a tangible sign and'symbol of my
true repentance. I have the chance! I have
such a chance as God alone in His infinite mercy
could vouchsafe to a miserable sinner. My church
at Long Stow has been burnt down through me——-
through my sin—to punish me—-——”
“ Are you sure of that, Mr. Carlton ? ”
“I know it, my lord. And I want to do
what only seems to me my bounden and my
obvious duty, and to do it soon.”
' The bishop looked enlightened but amazed.
“You would rebuild the church out of your
own pocket ? Is that really your wish ? ”
“It is my prayer! "
Y
83 oz


The Lord of the Manor
The reason for the step may be related as
characteristic of the man. Age had given the
firm a certain aristocracy of degree—not of kind—
even age could not soften the fact that Gleed &
Son sold things in tins. And the tins it was
that turned plain Gleed & Son into Gleed & Son,
Limited. Some innovator was making tins with
cunning openers attached; the lesser firms jumped
at the improvement. The lesser firms were
already doing Gleeds some slight damage in
their go-ahead little way; but the worst they
could all do together was as nothing compared
with the extra expenditure of an appreciable
fraction of a farthing per tin on an output of
millions in the year. Wilton Gleed could not
face the immediate hole in his profits. He had
never taken a risk in his life, and was not
going to begin. He had increased his expenses
by going into Parliament, and he was not such a
fool as to play tricks with his income. He faced
the Situation as though it were ruin staring him
in the face, and lost a discernible measure of
flesh before his big resolve. It was all he did
lose over the ultimate operation. He retired into
private and public life with more money than he
knew how to spend.
The average man is at his best as host, and
in that capacity Wilton Gleed was popular among
his friends. He was an excellent sportsman of
the selfish sort; cherished a contempt for the
various games which involve playing for one’s
side; but was a first-rate shot, a fine fisherman,
35


Peccavi
and a good rider spoilt by his great principle of
refusing the risks. To shoot and dine with him
was to see Gleed at his very best. He was a bald
little man, with silver-sandy moustache and close-
cropped whiskers; but his full-blooded face was
still pink with health, his fixed eye unerring as
ever, his step elastic as the heather he loved to
tread. Gun in hand, in his tweeds and gaiters,
and with his cap pulled well over his head,
Wilton Gleed never passed the prime of life; it
was late in the evening before he collected the
years blown away on the moor; and in its way
the evening was as delectable as the day. The
dinner was a good one, and the host aban-
doned himself to its joys with a schoolboy’s
ardour. lrreproachable champagne flowed like
water, more especially at the head of the table.
Gleed carried it like a gentleman, also the port
that followed, though a little inclined to be
garrulous about the latter. As he sipped and
gossiped, and settled the Eastern Question in two
words, and Mr. Gladstone’s hash in one, the skin
would shine as it tightened on the bald head, and
the always intent eye would fix the listener beyond
the needs of the conversation. It was very seldom,
however, that a syllable slid out of place, or that
Wilton Gleed went to bed looking quite his age.
For some years he had leased various shoot-
ings in the autumn, spending the other seasons
at a lordly but suburban retreat inherited from
his father, with an occasional swoop abroad—the
correct place at the correct time~—less for enjoy-
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The Lord of the Manor
ment than for other reasons. Gun, rod, and
cellar were what he did enjoy, and of these
delights he vowed to have his fill after getting
out of Gleeds with unexpected spoils. A sporting
estate was in the market within two hours and a
half of town; and for forty thousand pounds
Wilton Gleed became squire of Long Stow,
patron of an excellent living, and a large land-
owner in a country where he had a nucleus of
friends and soon made more. As Member of
Parliament for that division of London in which
Gleeds had employed hundreds of hands for half
a hundred years, he at the same time bought a
house in town, and let the place outside. Subtler
investments followed. The man was becoming a
gambler in his old age; but he played his own
game with ineradicable care and foresight, and
rose Sir Wilton Gleed when his side lost in the
General Election of 1880. It was only a knight-
hood, and Sir Wilton might have entertained
justifiable hopes of his baronetcy ; but one or the
other had been a moral certainty for some time.
It was in Hyde Park Place that Sir Wilton first
heard of the Long Stow scandal and its imme-
diate sequel. The news came in a few dry lines
from Sidney, by the first post on the Monday
morning, June 26, 1882. It fell like a firebrand
in a keg of gunpowder. Sir Wilton, however,
had even better reasons than were obvious for his
paroxysm of rage and indignation; personal
mortification was not the least of his emotions.
He would have gone down by the next train to
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Peccavi
“ horsewhip the hound within an inch of his life,”
but the cur had taken refuge in Lakenhall
‘ Infirmary, “ with very little the matter with him,”
in Sidney’s words. And just then the House
was an Aceldama which no good soldier could
desert for a night, with the Government satis-
factorily on the spit between Phoenix Park and
Alexandria, and the Opposition creeping up vote
by vote. Sir Wilton decided to run down on the
Wednesday for twenty-four hours, and talked of
having the rectory furniture thrown into the
street if the rector was not there to take it and
himself away for good. Sir Wilton had his own
impression as to his powers as patron of the
living, and he very naturally swore that he would
“have that blackguard out of it ” within the
week. A friend at the Carlton put him right on
the point. .
“You ’can’t do that, Gleed. A living’s like
nothing else. My lord gives, but my lord can’t
take away."
“ Then what on earth am I to do?”
“ Get him inhibited and make him resign. It
will come to the same thing.”
The fire was in all the newspapers, with the
hint of a scandal at the end of the paragraph.
Among those who spoke to Sir Wilton on the
subject was a jaunty politician who had never yet
recognised him at the club.
“Sir Wilton Gleed, I think? I fancy we have
met before ?”
“ Indeed, my lord ?”
ll
88


The Lord of the Manor
It was the noble who had chosen to forget the
circumstance hitherto ; to-day he was all courtesy
and confidential concern. What was this about
the church that had been burnt down? He had
heard it was on the other’s estate. Sir Wilton
professed to know no more as yet than the papers
told him.
“I ask because it reads to me—don’t you
know ? Some scandal what? And I’m sorry
to say—fellow Carlton—sort of connection of
mine.”
“ To be sure,” said Sir Wilton. “ I remember
hearing it.”
“Odd fish, I’m afraid. Here in town for
years, at that ritualistic shop across the park
—forget my own name next. Might have had a
good time if he’d liked. Never went out. Pre-
ferred the mews. Made a speciality of footmen
and fellows. Had a night club somewhere,
where he taught ’em to box, and brought my own
man home himself one night with an eye like
your boot. It was about the only time we met.
Remember hearing he could preach, though;
only hope he hasn’t been making a fool of
himself down there! ”
“I hope not also,” said the discreet knight;
“ but I am going down to-morrow, so I shall hear.”
He went down very grim: for Robert Carlton
had not only been a thorn in his side that twelve-
month past; he actually stood for the one false
move, of importance, which Sir Wilton Gleed was
conscious of having made in all his life. Yet he

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Peccavi
had taken no step with more complete confidence
and self-approval. A gentleman and man Of brain,
reported by Lady Gleed and their daughter, and
duly admitted by himself, to be the best preacher
they had ever heard; a man of family into the
bargain, and not such a distant cadet as the head
of that family implied; could any combination
have promised a more suitable successor to the
venerable sportsman who had scorned white ties
and caught his death coursing in mid-winter with
Dr. Marigold ? And yet the fellow had proved a
perfect pest from the beginning. He had gone
his own gait with a quiet independence only less
exasperating than his personal courtesy and
deference in every quarrel. In fact there had
been no regular quarrel : the squire had only been
rather rude to the rector’s face, and very abusive
behind his back. Nor was Sir Wilton’s annoyance
in the least surprising. Devoid himself Of asingle
religious conviction, but the natural enemy of
change, he viewed the inevitable, but too imme-
diate, innovations in the light of a personal
affront; but when his own expostulations were
met with polite argument on a subject which he
had never studied, and he found himself at issue
with a cleverer and a stronger man, who put
him in the illogical position of objecting in the
country to what his family approved in town,
then there was no alternative for the squire
but to withdraw from the unequal field and
wait upon revenge. Too politic to break with
one who after all had more followers than foes,
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The Lord of the Manor
and who speedily made himself the first person in
the parish, Sir Wilton very naturally hated his
man the more for those very considerations which
induced him to curb his tongue. But his dis-
appointment was manifold. It was not as if the
fellow had proved personally congenial to himself.
He preferred teaching the lads cricket to shooting
with the squire, and he was a poor diner-out.
His predecessor had shot almost (but not quite)
as well as Sir Wilton himself, and had the harder
head of the two for port. Carlton was not even
in touch with his own people. There was no
advantage in the man at all.
But now the end was in sight—the incredibly
premature and disgraceful end. Sir Wilton went
down grim enough, but much less angry and
indignant than he supposed. Most of his wrath
was the accumulation of months, free for ex-
pression at last. He was, however, a good and
clean citizen according to his lights, and he did
undoubtedly feel the rightful indignation with
which the story from Long Stow was calculated
to inspire many a worse man. Arrived at
Lakenhall, where the stanhope was waiting for
him, he asked but one question on the way to
Long Stow, and then drove straight past the hall
to the church. Here he got down, and examined
the black ruins with his hands in his pockets and
his shoulders very square and a fixed glare of
mingled rage and exultation. Then he walked
past the broken windows, and the stanhope met
him at the rectory gate. He drove home with-
91


Peccavi
‘
out a word. His one question had elicited the
the fact that the rector was still in the infirmary.
The village street cut clean through the high-
-walled hall garden, and the brown-brick hall
itself stood as near the road as the mansion in
Hyde Park Place, and was the uglier building of
the two, from the dormer windows in the steep
slates to the portico with the painted pillars.
Within was the depressing atmosphere of a great
house all but empty. Sir Wilton hurried through
a twilit drawing-room in deadly order, and forth
by a French window into a pleasaunce of elms
and plane-trees whose shadows lay sharp as them-
selves upon the shaven sward. A girl was
coming across the grass to meet him, agirl at the
awkward age, with her dark hair in a plait and
her black dress neither long nor short. Sir Wilton
brushed her cheek with his bleached moustache.
“Where’s Fraulein P” he said.
“ In the schoolroom, I think, uncle.”
“I want to speak to her. I’m only down for
the night and shall be busy. I’ll be looking
round the garden, tell'her.”
And he walked away from the house, treading
vigorously on the cropped grass; and presently
a little middle-aged lady, with a plain, shrewd
face, flitted over it in her turn. She found Sir
Wilton between the four yew hedges and the
mathematical parterres of the Italian garden at
the further end of the lawn. He shook hands
with her, but gave free rein, for the second time in
five minutes, to his idiosyncrasy of hard staring.
92


The Lord of the \Manor
Fraulein Hentig had been many years in the
family, and had taken many parts; at present
she was permanent housekeeper in the country,
but had lately also recommenced old schoolroom
duties on the adoption by Sir Wilton of his only
brother’s only child. There was no nonsense
about Fraulein Hentig. She told Sir William all
that she had heard and all that she believed was
true, without mincing facts or wincing at the
expletives which more than once interrupted her
tale. As it proceeded the fixed eyes lightened
with a vindictive glitter; but the end found Sir
Wilton scowling.
“I wish I’d been here! I wouldn’t have let
’ them break his windows; no, I should have
claimed the privilege of horsewhipping him with
my own hands. I’d do it still if he were here;
but he’ll never show his nose in Long Stow
again. I/suppose there’s no doubt the church
was wilfully set fire to ?”
“None at all from what I hear, Sir Wilton.”
“ Is nobody suspected ?”
“George Mellis was. They say he was in
love with the girl, and he disappeared on Saturday
night. However, it turns out that he was already
in Lakenhall hours before the fire, and he never
came back. It appears he went straight to the
rectory when he heard the scandal, and almost as
straight out of Long Stow when Mr. Carlton
admitted everything. Already I hear that he has
enlisted in London.”
“You don’t mean it! That’s another thing at
93


Peccavi
that blackguard’s door; it’s a nice list! But it’s
enough to send the whole parish to the dogs.
By the way, you would get Lady Gleed’s
letter ?”
“ Yes, Sir Wilton. I wrote last night to tell
her ladyship that she might make her mind easy
about her niece. She is very innocent, and
when I told her the windows had been broken
because Mr. Carlton had done something dis-
honourable, she was amazed of course, but she
asked no more questions. I spoke at once to the
servants, and I made Gwynneth promise not
to go among the people at present; they have
already typhoid fever in one of the cottages, and
that was my excuse.”
“Excellent!” said Sir Wilton. “I won’t
have her in and out of the cottages in any case,
and I shall tell her so before I go. She’s much
too young for that kind of nonsense. And she
mustn’t read just exactly what she likes. She
had a book in her hand just now—I couldn’t see
what—but she seems inclined to fill her head with
any folly. We must find a school for her, and
meanwhile bring her up as we’ve brought up our
own child.”
Fraulein Hentig smiled judiciously.
“ They are already rather different characters,”
she said. “ But I will do my best, Sir Wilton.”
When the pair quitted the Italian garden, the
gentleman hurrying to make other inquiries
before dinner, while the German gentlewoman
dropped behind, two brown eyes saw them
94


The Lord of the Manor
from an upper window, whither the girl had
carried her book in vain. Her attention had
been intermittent before, but now she could not
even try to read. The air was full of mystery,
and the mystery was more absorbing than that in
any book. It was also absolute and unfathom-
able in the girl’s mind. Yet her brain teemed
with questions and surmises. She had come
upstairs because she felt that they wanted her
out Of the way, her uncle and the good, Slow,
serious Fraulein. Yet that was not enough for
them : they also must retire as far as possible for
their talk. Of course Gwynneth knew what they
had to talk about; but what was the dishonour—
able action that a clergyman could commit and
that could not be so much as mentioned in her
hearing? She was not thinking Of “a clergy-
man” in the abstract. She was thinking of the
man with the beautiful, sad face; of the passionate
preacher with the voice that thrilled the senses
and the words that filled the mind. She had
heard him preach of sin and suffering with equal
sympathy. Phrases came back to her. Now
She understood. But what could he have done,
that he should suffer so, and that a perfectly
kind person like Fraulein Hentig Should exult in
his suffering ?
Gwynneth was splendidly and terribly inno-
cent, but all the more inquisitive on that account.
She was unacquainted with the facts, yet not
with the tragedy Of life. In a tragic atmosphere
she had been born and bred. Quentin Gleed
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Peccavi
had been fatally lacking in the politic virtues culti-
vated by his brother. He had deserted his wife
and drunk himself to death within the memory of
Gwynneth. The young girl recalled dim years
of bitter scenes in a luxurious home, and vivid
years of peace and poverty in a tiny cottage.
And now her mother was gone also; the dear,
independent, wilful little mother, who had taught
her child all but the wickedness that was in the
world! And that child sat at her bedroom
window in the new home that never could be
home to her; and the drooping sun could find no
bottom to her dark and limpid eyes, no flaw upon
her pure warm skin; and neither the cuckoo in
the poplar, nor the thrush in the elm, nor the
sparrows in the eaves just overhead, could tell
her anything of the wickedness that was in even
her small world.
96


IX.
A DUEL BEGINS.
LATE in the afternoon of July I 3, a Lakenhall fly
rattled through Long Stow, and waited in the
rain outside the rectory gate while one of the
occupants ran up to the house. He was such a
short time gone, and so few people were about in
the wet, that the fly was on its way back to
Lakenhall before the Long Stow folk realised
that it was the rector who had upset prophecy
by showing his nose among them in broad day-
light. He had done no more, however, nor was
anything further seen or heard of him during the
month of July. It appeared that he had returned
for some private papers only. The rectory was
locked up by the squire’s orders, but the rector
had forced his own study door, and his muddy
footmarks were confined to that room. The
same evening he went up to town—and dis-
appeared. But his address was known in an
official quarter. And all day and every day he
might have been discovered in the reading room
of the British Museum: a memorable figure,
stooping amid mountains of architectural tomes,
and drawing or copying plans in the few inches
97 H


Peccavi
of table-land they left him, all with a nervous
eagerness of face and hand not daily to be seen
' beneath that dispiriting dome.
Then the call came, and he was tried in the
consistorial court of his own diocese, before the
chancellor thereof, at the beginning of August.
No need to record more than the fact. The
proceedings were brief because the accused
pleaded guilty and his own word was the only
evidence against him. The sentence was that of
suspension foreshadowed by the bishop. The
Reverend Robert Carlton was formally suspended
a6 qfi‘icz'o at benefirz'o for the period of five years.
The result was reported in the London
papers; there was only matter for a few lines.
“Mr. Carlton was suspended for five years” was
the concluding sentence in T lze T z'mes report;
and that was good enough for Sir Wilton Gleed.
It was a happy omen for the holidays, which
began for him that very day. The family were
already in the country. Sir Wilton took the last
train to Lakenhall and drove himself home for
good in the highest spirits. Four miles of the
five were over his own acres, and every one of
them was crumbling with rabbits in the rosy dusk.
Later, the larkspur and peonies on the dinner-
table were as the very breath and blush of the
gorgeous English country; and a thrush sang
its welcome through the open window, and a
nightingale trilled the tired Londoner to sleep ; but
he dreamt of a pheasant that he had heard calling
between Lakenhall and Long Stow.
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A Duel Begins
In the country Sir Wilton was an early riser,
and he was abroad next morning while the
shadows of the elms still stretched to the house
and quivered up its bare brick walls. The great
lawn was dusted with a milky dew in which Sir
Wilton positively wallowed in his water-tight
boots ; it was not his least delight to be in shoot-
ing-boots and knickerbockers and soft raiment
once more. The first few minutes of the more
excellent life produced an unseasonable geniality
in the breast of Wilton Gleed. The man was
a human being, and he longed for companionship
in his joy. But Sidney never rose before he
must, nor the gardeners either, it appeared. In
the stable-yard a groom was encountered, but
Sir Wilton had seen his face every day in town.
He went out into the village, and naturally
turned to the left. The cottage doors were open,
and they were filled with homely figures that
touched a cap or courtesied as he passed with a
pleasant word for all. It was good to be back,
to be a little king again. Sir Wilton pulled
the cap over his eyes because the sun was in
them, and admired the ripe wheat in the field
beyond the post-office, the barley in the field
beyond that. So he passed the Flint House on
the other side with unruffled mind, and was
passing the Flint House meadow before his
thoughts took the inevitable turn which led to
profane mutterings through shut teeth. But this
morning it did not lead quite so far ; this morning,
with the scented air of England in his nostrils,
99 H2


A Duel Begins
“ Well, I’m damned ! ” he cried at last.
Robert Carlton sat asleep in his chair, his
hands in his overcoat pockets, the collar turned
up about his ears. His boots and trousers were
brown and yellow with the dust of the district.
In an instant he was on his feet, scared, startled,
and abashed.
“ So you’ve come back, have you P”
“An hour or two ago. I walked from
Cambridge. I don’t know how you heard! ”
“ Heard P You must think me in a hurry for
your society ! No, this is an unexpected pleasure,
and I use the words advisedly. It's something to
find you don’t come twice in broad daylight.”
“ I have come on business, as before, but this
time the business will occupy more than a few
minutes. I wished to get it in train with as little
fuss as possible. Then I was coming to see you,
Sir Wilton.”
It was quietly spoken, without bitterness or
defiance, but also without the abject humility
which had trembled in the clergyman’s first
words. The other made some attempt to modify
his manner: nothing could put him in the wrong,
but he realised that it might be as well to abstain
from mere brutality. And what he had just
heard implied a certain reassurance.
“I see,” said Gleed. “You have come to
make arrangements about your furniture and
effects. I am glad to hear it.”
“ My furniture and effects P ” queried Carlton.
“ What arrangements do you mean P ”
IOI


Peccavi
“Well, you can’t leave them here, can
you P ”
“ Why not, Sir Wilton P”
“ Why not! ” echoed thesquire, turning from
pink to purple with the two words. “Because
you’ve been disgraced and degraded as you
deserve; because you’re the hound you are;
because you've been suspended for five years, and
I won’t have you or your belongings cumber my
ground for a single day of them! So now you
know,” continued Gleed in lower tones, his venom
spent. “I didn’t think it would be necessary to
tell you my opinion of you ; but you’ve brought it
on yourself.”
Carlton bowed to that, but respectfully pointed
out the difference between suspension and depri-
vation, his tone one of apology rather than of
triumph.
“I don’t say which I deserved,” he added,
“ but I do thank God for the mercy He has shown
me. This gives me another chance—in five
years’ time. Meanwhile I am not only entitled
to keep my furniture in the rectory. I believe I
may live in it if I like.”
Gleed stood convulsed with wrath redoubled.
He had been too busy in town to prime himself
upon a point which could not arise before he
went down to the country; and here it was,
awaiting him. His disadvantage alone was
enough to put him in a passion; but the last
statement was monstrous in itself.
“I don’t believe it! I don’t believe a word
102


A Duel Begins
you say! A man who can live a lie will tell
nothing else ! ”
Carlton drew himself up, his nostrils curling.
“ Better go and ask your solicitor,” he said. “ I
have forfeited the right—as you so well know—-
to the only possible reply.”
“Rights apart,” rejoined Gleed, his colour
heightening by a shade, “do you mean to tell me
you would seriously think of remaining on the
very scene of your shame ? ”
“I didn’t say I would do anything. I said I
believed I could.”
“You have done enough harm in the place;
surely you wouldn’t come back to do more? ”
“ N o; if I came at all, it would be to undo a
little of the harm—to live it down, Sir Wilton, by
God’s help!” said Carlton, and his voice shook.
“But I do not mean to live here. I have spoken
to the bishop, and his advice is against it, though
he leaves me free to follow my own judgment.
This afternoon I hoped to speak to you. There
is another matter which is really a duty, so that
I can be in no doubt as to what to do there. It
will not involve my remaining on the spot, or
obtruding myself in any way. But the church
has been burnt down on my account, and I intend
to rebuild it before the winter.”
“The church is mine! ” said Gleed, savagely.
“ I don’t want to contradict you, Sir Wilton ;
but you should really see your lawyer on all these
points.”
“ The land is mine! ”
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Peccavi
“Not the church land, Sir Wilton; and the
rector is not only entitled, but he may be compelled,
to restore and rebuild within certain limits. Your
solicitor will turn up the Act and show it you
in black and white. And after that I think you
will hardly stand between me and my bounden
duty.”
“I don’t recognise it as your duty. Your
first duty is to resign the living lock-stock-and-
barrel—if you’ve any sense of decency left; but
you haven’t—not you, you infernal blackguard,
you!”
Gleed was standing on the drive, his arms
akimbo and his fists clenched, his flushed face
thrust forward and his stockinged legs planted
firmly apart. It was Carlton’s lithe figure which
had been filling the doorway for some minutes;
but at this he strode upon his adversary, and
towered over him with a hand that itched.
“ Why must you insult me ? ” he cried. “ Do
you think that’s the way to get me to do anything ?
Or are you bent upon having me up for assault ?
For heaven’s sake remember your own manhood,
Sir Wilton, and respect mine ; don’t trade too far
upon my readiness to admit that I am all men
choose to call me. Have a little pride! I am
ready to take my punishment, and more. I will
keep away from the place as much as possible.»
If I can let the rectory, that will be so much more
money for the church. Don’t oppose me ; if you
can’t help me by your countenance (and I grant
you it’s more than I have a right to expect), at
104


A Duel Begins
least be neutral, and let me work out my own
salvation in my own way. It will make no
difference to the past. It may make all the differ—
ence in the future. God knows I can’t reinstate
myself in His sight and in the hearts Of men by
building a church ! But I can leave behind me a
sign of my sorrow and my true penitence. I can
leave behind me a name and an example, bad
enough in all conscience, but yet not wholly vile
to the very last. And think what even that
would be to me ! And think what it would be if
I could but pave the way, not to forgiveness, but
to some reconciliation with those whom I have
loved but led' amiss . . . Well, that may be too
much to hope . . . no, I have no right to dream
of that . . . but at least let me make the one
material reparation in my power; let me do my
duty! When it is done, if you and they will have
no more of me, then you Shall all be rid of me for
good.”
Gleed wavered, partly because in mere person-
ality he was no match for the other, partly because
the prospect of a new church for nothing made its
own appeal to the man who had counted the cost
of the broken windows. His mind ran over the
pecuniary scheme and detected a flaw.
“ And what’s to become of the parish for the
next five years ? ” he asked. “Who’s to pay a
man to do your work ? ”
“There’s the stipend I cannot touch and
would not if I could ; a part of that will doubtless
be set aside. Until the church is habitable, how-
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Peccavi
ever, the case will probably be met by one of the
curates coming over from Lakenhall and taking a
service in the schoolroom.”
“And how do you know?” cried Sir Wilton,
not unjustifiably. _
“ The bishop sent for me,” said Carlton—and
his eyes fell. “I ventured to speak to him on
the subject before I left. Do you think I don’t
care what happens here in my absence P I hope
the services will begin next Sunday—the building
next week. I have worked the whole thing out.
I could show you the figures and the plans. The
new ones are ready, if you can call them new. I
shall be my own architect as before for the
transepts, but the rest shall be exactly as it was.”
“ We’ll see about that,” said Sir Wilton
grimly. He knew those melting eyes, that
enthusiastic voice. They had brought their hun-
dreds to this man’s feet before. They might do
so again. Even the squire felt their power in
his own despite.
“ It is my one chance ! ” the voice went on in
softer accents. “Do not ask me to forego it
altogether; but I will keep in the background as
much as you like; all I want to know is that the
work is going on. Suppose I did resign, and you
appointed another man. Why should he give
towards the church? Why should he come
where there is none? Let me build the new
one first ! ”
“Has it come to letting? I understood I
couldn’t prevent you P” ‘
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A Duel Begins
“ No more you can ; although—”
“We’ll see ! ” cried Gleed. “That’s quite
enough for me. We’ll see! ”
“But, Sir Wilton ”
“Damn your ‘buts,’ sir!” shouted the other,
shaking with rage. “ You disgrace the parish,
and you won’t leave it. You come back, and set
yourself against me, and think you can do what
you like after doing what you’ve done. By God,
it’s monstrous ! There’s not a man in the country
who won’t agree with me; you’ll find that out to
your cost. Build the church, would you? I’ll see
you further ! Law or no law, I’ll have you out of
this ! I’ll hound you out of it! I’ll have you
torn in pieces if you stay! ”
“I have already told. you I don’t intend to
stay,” said Carlton quietly. “ I only intend to
rebuild the church.”
“ All right ! You try ! You try! ”
And with his fixed eyes flashing, and his fresh
face aged with anger, but scored with implacable
resolve, Sir Wilton Gleed swung on his heel, and
so down the drive with every step a stamp.

107


X.
THE LETTER or THE LAW.
IN the village he met Tom Ivey, but passed him
with a savage nod, and was some yards further
on when a thought smote him so that he spun
round in his stride.
“That you, Ivey?” he called. “I wasn’t
thinking; you’re the very man I wanted to see.
How are you, eh?”
“Nicely, thank you, Sir Wilton,” said Tom,
coming up.
“Plenty of work, I hope?”
“ Well, not just lately, Sir Wilton.”
“ Good! I may have some for you. I’ll see
you about it this evening or to-morrow; mean-
while keep yourself free. By the way, how’s
your mother ? ”
“Very sadly, Sir Wilton. I sometimes fare
to think she’s not long for this world.”
“Nonsense, man! What’s the matter with
her ?”
Tom hardly knew. That was old age, be
thought. Then the house was that old and
small; sometimes she fared to stifle for want of
air. And this Tom said doggedly, for a reason.
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The Letter of the Law
“ Ah! ” cried Sir Wilton, his fixed eye
brightening. “Wasn’t there a question of repairs
some time since ? ”
“There was, Sir Wilton.”
“ Well, I’ll reconsider it. We must do What
we can to make the old lady comfortable for the
winter. I’ll come and see her, and I’ll see you
again about the other matter. Keep yourself free
meanwhile. Don’t you let any of those Lakenhall
fellows snap you up ! ”
And Sir Wilton went on chuckling, but again
turned quickly and called the other back.
“By the way, Tom, who were those fellows
you used to work for in Lakenhall ?”
“Tait & Taplin, Sir Wilton.”
A note was taken of the names.
“The only builders in the town, eh ?”
“Well, Sir Wilton there’s old Isaac Hoole, the
stonemason.”
“A stonemason, by Jove!” and down went
his name. “What other builders and stone-
> masons have we in the district—near enough to
undertake some work here ? I’m not thinking of
the job I’ve got for you, Tom.”
Ivey thought of three within fifteen miles, and
several at greater distances, but doubted whether
any of the latter would accept a contract so far
afield. Their names were taken, nevertheless,
and Sir Wilton stared his hardest as he put his
pocket-book away.
“ I shall want you all the same," he said, “and
I shall expect to get you when I want you.
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Understand? If anybody else Offers you a job,
remember you’ve got one. And I’ll see your
mother this morning.”
Tom went his way with his honest wits in a
knot. He could not conceive what was coming.
Ten minutes ago he had found a note Slipped
under the door in the night, and he was going
straight to the rectory without his breakfast.
Had Sir Wilton been there before him, and was
he going to rebuild the church ? Then what had
the reverend to say to it, now that he was suspended
for five years ? And what in the world could he
have to say to Tom Ivey ?
He said nothing at all until they had shaken
hands, and nothing then about the fire ; it is with
the hand alone that men pay their big debts to
men, and Robert Carlton did not weaken his
thanks with words.
“Have you got a job, Tom ?" were his
first.
“I have and I haven’t, sir,” said Ivey.
“ You’re not free to take one from me ? ”
“I wish I was, sir!” cried Tom, impulsively
(he was not so sure about it on reflection); and
in his simplicity he explained why he was not free.
“ But perhaps that’s the same job, sir?” he added,
hopefully.
Carlton shook his head, and looked wistfully on
the friendly face ; a few words (he knew his power)
and the very man he wanted would be on his side
against all Odds. But he must not begin by
dividing the village into factions; he must fight
I IO


The Letter of the Law
his own battle, with mercenaries from neutral
ground, or none at all.
“Where was it you served your time, Tom P ”
he asked at length.
“Tait & Taplin’s, sir, in Lakenhall.”
“Thanks. I won’t keep you, Tom. It will do
you no good to be seen up here.”
He held out his hand with a dismal smile. It
was the other’s turn to wring hard. “ I care
nothing about that, sir ! We’ve been shoulder to
shoulder once already ; my mind don’t go no
further back than that; and we’ll be shoulder to
shoulder again !”
Carlton found flour and tea in the store-room,
and in the fowl-house two new-laid eggs. He
cooked his first breakfast with the sun pouring
through the open kitchen window upon six weeks'
dirt and dust. He was not a man of very hearty
habit, but he had learnt of old the evil of exercise
upon too light a diet. His pony was fattening in
the glebe ; but a fastidious sense of fitness forbade
him to drive, and between nine and ten he set out
for Lakenhall on foot.
It was an ordeal for the first half-mile: the
sunlight flooding the village felt like limelight
turned on him alone. Some children courtesied
as though nothing was changed ; their elders
stared at him without further sign ; only one
shouted after him, he knew not who or what. He
reached the open country with a raging pulse,
thinking only upon circuitous ways back; but
three solitary miles restored his nerve. And in
III


Peccavi
Lakenhall it was only every other passer who
stopped and turned and stared. Entering the
town he was nearly run over by a dog-cart. It
was Sir Wilton driving, and Carlton caught the
gleam of his eye even as he leapt to one side for
his life, but mistook its significance until he was
within sight of Tait & Taplin’s. Then it occurred
to him, and he entered fully prepared.
“ No, thank you, sir—not for us ! We’ve
heard of you, and we don’t deal with your sort.
Do you hear, or do you want to hear more P ”
Carlton searched in vain for another builder,
and only got the name of a stonemason by going
into the cemetery and looking at the newer grave-
stones. He had then to discover where the man
lived, and he was ashamed to ask questions in
shops. He was still scouring the town, and it
was afternoon, when a gig was pulled up in the
middle of the road.
“So you’re back P Well, you look better than
you did.”
“I am,” said Carlton, “ thanks to you.”
“Who are you looking for P ”
“ Hoole, the stonemason.”
“ Jump up and I’ll drive you there.”
The tone was too humane for Carlton.
“Thank you, doctor, but I like walking.”
“ Then find him for yourself, and be damned
to you! ”
And Marigold drove on, red to the boar of his
eighty years ; but, as Carlton stood watching him
out of sight with vain compunction, the old doctor
I 12


The Letter of the Law
turned in his seat and pointed up an alley with his
whip in passing.
Hoole, the stonemason, was not rude, but
he was as firm as Tait & Taplin in his refusal.
He was an elderly man, of few words, but he
admitted that Sir Wilton Gleed had been there
that morning. That was enough for Carlton, who
was turning away when something in his visible
fatigue and dejection moved the mason to give
him a hint.
“You won’t get anybody in the district to
work for you against Sir Wilton,” he said.
“That stand to reason.”
“Then I must go out of the district,” said
Carlton. And he bought a county directory at
a shop where he had been a regular customer;
but they insisted on the settlement of his current
bill first; and even then he had to help himself
to the new book, and leave the money on the
counter, because they scorned to serve him. The
directory contained the names and addresses of
the very few builders and master-masons within
a day’s journey of Long Stow. And it was all
there was to show for the long day’s round of
retribution and rebuff when, late in the after-
noon, Carlton returned as he had come, too tired
and too dispirited to walk an inch out of his
way ; and the school-children who had courtesied
in the morning knew better now, and cried after
the bent figure slinking home at dusk.
The next day was Sunday, and the school-bell
tinkled towards eleven o’clock, and stopped pre-
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Peccavi
cisely at the hour. Then Carlton knew that his
own idea had been adopted, and that somebody
was saying matins in the parish school-room: he
read the service to himself in his study, and
evensong when evening came, with a sermon
of Charles Kingsley's after each: for doctrine
could not help him now, but brave humanity
could and did.
The Monday was Bank Holiday; but Carlton
only knew it when he had trudged ten miles to
have speech with a builder whose premises were
closed; and so another day was lost. On the
Tuesday he tried again, but with as little avail.
Sir Wilton Gleed had been there before him (as
long ago as the Saturday afternoon), and it was
the same elsewhere. The week went in fruitless
visits to small contractors and working masons in
this large village or in that little town ; the enemy
had been first in every field, with a cunning
formula which Carlton reconstructed from the
various answers he received.
“ Of course, the church will have to be rebuilt,”
Sir Wilton had been saying; “but not by him.
He hasn’t the money, for one thing; it had better
be an iron church, if he is to pay you for it. _I-Ielp
me to get rid of him, and you shall hear from me
again. We will have a decent church when ._we
are about it, and a local man shall get the job.”
Meanwhile the boycott was nowhere more
operative than in Long Stow itself, and no human
being came near the rectory, where the rector
subsisted on a providential store of bacon and the
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The Letter Of the Law
daily deposit of eggs, and on strange bread of his
own baking, for he would risk no more insults in
the Shops. But one night a forgotten friend came
back into his life : his collie, Glen, came bounding
down the drive to meet him, and the mad uproar
of that welcome was heard through half the village,
and duly became the talk. The dog had been a
vagabond and a rogue for six wild weeks, and it
came back gaunt and hard, its brush clotted and
raw underneath with the spray from a farmer’s
gun. Carlton washed the wound with warm
water, and the two pariahs supped together, and
lay that night upon the same bed, and went
abroad together next morning, to try the last
man left.
The day after that they stayed at home, and
word reached the hall that the rector had been seen
among the ruins Of his church; he was, indeed,
exploring them for the first time, and that both
with method and deliberation. When seen, hOW—
ever (from the lane that runs under the fine east
window of tO-day, past the lawn-tennis court which
was then a fowl run, and the glebe that is Still the
glebe), he was seated on a sandstone block in front
of the little lean-t0 shed ; and, as a matter of fact,
his back was to the ruins. He was contemplating
similar blocks and slabs Of the undressed stone
that lay where they had been lying on Midsummer
Day: some were still smutty from the fire, all
were slightly stained by the weather, Otherwise
there was no change that Carlton could see as he
sat thus. At one end of the shed rose a great
II 5 ' I 2


Peccavi
yellow cairn of material raw from the quarry—a
stack of stones about as much of one size and
shape as so many lumps of sugar; enough to
finish the transepts, as matters had stood; a mere
fraction of the amount required now. Carlton
looked on what he had got, and his eyes closed
in a calculation beyond his powers in mental
arithmetic; he had to take a pencil to it, and
then a foot-rule to the blackened courses, and
presently a pair of compasses to the plans in the
study.
In the afternoon he tidied the shed. Every
tool was intact; a little rust had been the worst
intruder; and the feel of the cool sleek handles
quickened Carlton’s pulse. Nay, the hammer
rang a few strokes on the cold-chisel, for he could
not help it, and the music reminded him of his
poor bells, now cumbering the porch; it was
almost as good to hear; and the way the
soft stone peeled, in creamy flakes, thrilled the
hand as it charmed the eye. But a very few
minutes served to make the enthusiast ashamed
of his enthusiasm; and though he spent more
time in the ruins, now testing a standing wall,
now scraping a charred stone, ardour and deter-
mination had died down in an eye that was
looking within; a wistful irresolution flickered in
their place. And that night the lonely man
walked his room once more, from twilight to
twilight, with long intervals spent upon his
knees. in agonies of doubt and self-distrust, in
passionate entreaty for a right’judgment, and for
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The Letter of the Law
the strength to abide by it. Yet his duty had not
dawned upon him with the day.
Towards eleven the school-bell tinkled. It
was Sunday once more; and once more he read
the prayers upon his knees and the psalms and
lessons standing; but no sermon to-day. No
man could help him in his struggle with himself;
he must trust to the strength of his own soul, to
the singleness of his own heart, and to the guid-
ance of the God who was drawing nearer and
nearer to him in these days—with each prayer
that rose from his heart—with each bead that
stood upon his brow. And so at last, when the
burden of doubt and darkness became more than
the man could bear, it was as though the heavens
had opened, and a beam of celestial light flooded
the narrow room with the low ceiling and the
cross-beams; for the peace of a mind made up
had descended upon the solitary therein. And
that night his sleep was sound, so that in the
morning he had to ask himself why; the answer
made him catch his breath; it did not shake his
resolve.
“He shall have his chance,” said Carlton;
“he shall have it fairly to his face. And he will
' take it—and that will be the end!”
He hung about the ruins till it was ten o’clock
by his watch, and then went straight to the hall.
Sir Wilton was at home; but the footman hesi—
tated to admit this visitor. Carlton’s own hesita-
tion was, however, at an end, and his eye forbade
rebuff. He was shown into the drawing-room,
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Peccavi
where a very young girl was at the piano,
evidently practising, and yet playing in a way
that made Carlton sorry when she stopped. The
cool room smelling of flowersp the glimpse of
garden through an open window, with the court
marked out and chairs under the trees; the
momentary sound of a fine instrument finely
touched : it was all the very breath and essence of
the pleasant every-day world from which he had
rightly and richly earned dismissal, and it all was
branded in his brain. Then the young girl rose,
and stood in doubt with the sun upon her plaited
hair, and eyes great with innocent distress; but
Carlton barely bowed,_and the child hardly knew
how she got across the room.
Sir Wilton entered with jaunty step. His
whiskered jaw was set like a vice, but the light
of conscious triumph danced in his fixed eyeballs.
Carlton had come prepared to have his intrusion
treated as his latest crime; a glance convinced
him that the other was too sure of victory to
object to an interview with the virtually van-
quished.
“So you are quite determined that I shall not
rebuild the church ? ”
It was a point-blank beginning. Sir Wilton
shrugged and smiled. “ I have told you to build
it if you can,” said he.
“But you mean to make that an impos-
sibility ? ”
“ Naturally I don’t intend to make it easy.”
“Admit that by foul means, since none are
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The Letter of the Law
fair, you are deliberately preventing me from
doing my duty! ” Carlton pressed his point with
a heat he regretted, but could not help.
“ I admit nothing,” said the other, doggedly—-
“least of all what you are pleased to consider
your ‘ duty.’ Your real duty I’ve already told you.
Resign the living. Let us see the last of you.”
Carlton met the rigid stare with one as un-
wavering and more acute. It was as though he
would have seen to the back of the other’s brain.
“ Very well,” he said at length. “ You shall ! ”
“ Ah ! ” cried Sir Wilton, when he had re-
covered from his surprise. But it was not the
cry of victory ; there was an uncharacteristic lack
of finality in the clergyman’s tone.
“You shall see the last of me this very morn-
ing,” he continued swiftly, nervously, “if you like!
But it will rest with you. I am not going uncon-
ditionally. Will you listen to what I have to say P ”
Gleed shrugged again, but this time there was
no accompanying smile. The other threw up his
head with a sudden decisiveness—a pulpit trick
of his when about to make a primary point—
and his right fist fell into his left palm without
his knowing it.
“ Very well,” said Carlton ; “ now I’ll tell you
exactly on what conditions you shall have your
heart’s desire, and I will renounce mine. In spite
of what I hear you’ve been saying, I have a little
money of my own—not much, indeed—but enough
for me to have subsisted upon for these next years.
Iam not going to touch a penny of it—I shall
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Peccavi
pick up a living for myself elsewhere. Meanwhile
I have turned my income into capital which is now
lying in the bank at Lakenhall. It is a trifle
under two thousand pounds, and I want the whole
of it to go into the new church. Wherever I am
I ought to be able to earn a little more, either as a
coach or with my pen; so let the offer stand at a
church to cost two thousand pounds. I long to
have the building of it. I make no secret Of that.
But I have been trying to read my own heart,
and I see the selfishness of such longings; and I
have been trying to read your heart, Sir Wilton,
and I see the naturalness of your opposition. SO
I come to you and I say, build the church your-
self, and I withdraw. Build a better church out
of your abundance, and I will resign as you wish.
Give me your written undertaking, here and now,
and you shall have my written resignation in
exchange.”
The words clung tO his lips; he alone knew
what it cost him to utterthem; he alone, in his
absolute freedom from the mercenary instinct,
would have felt certain Of the result. But the
rich man was touched upon his tender spot.
What return was he Offered for his money?
Who would thank him for building a church in
the heart Of the country? The church could be
built by subscription ; bad enough to have to head
the list. Besides, he was flushed with triumph;
he saw but a beaten man in the nervous wretch
before him. Fancy bribing a beaten man to fly!
“I like your impudence,” said Wilton Gleed.
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The Letter of the Law
“Upon my word! My written undertaking—to
you ./ ”
“ Do you refuse to give it?” asked Carlton
quickly.
“ Certainly—to you.”
“ Undertakings apart, do you entertain my
suggestion, or do you not P”
“That’s my business.”
Carlton felt his patience slipping.
“ Do you mean to say that you don’t even yet
recognise that it’s mine too, as rector of the
parish? Are you still so ignorant of the legal
bearings of the situation? God knows, Sir
Wilton, it is not for me to speak of right and
wrong; but I do assure you that you’re putting
yourself wilfully in the wrong in this matter. You
hinder me from doing my legal duty, and you
refuse to assume any responsibility! Suspended
or not, I am bound to keep my chance], at all
events, ‘in good and substantial repair, restoring
and roouildz'ng when neoessary.’ ”
Sir Wilton’s eyes, fixed as usual, caught fire
suddenly.
“ Oh, you’re bound, are you P”
“ Legally bound.”
“ You’re sure that’s the law P”
“ The very letter of the law, Sir Wilton.”
“ Then see that you keep it! You come here
blustering about your legal rights; but you forget
that I’ve got mine. Where there’s a law there’s
a penalty, and by God I’ll enforce it! ‘The
very letter of the law,’ ehP I’ll take you at your'
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Peccavi
word; you shall keep it to the letter. Build
away! Build away! The sooner you begin the
better—for you ! ”
This was probably the boldest move that Sir
\Nilton Gleed ever made in his life; it was cer-
tainly the least considered. But what satisfaction
sweeter than hoisting the enemy with his own
petard? It is the quintessence of poetic justice,
the acme of personal triumph; and the sudden
opportunity of achieving his end by means so
neat was more than even Wilton Gleed could
resist. Every builder and mason within reach
was already on his side ; not a man of them who
would work for dissolute hypocrisy in defiance of
might and right. No need to say another word
to the masons and the builders. They could be
trusted on the whole, and the untrustworthy
could be bribed. Gleed had not the smallest
scruple in the matter, and he was characteristi-
cally forearmed with a public defence of his
private conduct. He believed that every right-
thinking man would applaud his sharp practice in
the cause of religion and of morality; and his
confidence was not to be shaken by the way in
which his challenge was received.
“Are you in earnest P” asked Carlton. “ Do
you seriously propose to hinder me with one hand
and to compel me with the other P”
“I mean to take you at your word,” Gleed
repeated. “You are fondv of talking about your
duty. Let’s see you do it.”
“ You set the builders against me, and then
122


XI. '_
LABOUR or HERCULES.
ALL the church had not been burnt to the ground.
West of the porch (itself not hopelessly destroyed)
stood thirteen feet of sound south wall, blackened
on the inside, calcined in the upper courses, but
plumb and firm as far as it went. A correspond-
ing portion of the north wall, the sixteen-foot strip
west of the window almost opposite the porch,
stood equally rigid and erect. And, thus supported
on either hand, the entire west end rose practically
intact, without a missing or a ruined stone; the
window was still truly bisected by its single
mullion; neither head nor tracery had given the
fraction of an inch ; only the mangled leads, with
here and there a fragment of smoked glass adher-
ing, would have told of a fire to one led blindfold
under the west window, and there given his first
view of the church.
But that was the one good wall and real
exception to a rule of utter ruin. The rest of the
original building was either razed already or else
unfit to stand. The embryonic transepts were
not quite demolished, but they had never been
many feet above ground. Sections of wall still
124


Labour Of Hercules
stood where there were no windows to weaken
them, but east of the porch nothing stood firm.
Worst of all was the east end, from which the
chancel walls had been burnt away on either side.
It stood as though balanced, with an alarming
outward list. One mullion of the great window
had gone by the sill; the other was cracked and
crooked, as if supporting the entire weight Of
the gable overhead ; and it looked as though a
push would send the tottering fabric flat.
Black ruin lay thick and deep within. To
peep in was to see an ashpit through a microscope.
The remnants of the slate and timber roof lay
uppermost. Tie-beams, corbels, king-posts, ridge,
struts, wall—plates, pole-plates, rafters principal
and common, joists, battens, laths and fillets,
half-burnt and black as the pit, save where some
spilled sheet-lead shone in the sun, spread a
common pall over nave and chancel, aisle and
pews. It was as a midnight sea frozen in mid-
storm, the twisted lectern alone rising salient like
a mast. Slates lay in shallow heaps as though
dealt from a pack ; and certain pages, brown and
brittle at the edges, which the wind had torn from
the burnt Bible before Carlton rescued the
remains, still fluttered in the crannies when the
wind went its rounds. And the hum Of bees was
in the air; but there had been great distress
among the sparrows, and one heard more of the
rectory cocks and hens.
Upon this desolate and dead spot, in the heart
of the warm, live country, Robert Carlton stood
12 5


Peccavi
looking within a few minutes of his exit from the
hall. But he did not stand looking long. He
had changed into flannels at top speed, and there
was still more change in the man. His eye
glowed with a grim decision which lightened
without dispelling the settled sadness of the face.
Passionate aspiration had cooled and hardened
into dogged and defiant resolve; and there was
an end to all compunction and self-questioning
suspense. Carlton knew exactly what he was
going to do ; he had known where to begin since
the day before yesterday. He wore neither coat
nor waistcoat, his sleeves were rolled up, he had
a crowbar in one hand, and a heavy hammer in
the other. He began immediately on the thirteen
feet of good wall to the left of the porch.
He had tested this wall on Saturday. The
upper courses were loose and crumbling; the
sooner they went the better. Carlton climbed
upon the wall, and, sitting astride where it was
firmest, began working off the loose stones one
by one with the crowbar. Iron would ring on
iron twice or thrice, and then a twist of the bar
send the charred stone tumbling. It was easy
work, but the position was awkward, and Carlton
soon went for a ladder; on the way he was
surprised to find that he was already drenched
with perspiration, and rather hungry.
But the next hour tired him more, or rather
the time that seemed an hour to him, for it after-
wards turned out to be three hours by the watch
that he had left indoors. iny the topmost
126 '


Labour of Hercules
course, or the stones on which the red-hot eaves
had rested, lent themselves to off-hand treatment ;
they had been burnt to cinders—the mortar bind-
ing them, to powder; it needed but a wrench to
dislodge each one. But the next few courses were
a different matter. Half the stones were too
loose to leave, too good to chip in the removal.
Carlton worked upon them with the cold-chisel
first, the crowbar next, and finally with his naked
fingers, removing the stones with immense care,
and very deliberately dropping each into its own
bed in the long grass outside. At last the little
strip of wall was left without an unsound member
from serrated crest to plinth: not a stone that
shook or shifted at a conscientious push ; and the
workman took his eyes from his work. But he
did not peer through the trees in search of other
eyes, for he was not thinking of himself or of his
’ Work from a spectacular point of view. He
merely saw that the sun had travelled the church
from end to end while he had been busy. And
suddenly he found himself sinking for want of
food, and unable to stand upright without intoler-
able pain. But he was back within half-an-hour,
and remained at work upon the sixteen-foot strip
opposite till after sunset.
“But it hasn’t been anything like a full day,
old dog,” said Carlton, as they crept up to bed
between eight and nine. And he set his seven-
and-sixpenny alarum at four o’clock.
Next forenoon the sixteen-foot strip was done
with in its turn ; no infirm stone left standing
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Peccavi
upon another. Scraped and repointed, with the
uninjured pieces replaced in fresh mortar, and an
entirely new top course, these two short walls
would be worthy of the gallant west end to which
they acted as buttresses. Its wounds were not
skin-deep, thanks to the west wind which had
driven the flames the other way. It looked as
though a sponge would cleanse it, and Carlton
sighed as he turned his back upon the one good
wall.
Elsewhere, as has been said, there were
fragments fit to use again, but not to remain as
they were. It cost Carlton a couple of days to
take these to pieces, laying the good stones
carefully in the grass, as his practice had been
hitherto. The fourth day, however, he tried a
change of labour to ease his aching limbs, and
went round and round with a barrow, picking the
sound stones from the grass, and stacking them
near the shed. Next morning he fought his way
into the chancel, and stood chin-deep in the
wreckage, contemplating the leaning east end.
And all this time no soul had come near him;
through the trees he had indeed heard whispers
that were not of the trees, but he had never
thrown more than a glance in their direction,
and the green screen was still charitably thick.
The east end must come down sooner or later
—therefore sooner. Carlton was no engineer,
but he was a man with a distinct turn for
mechanics; had used a lathe as a lad, and taught
his Boys’ Friendly how to use it in their turn;
I28


Labour of Hercules
had picked up much from Tom Ivey, and was
himself blessed with sound instincts concerning
application and control of power. Here was a
tottering wall to come down altogether. It was
too insecure to pull to pieces. The problem was
to get it down with as little damage and as little
danger as possible. One man could do it, Carlton
thought, but not without considerable risk of a
broken head at least. If he could but make sure
of the whole wall falling in the one outward
direction! He revolved about it, mentally and
on his feet, till he became angry with himself for
the loss of time, ceased to speculate, and went
to work in desperation. He would trust to luck ;
he despised himself for having studied a risk so
small. He had done so out of no absurd con-
sideration for his own skin, but entirely from the
depth and strength of his artistic impulse to do
a thing properly or not at all. Even now he
had to prepare the ground: he had to clear the
chancel enough to give himself free play.
Then he found a scaffolding-pole which had
not been used, and tilted at a tree for practice.
The pole was unmanageable from its length. He
sawed it shorter. It was still too unwieldy to use
amid the a'e'hris. He shortened it until he had a
battering-ram some eighteen feet long. But all
these preliminaries had taken unimagined hours,
and again Carlton felt sick with hunger before he
thought of food, and unequal to further effort
until he had some. So he turned a breaking but
reluctant back upon the church, and went indoors ;
129 K


Peccavi
remembering everything on the way, and loathing
himself afresh: at his work he was beginning to
forget!
Thus far this outcast had subsisted chiefly on
eggs; he beat up a couple now, and tossed the
stuff off with a little wine and water. Then he
fell upon a box Of biscuits, but threw the dog as
many as he munched himself, striding up and
down the while, and for all his fatigue. The
room was the one in which he had Studied his
own physiognomy. It might have been any
other. He had no eyes for himself tO-day, and
not many thoughts, for, in the midst of his con—
trition for forgetting, he had forgotten again.
His mind had escaped to the chancel; the flesh
followed in a few minutes, having eaten and rested
on its legs.
The dog bounded ahead, and presently an-
nounced an intruder at the top of its voice.
Carlton quickened his pace, frowning at the
thought Of interruption ; he was on the spot before
curiosity had tempered his annoyance ; and there
among the ruins stood Sir Wilton Gleed, not
frowning at all, but forcing a smile behind his
Cigar.
“How long is this tomfoolery to go on?”
said he.
Carlton Stood looking at him for some seconds ;
then he picked up his pole without replying.
“You’d better stand to one side,” was all he said,
“Kennel up, Glen! ”
“ Going to do something desperate ,7’”
1.30


Labour of Hercules
“The further you get away from me the safer
you’ll be.”
But he did not look round as he spoke, and
Sir Wilton gripped his stick without occasion.
Carlton’s blood was boiling none the less. The
enemy had surprised him at his worst. He was,
for the first time, attempting Single-handed the
work of several men; and he might be going
about it in a very ridiculous way. He could not
tell till he tried ; and it was one thing to experi-
ment in private, but quite another thing to court
open discomfiture of the very nature which would
most delight the looker-on. And the man was
worn out with hard and unaccustomed labour,
dyspeptic from evil feeding, nervous and irritable
from both causes combined. Sir Wilton Gleed
could,hardly have chosen a worse moment for
renewing the duel.
In Carlton the longing to do something violent
suddenly outweighed his desire to raze the east
end of the church. He poised his pole and fixed
both eyes on the one remaining mullion of the
east window. If the mullion went, he still
thought that the whole fabric should collapse, for-
getting the inherent independence of arches ; and
his mind dwelt wistfully on the effect of the crash
upon Sir Wilton Gleed. But his aim was not
the less accurate, nor did his anxiety hinder
him from utilising every muscle in his body
at the ideal moment. The end of the ram smote
the mullion fairly and powerfully, where it was
already cracked. The mullion flew asunder; a,
’ 151 K 3


Labour of Hercules
you sha’n’t make me strike you ; but if you don’t
go out you’ll be put out, Sir Wilton.”
Gleed smiled again. His collar was seized.
He smiled no more, but lashed out with his
stick. The stick was wrenched away from him.
It whistled in the air. And Robert Carlton had
his enemy at his mercy, still held by the collar,
in the place where he had preached goodwill to
men. For he was much the taller of the two
and an old athlete, whereas the other was only
an elderly sportsman. Carlton could have whipped
him like a little dog. He did almost worse:
released him without a cut, and handed him his
stick without a word.
And at that moment there came the crash
that would have saved this collision a few seconds
before. Both men turned, rubbing their eyes; a
cloud of yellow dust had filled them as it filled
the chance]. The cloud dispersed, and wall and
window were gone from sill to gable; what
remained was nowhere higher than a man could
reach.
“Now leave me in peace,” said Carlton, “for
I shall have my hands full ; and don’t trouble to
come again, because I sha’n’t listen to you.
You’ve had two chances. I promised to live
away and only find the money and the men ; you
wouldn’t have it. I invited you to build the
church yourself; you wouldn’t hear of that. _No ;
you would force me to do my duty, having tied
my hands ! You would take me at my word. I
am taking you at yours. I should try fresh
I33


XII.
A FRESH DISCOVERY.
HIS son was waiting for him at the gate.
“The man’s mad!” cried Sir \Vilton with a
harsh laugh.
“What’s he been doing? What was that
row ?”
Sidney’s manner with his father was subtly
disrespectful; he seldom addressed him by that
name, enjoyed arguing with him (having the
clearer head), and argued in slang. Yet his
tongue was as dexterous and plausible as it was
always smooth, and he was a difficult boy to convict
of a specific rudeness.
“There’s some method in his madness,” was
his comment on the father’s account of the work
accomplished under his eyes.
“ But he says he’s going to build it up again ! "
“ I wonder if he will,” speculated Sidney.
“ What—by himself ? ”
“Yes.”
“Of course he won’t. NO man could. He’s
a lunatic.”
They were walking home. Sidney said
nothing for some paces. Then he asked an
innocent question. It was a little way Of his.
I35


Peccavi
“I suppose one man could finish one stone,
though, father P ”
Sir Wilton conceded this.
“ And fix it in its place, shouldn’t you say P”
A gruffer concession.
“Then I’m not sure that he couldn’t do more
than you think,” said Sidney. “ The windows
might stump him, and the roof would; but he
could do the rest.”
“Nonsense! ” cried Sir Wilton. “You don’t
know what you’re talking about.”
“ Of course I don’t,” admitted Sidney readily.
“ That was why I asked about the one man and
the one stone.”
Sir Wilton had not half his boy’s brain. The
cold-blooded little wretch would boast that he could
“score off the governor without his knowing it.”
Sir Wilton’s merit was his tenacity of purpose.
“I tell you the man’s mad,” he reiterated;
“ and if he doesn’t take care I’ll have him
shut up.”
“A great idea!” cried Sidney. “ But, I
say, if that’s so we oughtn’t to be too rough on
him ! ”
“ In any case I’ll have him out of this,” quoth
Sir Wilton through his teeth ; but his mind dwelt
on the shutting-up notion : it really was “a great
idea.” And Carlton himself had given him
another : he just would “take fresh ground.”
He sought it that evening by a painful path.
Jasper Musk and Sir Wilton Gleed were not
friends; they had not spoken for years. Sir
I 36


A Fresh Discovery
Wilton had not been long in the parish before he
discovered that Musk had “cheated” him over
the Flint House. The word was much too
strong; but some little advantage had no doubt
been taken. The quarrel had lasted to the
present time; but Sir Wilton had often felt that
Musk must hate the common scourge even more
bitterly than he did himself, and that he would be
a very valuable ally. He was a strong man and
solid, the one powerful peasant in the neighbour-
hood. Unfortunately, sciatica had bound him to
his chair from the very day of his daughter’s
funeral. It would have been comparatively easy
to accost the old fellow in the open, and to
disarm him with instantaneous expressions of
sympathy and of indignation. It was more
difficult for the lord of the manor to knock at the
door of an enemy who was not a tenant—a door
opening on the very street, and a door that might
be slammed in his face for all Long Stow to see
or hear. So Sir Wilton went after dinner, on a
dark night; was admitted without demur; and
stayed till after eleven.
Next day he went again; he was also seen
at the village constable’s; and the village con-
stable was seen at the Flint House; and Sir
Wilton happened to call once more while he was
there. The afternoon was rich in developments,
and duly murmurous with theory, prophecy, specu-
lation. The schoolmaster was summoned from
the school, the saddler from his bench : it was the
latter who fetched Tom Ivey from the room that
I37


Peccavi
he was adding to his mother’s cottage at Sir
Wilton’s expense. Meanwhile the village whisper
became loud talk; but its arrows, shot at a
venture, flew wide of any mark. For through all
his dark disgrace, as now when the odium attach-
ing to him was gathering like snow on a rolling
snowball; from the night of the fire to this
eighteenth day of August; there was one thing of
which Robert Carlton had never been suspected
by those who had loved or feared him for a year
and a half.
Naturally the excitement penetrated to the
hall, where Sir Wilton kept dinner waiting, but,
very properly, did not refer to the unsavoury
subject at that meal. He was, however, in
singularly high spirits, and drank a vast amount
of excellent champagne ; yet his own wife left the
table in ignorance of what had happened. Now
Lady Gleed was a very particular person, a great
stickler for restraint, her own being something
strenuous and exotic. She seldom spoke of
ordinary things above a whisper, and would have
dealt with the village scandal in dumb show if
she could. To her daughter she had genuinely
preferred never to mention it at all.
But Lydia Gleed—it should have been
Languish—was a more modern type. She was
frankly interested in the affair. It had given
quite a zest to what would otherwise have been
an insufferably dull month for Lydia. The girl
had the makings of a perfect woman of society,
and yet the end of her second season found her
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A Fresh Discovery
still an unknown distance from the first step to
the realisation of that ideal. Proposals she had
received, but none such as an heiress of her
calibre was entitled to expect. She had actually
been engaged to an adventurer; but that had
only retarded matters.
There may have been purer causes. Feeble
and inanimate in her every-day life, and con-
stitutionally bored by the familiar, Miss Gleed
kept her best side for those whom she knew least ;
could chatter to acquaintances, the newer the
better; was in her element at parties, and out of
it at home. Even in her element, however,
Lydia never forgot to conceal as much of her
appreciation as possible, and would dance angeli-
cally with the corners of her mouth turned down,
and take like medicine the wine which really did
make glad her heart. This August she was
feeling particularly blasee and dissatisfied; and
the romantic downfall of the rector—whose
sermons had kept her awake—was a French novel
without the trouble of reading it or the risk of
confiscation. To-night, therefore, it was Lydia
who invited Gwynneth to play, and pressed the
invitation with a compliment; it was her com-
moner practice to snub the much younger girl.
And it was Lydia who drew her chair close to
that of Lady Gleed, and began the whispering, to
which Gwynneth was made to shut her ears with
all ten fingers. Yet for once Lady Gleed was
frankly interested herself.
“ But what has he done ? ”
I39


Peccavi
The music had stopped. They had not
noticed it. The ungrown girl was standing in
the middle of the room. She was dressed in
white, and her face looked as white in the
candle-light, but her eyes and hair the darker
and more brilliant by contrast. And the eyes
were great with a pity and a pain which were at
least not less than the natural curiosity of a
healthy child.
“Mind your own business,” said Lydia,
bluntly.
But even as she spoke the door opened.
“What’s this? \Vhat’s this?” cried Sir
Wilton, who was beaming, and good-naturedly
concerned to see the tears starting to his brother’s
child’s eyes. “Whose business have you been
minding, little woman ?”
“It was about Mr. Carlton,” the child said
with a sob. “ I hear everybody saying nothing’s
bad enough for him—nothing—and I thought he
was so good! I only asked what he had done.
I won’t again. Please—please let me go! ”
“In an instant,” said Sir Wilton, detaining
her with familiarity. “You mustn’t be a little
goose.”
“ Let her go, Wilton,” whispered his wife.
“ Not till I’ve told her what Mr. Carlton has
done ! ”
And Sir Wilton Gleed beamed more than
ever upon the consternation of his ladies.
“ But, Wilton ”
Lady Gleed had risen, and was even forgetting

I40


A Fresh Discovery
to whisper. Lydia merely looked unusually
wideawake, and prettier for once than the child
under the chandelier, who was terribly disfigured
by her embarrassment and distress.
“If you want to know what Mr. Carlton has
done,” said Sir Wilton to his niece, “it was he
who set fire to the church ! ”
I41


XIII.
DEVICES OF A CAS'I‘AWAY.
LEFT in peace, Carlton threw himself into his
task with redoubled spirit, and presently forgot
the existence of Sir Wilton Gleed.’ He had just
three hours before dark. In this time he suc-
ceeded in pulling the rest of the east wall to pieces,
even to the loosened plinth, and was adding the
good stones to his stack when night fell. It was
a night not to be forgotten in the history of
Robert Carlton’s case. Nothing happened. But
he had no proper food in the house, and he began
to feel really ill for the want of it. Eggs and
bacon he had, but the lighting of the fire fatigued
him more than anything he had done all day, and
he fell asleep in the kitchen, and the bacon went
brittle, and his attempt at bread was become an
unmasticable fossil. A very little whisky, from a
bottle that had been open for months, did him more
good, and enabled him to face the food problem
in earnest before he went to bed. It was a very
serious problem indeed. Health and strength,
success or failure, continued vigour or a swift
collapse, all hinged upon the inglorious question,
which engrossed till near midnight one of the
142


Devices of a Castaway
plainest livers on earth, as his labours had absorbed
him since dawn. He had to reckon with his
enemies in the matter. He had not the slightest
hope of obtaining supplies in the village. But at
daylight he walked some miles to see a farmer
who had sometimes trudged as many to hear him
preach; and the farmer gave him breakfast with
a surly pity, which Carlton suffered, as he accepted
the meal, for his hard work’s sake.
He had explained that he came on business,
and after breakfast the farmer asked him, not
without suspicion, what his business was.
“Do you kill your own sheep?” inquired
Mr. Carlton.
“ Only for ourselves.”
“When do you kill ? ”
“Let’s see. Friday, is it? Then we kill this
mornin’.”
“ May I wait and watch ? ”
The other stared.
“ I want some mutton,” Carlton explained.
“But I don’t keep a butcher’s shop,” growled
the farmer. “Well, we’ll see what we can do;
we may be able to let you have a bit of the
neck-end.”
“I should be very grateful for it. But I’m
afraid I want more.”
“ What more ? ”
“A flock of sheep.”
He was willing to pay outside prices. So
a bargain was struck; and the sheep were in
the glebe that night. Meanwhile he had seen
143


Peccavi
one killed and dressed, and was not the less
thankful that he had neck-end chops enough to
last him that week.
The stacking of the stones was finished early
on the Friday afternoon, and Carlton determined '
to take the rest of that day easily. So he set
himself to retrieve the lectern from the ruins,
and did finally wheel it to the rectory, on two
barrows ; the first broke under its weight. More-
over, this had consumed the entire afternoon, as
another would have foreseen at a glance, and
Carlton emerged as from a pool of ink. Since
he had made himself rather hot and black, how-
ever, he thought it a pity not to clear a little more
of the interior while the light lasted. It must be
done some day; but again the task was more
formidable than it appeared to dauntless eyes still
aflame with vast endeavour. The firemen had
not spared the water when all was over, so the
big bones of the roof were not burnt through.
Tie-beams and principal rafters, in particular, lay
whole and heavy, and immovable less from their
weight than from the inextricable tangle in which
they had fallen. There was nothing but the saw
for these, and Carlton had already sawn the
lectern from its grave. He learnt to saw with his
left hand that evening; and after all had very
little but his own personal condition to show for
his labour: only the nucleus of a wood-heap near
the stack of stones, and a crooked, blackened,
brass thing in the dining-room. But then he had
not intended to do much that afternoon ; he went
I44


Devices of a Castaway
indoors, and drew the water for his bath with
that consolation.
Meat for the second time that day! Carlton
began to feel a man. He paced his study with
the old rapid step; and he determined to order
and arrange his day’s work so that the muscles
should relieve each other in gangs: varied exer-
tions; that was the principle of all continuous
labour. You cannot sit down to rest when you
are working hard ; but you can do something else.
Carlton never rested till he went to bed. But
this evening he sat down at his desk.
A sheet of sermon paper was ruled in six
columns and a margin ; the columns were headed
by the days of the week; down the margin the
days were divided into three periods, a short and
two long; it was the class-room chart of his
school-days over again. In future he would rise
at five; four was tOO early. The short period
before breakfast should be daily devoted to work
in the house. The place must be made and kept
habitably clean; that could be left partly to the
wet days. Then there was the kitchen work, the
preparation of food for the day, baking two days
a week, the occasional Slaughter of a sheep ; and
here Carlton paused to grapple with the appalling
problem presented by the hungriest of living men
and the smallest of slain sheep . . . Salt seemed
the solution . . . Salt mutton? . . . At any
rate all carnal cares and menial duties should be
disposed of for the day as early as possible in the
early morning; not till then would he break his
145 L


Peccavi
fast; and the real day’s work should begin as
near eight o’clock as might be, but as often as
’possible on the right side of the hour. Moreover,
it should begin with the lighter labour: scraping
and repointing the uncondemned walls, for
example; that would take one man weeks or
months; but it would not tire him out at the
beginning of the day. Then there was the pre-
paration of the stones; the careful scraping of
those preserved; classification as to size for the
various courses; cutting and fitting of fresh
stones; the actual building with trowel and
plummet. All this went under one head, and
was for the body of the day; a long spell broken
by a good meal and a determined rest. The day
should finish, for many a day to come, with a
savage attack upon the chaos within the walls.
A hand too tired for skilled labour would still be
fit for that.
And as Robert Carlton reached this stage in
the laying of his ingenious plans, he leaned back
in his chair, and stared at his dull reflection in the
diamond panes above his writing table, in a sudden
horror of himself and all his ways and works.
He was actually happy—he! The reaction was
the same in kind as that which had come to him
at the shed, in the joy of touching hammer
and chisel again, and which had driven him to
the hall next morning. But it was greater in
degree: for then he had seen how happy he
might be ; to-night he knew how happy he was.
“ But only in my work! Only in my work ! ”
146


Devices of a Castaway
he cried, and fell upon his knees to crave for-
giveness from the Almighty for daring to enjoy
the consolation which He had ordained for him.
The artist was dead in Carlton for that night.
He rose a very miserable sinner, every thought a
whip for his poor spirit that had dared to come
to life without leave. He had committed deadly
sin with deadliest result ; let him never forget it !
He, God’s servant the morbid rehearsal may
be spared. But he did not spare himself. All
the aggravating circumstances were recalled, none
that extenuated ; all that he had suffered he
must needs suffer anew, slowly, deliberately, and
in due order; that he might not forget, that he
might never forget again! Now he was con-
fessing to Musk, now to George Mellis; poor
George, where was he? Now they were break-
ing his windows, and now Tom Ivey was refusing
his hand. But at last he was before the bishop ;
that strong, queer voice was croaking across the
desk; and all at once the croak ended, and the
voice rang like a sovereign with words of refined
gold.
“ Courage, brother ! Pray without ceasing.
Look forward, not back; do not despair. Despair
is the devil’s best friend ; better give way to
deadly sin than to deadlier despair ! ”
And he prayed again ; but not in the house.
“ For I will look forward,” he said as he went.
“ But let me never again forget! ”
There was neither wind nor moon. The
sparrows were still, but not the shrill little swifts.

147 L 2


Peccavi
And somewhere a thrush was singing, clear and
mellow and certain as a bell; and once a bat’s
wing brushed the bowed bare head of him who
prayed not for forgiveness but for the peace of a
soul; for neither was it in the ruins that Robert
Carlton knelt once more.


X IV.
THE LAST RESORT.
CARLTON chose a fresh stone from the heap; he
was going to begin all over again. He got it
in his arms, and he managed to stagger with it
to the front of the shed. The stone was at least
two feet long, and its other dimensions were about
half that of the length; as Carlton set it down,
himself all but on the top of it, he trusted it was
the largest size in the heap. It was of a rich
reddish yellow, roughly rectangular, but lumpy
as ill-made porridge, exactly as it had come from
the quarry. Carlton tilted it up against a smaller
stone, smooth enough in parts, but palpably
untrue in its planes and angles. This was the
stone that he had been all day spoiling; it had
been as big as the new one that morning, when
he had begun upon it with a view to the lower
eleven-inch courses; and now he had failed to
make even a six-inch job of it. The stone was
so soft. It cut like cheese. But he was not
going to spoil another.
So he rested a minute before beginning again,
and he marshalled his tools upon a barrow within
reach of his hand. It was rather late on the
Saturday afternoon. In the morning he had felt
I49


Peccavi
disinclined for violent exertion, but just equal to
trying his hand at that stone-dressing which would
presently become his chief labour; and his hand
had disappointed him. It had the wrong kind
of cunning: as amateurs will, Carlton had picked
up his fancy craft at the fancy end: gargoyles
were his speciality, and an even surface beyond
him.
“But I can learn,” he had been saying all
day; and most times the dog had wagged his
tail.
Ten minutes ago his tone had changed. '
“I’ll start afresh! I’ll do one tO-night! I
won’t be beaten ! ”
And that time Glen had leapt up with his
master, and lashed his shins with his tail, as
much as to say, “ Beaten ? Not you ! ” and had
accompanied him to the heap, and was pretending
to rest with him now. But Carlton was constitu-
tionally impatient Of conscious rest; and this
afternoon certain sounds, louder though less
incessant than those of his constant comrades, the
bees and birds, informed him that the Boys’
Friendly were not too proud to use the far strip
of glebe land which the rector had levelled for
them last year. The discovery made him glad.
But it also brought him to his feet within the
minute that he had promised himself; and the
hammer rang swift blows on the cold-chisel as
much to drown the music of bat and ball as to
clear the grosser irregularities from one surface
of the stone.
15o


The Last Resort
This done (and this much he had done success-
fully enough before), hammer and cold-chisel were
thrown aside, and the marbling-hammer taken up,
because Tom Ivey had always used it to make
the rough sufficiently smooth. But it is a mongrel
implement at best, being hammer and chisel in
one, with changeable bits like a brace, and yet
with less of these than of the pickaxe in its cross—
bred composition. Like a pick you wield it, yet
lightly and with the one and only curve, or at a
stroke you go too deep.
Chip, chip, chip went the sharp seven-eighths-
of-an-inch bit; and off curved the soft yellow
flakes, to turn to powder as they fell.
Chip, chip, chip along the top; and the keen
bit left its mark each time; and the finished row
of these was like the key-board of a toy piano.
Chip, chip, chip, always from left to right, a
tier below, and then the tier below that. The
toy piano is becoming a toy organ of many
manuals; and the hue of the keys is not that of
the rough outer surface: as they first see the
light they are nearer the colour of cigar-ash.
Chip, chip, chip—chip, chip, chip; but swish,
swish, swish is a thought nearer the sound. So
soft that stone, so sharp that bit, so timorous and
tentative the unpractised strokes of Robert
Carlton !
Every now and then he would stop, and
anxiously apply a straight lath to the spreading
smoothness; but he was improving, and in the
end the plane was at least as true as it was
151


Peccavi
smooth. The key-marks of the marbling~hammer
were not always parallel or of even length, and
the rows declined from left to right like the hand
of a weak writer: “bad batting,” Tom Ivey
would have called it, a “bat” being the mark in
question, and long, even bats, “straight along
the stone,” the mason’s ideal, as the inquisitive
amateur had discovered the first day Ivey worked
for him. But knowledge and skill lie a gulf apart,
and on the whole Carlton felt encouraged. He
had done but one side of four, but the one was
smooth enough to face the world as coursed rubble;
let him but get and keep his angles, and the
other three would matter less. So now he took
the straight-edge, as the lath was called, and
the bit of black slate which Tom had also left
behind him; and with these and the mason’s
square a rectangular parallelogram with eleven—
inch ends was duly ruled on the satisfactory
surface. Hammer and cold-chisel again. Much- I
use of the square, but no more play with the
marbling-hammer. No need to perfect the parts
doomed to mortar and eternal night ; rough criss—
cross work with a mason’s axe is the thing for
them ; as Carlton knew when he rather reluctantly
applied himself to the mastery of that implement,
just as he was beginning to acquire some profi-
ciency with the other. The mason’s axe was the
most treacherous of them all. It was a hand
pickaxe with a point like a stiletto; a touch, and
the steel lay buried. But it was the right tool to
use, and Carlton used it to the best of his ability,
I52


The Last Resort
stooping more and more over his work as the
light began to fail him.
He was going to succeed at last ! If only he
had not lost so much time! Then he might have
mixed some mortar and laid the first stone of his
own cutting—the first stone of the new church!
That would have been something like a day’s
work; yet he was not dissatisfied with his pro-
gress. Swish, swish, swish; he might have done
much worse. He had pulled down the bad walls-—
swish—and what was good of them—swish—he
had saved and there they were. He looked up,
the perspiration standing thick upon his white
forehead, his eyes all eagerness and determination.
He stood upright to rest a moment in the mellow
light—happy again ! Happy because he had not
time to think of himself, but only of what he was
doing, and of what he felt certain he could do:
happy in his aching limbs and soaking flannels,
- and all that with a happiness he was for once not
destined to realise and to check. For, even as he
stood, Glen barked, and Carlton turned in time to
see the village constable tuck his cane under his
arm while he stood still to feel in his pockets.
The man was in full uniform—a strange circum-
stance in itself.
“ Good evening, Frost,” said Mr. Carlton.
“ Evenin’, sir.”
The constable was an imposing figure of a
man, with a handsome stupid face, and a stolid
_ deliberation of word and deed which gave an
impression of artless but indefatigable vigilance.
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In reality the fellow had few inferiors in the
parish.
“For me P ” and Carlton held out his hand as
the other produced a paper.
“ For you an’ me,” said the constable, winking
as he kept the paper to himself. And in an
impressive voice he read out a warrant for the
apprehension of the Reverend Robert Carlton,
Clerk in Holy Orders, on a charge of unlawfully
and maliciously setting fire to the parish church
of Long Stow, in the County of Suffolk, on the
night of the 24th or the morning of the 25th
June, in the year of grace 1882 ; the warrant was
signed by two justices—Sir Wilton Gleed of
Long Stow Hall, and Canon Wilders of Laken-
hall.
“Like to see it for yourself P” inquired
Frost.
“ No, thank you ; that’s quite enough for me.
Well, upon my word ! ”
And Carlton stood staring into space, a
glitter in his eyes, a smile upon his lips, incapable
of unmixed indignation : really, Sir Wilton was a
better fighter than he had supposed.
“You will have to come with me to Laken-
hall,” said the constable’s voice.
Carlton realised the situation.
“ To-night P ”
“At once, sir, if you please. They’ve sent a
trap for us from Lakenhall. That’s waiting at
the gate.”
The mason’s axe was still in his hand, the
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The Last Resort
unfinished stone at his feet. Carlton looked
wistfully from one to the other, and thence in
appeal to the officer of the law.
“I say, Frost, is there any hurry for a
quarter Of an hour ? I’d—I’d give a sovereign to
finish this stone! ”
Virtue blazed in the constable’s face.
“You don’t bribe me, sir!” he cried. “I’m
ashamed Of you, I am, for tryin' that on! No,
Mr. Carlton, you’ve got to come straight away.”
“ But surely I may change first ? ”
“You’ll have to be quick, and I’ll have to
come with you.”
“Is that necessary?” asked Carlton with
some heat, as he flung his tools under cover.
“ That’s left to me, sir, and I don’t trust no
gentleman in his dressing-room. My orders are
to take you alive, ‘Mr. Carlton.”
Carlton was upon him in two strides.
“Very well,” said be, “you Shall; and you
shall come upstairs and see me change. But
address another word to me at your peril ! ”
A small crowd had collected at the gate; a
Lakenhall policeman was waiting in the trap.
Carlton came down the drive with his long coat
flying and his head thrown back. Somehow he
was allowed to depart without a groan.
On the way he never spoke, and something
kept the constables from speaking before him.
They had a slow horse; it was nearly an hour
before Carlton saw the inside of a police-station
for the first time in his life. Here he was formally
I55


Peccavi
charged by a portly inspector with whom he had
some slight acquaintance; the charge concluded
with the usual warning that anything he said
might be given in evidence against him.
“ I hear,” said Carlton. “And now P”
The inspector shrugged his personal regret.
“ I’m afraid there’s only one thing for it now,
H
“ The cells, eh P”
“That’s it, Mr. Carlton.”
“Till when P”
“ Monday morning, sir, the magistrates sit.”
“Lead the way, then,” said Carlton. “I can
spend my Sunday in gaol as well as in my own
rectory.”
His eye was stern but steady; he was filled
with contempt, but without a fear. He knew
who was at the bottom of this charge, and had
begun by quite admiring the man’s resource; but
his admiration did not survive a second thought.
What a fool the fellow must be! No fool like
an old fool, said the proverb; and none so
insanely reckless as your prudent people, once
they lose their head, thought Robert Carlton in
his cell. Of the charge itself he scarcely con-
descended to think at all; for to his mind, the
more innocent on that score for his guilt upon
another, the thing seemed more preposterous
than it really was. He burn the church! With
what object, pray? And what did they suppose
he had risked his life for at the fire P Remorse,
or show? He could have laughed; he was
sir.
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unable to imagine a shred of evidence against
himself.
There was a Testament on the table, but he
had brought his Bible in his pocket; and by the
gas-jet in its wire guard, that striped the walls
with lean shadows like the bars of some wild
beast’s cage, Robert Carlton forgot his own sins,
persecution and imprisonment, in those of his hero
St. Paul; and was in another world when the
rattle of a key brought him back to this. It
was the fat inspector himself, with good news
on his face, and in his hand the card of Canon
‘Nilders, Rector of Lakenhall and chairman of
the local bench.
“He doesn’t want to see me, does he P” said
Carlton, in plain alarm.
“ If you’ve no objection to seeing him, sir.”
“But he was one of those who signed the
warrant! Tell him I can’t see anybody. Thank
him very much. Say that I appreciate his
kindness, but would prefer to be alone.”
In a few minutes the man returned.
“That’s a pity you won’t see the canon, sir;
he don’t half like it. He couldn’t help signing
the warrant, not in his position ; that seem to me
to be the very reason why he come the minute he
heard we had you here ; and it’s my opinion he’d
like to see you out of custody.”
“ You mean on bail P”
“ Yes, sir.”
“ Because I’m a clergyman, and it’s a disgrace
to the cloth! ”
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Peccavi
This explanation was a sudden idea impul-
sively expressed ; but the inspector’s face was its
tacit confirmation.
“ Is he here still ?” demanded the prisoner.
“ Yes, sir, he is.”
“ Then you can say I’ve been taken on a false
and abominable charge,” cried Carlton, “and I
don’t want my liberty till the falsehood’s proved !
But I am equally obliged to Canon Wilders,” he
added with less scorn, “and you will kindly tell
him so with my compliments.”
But he paced his cell in a curious twitter for
one who had entered it without a qualm. In all
his trouble this was the first word from a clerical
neighbour: to a man they had stood aloof from
him in his shame. His own movements were in
part responsible: he had disappeared from view.
Nor had he expected or coveted their sympathy;
yet, now that one of them had come forward,
Carlton was conscious of a wound he had not
felt before. There was Preston of Linkworth—
but his wife would account for him. There was
Bosanquet of Bedingfield, and there were others.
They might have inquired at the infirmary
(Preston had), but he had never heard of it. As
for Wilders, he was a worthy man of local mark,
for whom Carlton had preached upon occasion;
one prosperous alike in worldly welfare and in
spiritual satisfaction; the last person to go into
disgrace ; and yet, by reason of a certain officious-
ness of character, the first to come forward as he
had done. Carlton had no wish to be ungracious
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The Last Resort
or ungrateful, or to make a personal matter of the
signing of the warrant ; but he could not face his
fellows with this new charge hanging over him,
nor was he going free by the favour of living man.
On the other hand, he pondered more upon his
brother clergymen that Saturday night in gaol
than in all these eight weeks past. And the sense
of mere social downfall, the dullest of his aches
hitherto, became suddenly acute, so that for that
alone he wished they had not put him in prison.
But for all the rest he cared as little as before,
and showed as little interest in the pending event.
His indifference quite troubled the inspector,
who evinced a desire to show the prisoner every
possible consideration, and was an early visitor
next morning.
“ That ain’t no business of mine, sir ; but you’ll
be wanting to see a solicitor during the day P ”
“ Why so P ” asked Carlton.
“Well, sir, your case will come up to-morrow
morning.”
“ But what do I want with a solicitor?”
“Why, sir, every pris—that is, accused
The inspector boggled at the word, and stood
confounded by the other’s density.
“ Oh, I see!” cried Carlton. “ So you’re
thinking of my defence, are you? Thanks very
much, but I don’t want a lawyer to defend me.
I make your side a present of the lawyers, Mr.
Inspector; they’ll want them all. It’s for them
to prove me guilty, not for me to prove my
innocence.”
U

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“ And do you really think we have no case
against you?” inquired the inspector, with a
change of tone, for he happened to have charge of
the case himself.
“I don’t think about it,” returned Carlton,
with unaffected indifference. “The thing’s too
preposterous to be worth a thought.”
“I’m glad you find it so,” said the other,
nettled ; “let’s hope you won’t change your mind.
I only spoke for your own good; there’s plenty
would blame me for speaking at all. I won’t
trouble you no more, Sir. I might have known
I’d get no thanks, after the way you served Canon
Wilders last night. Defend yourself, and let’s see
you dO it ! ”
The door shut with a clang, and Carlton
watched the vibrations in some distress. He was
sorry to hurt the feelings of his would-be friends,
but he needed no man’s friendship in the present
crisis. God would be his friend; his faith in Him
was as profound as his contempt of the false
charge hanging over himself. The latter, he felt
convinced, must break down as it deserved ; but if
not, then the meaning would be clear. It would
mean that he had not been punished sufficiently
for what he had done, and must accordingly be
prepared to suffer something for that which he
had not done, but of which his sin had indubitably
caused the doing. And Robert Carlton was so
prepared in his heart of hearts. Yet he was
unable to carry his pious fatalism to its logical
conclusion, and to abate his bitterness against the
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human instruments of a vengeance he was willing
to think Divine.
On the contrary, he condescended at intervals
of the day to give his mind to the proceedings of
the next; and he did recall one or two circum-
stances which prejudice and malice might twist
against him. To consider these was to be instantly
inspired with a conclusive reply on every point;
but Carlton was not sure whether the law would
permit him to reply at all. So in the afternoon
he begged for newspapers, and his request, though
acceded to, was all over Lakenhall by nightfall.
A suspended clergyman who thought so little of
his notorious sins that he could ask for newspapers
on a Sunday afternoon! The inference drawn
by a small community, greatly excited about the
case, and unconsciously anxious to believe the
worst of one who was bad enough at best, will be
readily imagined. The whole town shook its head.
Meanwhile the object of popular detestation
was comparatively happy in the exercise of his
receptive powers. By good luck his bundle of
provincial newspapers contained that which can
only be met with in a local press: a verbatim
report of the police-court proceedings in a painful
case of infinitesimal interest to the world at large.
The interest, however, was all-absorbing to Robert
Carlton. The accused had been represented by
a solicitor. The solicitor had fought his case
tooth-and-nail. There had been certain “scenes
in court”; all were reported in the local paper,
and no point involved was lost upon the alert
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Peccavi
brain of the imprisoned clergyman. It was with
difficulty that he dismissed the subject from his
mind when the church-bells rang once more
through the quiet country town. It happened,
however, that the parish church was quite near
the police-court; and in the morning Carlton had
been enabled to follow the whole service, partly
through knowing it by heart, partly from the
strains of hymn or psalm that reached him at due
intervals through the grated window: and ever
since then he had been looking forward to even-
song. So now when first the bells ceased, and then
the voluntary, the prisoner presently rehearsed the
exhortation (in silence) on his feet, the general
confession (half aloud) upon his knees; then
followed the psalms, also from memory, his lips
moving, his hands folded; then knelt again to
pray the prayers. And his eyes were as earnest,
his attitude as reverent, and even certain gestures
as punctilious, as though he were back in his
church that had been burnt, instead of lying in
gaol for burning it.
The August evening came early to its close;
a little while the new moon glimmered in the cell ;
then the organ pealed the people out of church,
and a few steps passed that way, and a few voices
floated in through the bars, before all was quiet
in the little old town. And Robert Carlton
thought no more that night upon his enemies, and
took no further heed for the morrow.
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XV.
HIS OWN LAWYER.
CANON WILDERS was supported by Mr. Preston,
of Linkworth, and by a youthful justice whom
Robert Carlton did not know by name, but who
sat like the graven image of Rhadamanthus,
encased in the atrocious trousers and the
excruciating collar of the year 1882.
Considering the romantic interest of the case,
this was by no means “a full bench”; there
were, however, some conspicuous and deliberate
absentees, including Sir Wilton Gleed and Dr.
Marigold. Carlton was less surprised at his
enemy’s abstinence than at the position volun-
tarily occupied by James Preston, an indolent
cleric but genial gentleman, who had been his
friend. His surprise deepened when Preston
nodded to him, hastily enough, and with a change
of colour, but yet in a way that thrilled Carlton
with a doubt as to whether he had altogether lost
that friend. He was in no such suspense con-
cerning the stately chairman, who very properly
looked at the prisoner as though he had never
seen him before, and never addressed him with-
out tuning his voice to the proper pitch of distant
163 M 2


Peccavi
disapproval. This was not a question of losing a
friend, but of having made an enemy Of the most
potent personage in the court.
The latter was densely crowded when the
stout inspector opened the case, but the familiar
faces stood out in quick succession, and they
were not a few. In a doorway apart stood a
Long Stow trio—the saddler, the sexton, and
Tom Ivey; all three were in their Sunday
clothes, and more or less visibly ill at ease ; but it
was only Ivey who reddened and looked away
when the prisoner caught his eye. As for
Carlton, he became so lost in sudden and
absorbing speculation that it was some minutes
before he realised that the inspector had finished
a bald brief statement of his case, and that a
witness was already in the box and giving evidence.
The witness, however, was only FrOSt, the village
constable, and his evidence merely that of the
arrest on the Saturday at Long Stow. Carlton
nevertheless whipped out his pocket-book, and
the witness waited before standing down.
“May I ask him two or three questions?”
said the prisoner, addressing himself with courtesy
to the bench.
“ As many as you please,” replied the chairman,
“ provided they are relevant.”
Carlton bowed before turning to the witness.
“ How far were you responsible for the
warrant on which you arrested me P”
“ Re-spon-si-ble ! ” exclaimed the chairman in
separate syllables. “What do you mean P ”
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His own Lawyer
“ I wish to ascertain exactly in what measure
the witness has been concerned in trumping up
this charge against me.”
“That is not the language in which to
inquire!” .
“Your worships may discover that it is
exceedingly mild language, before the case is
over."
“I shall not allow you to cross-examine wit-
nesses unless you do so with due respect to the
bench.”
The clerk to the justices, who had examined
the witness, was the means of averting an
immediate scene.
“I think, your worship, that he wishes to
know whether the witness laid the information
against him.”
“I thank you,” said Carlton, an incredible
twinkle in his eye, as he again turned to the
witness. “I do desire to ask you, with due
respect to the bench, whether you ‘laid this
information’ against me, or whether you did
not ?”
“I did,” said Frost.
“ Before whom did you ‘ lay ’ it ? ”
“ The magistrate.”
“ What magistrate ? ”
“ Sir Wilton Gleed.”
“ And when ? ”
“ Last Friday.”
“The date, please! ”
“ That would be the 18th.”
. I65


Peccavi
“ The 18th of August! And the church was
burnt on the morning of the 25th of June ! How
is it that it took you eight weeks all but two days
to ‘ lay your information ’ against me P”
The witness looked confused; but the chair-
man was quick to interpose ; he had been waiting
his opportunity.
“That may or may not transpire in the
evidence,” said he ; “ it is in either event an abso—
lutely inadmissible question, and I should strongly
recommend you to employ a solicitor. If you
like I will adjourn the court for half-an-hour while
you instruct one ; but I will not have the time of
the court wasted by irrelevant and inadmissible
questions such as you seem inclined to put. If
you have nothing better to ask the witness I
shall order him to stand down.”
“ Let him stand down,” returned the prisoner,
indifferently. “ I have done with him."
Robert Carlton had surprised himself. He had
come into court with the most admirable intentions
that it was possible to entertain : he was to have
kept cool but humble, to have curbed his contempt
of proceedings conducted (if not instituted) in the
best of good faith, and never for an instant to
have forgotten his guilt of sin in his innocence of
crime. In this spirit he had risen from his knees
that morning, and with this resolve he had left
his cell and been ushered into court ; but the
very atmosphere of the place had made the blood
sing in his veins; and it needed but the chair-
man’s voice to make it boil. He had sinned, and
166


His own Lawyer
chosen to suffer for his sin: so no crime was too
dastardly to lay at his door. He was down, and
deservedly down, so friends and acquaintances
alike must gather and conspire to trample him.
Carlton’s point of view went round like a
Weathercock in the wind; flesh and blood flew
to the front, in despite of spirit ; and all the man
in him rebelled at man’s injustice, in despite of
his prayers.
So when the next witness was being sworn
(it was his own sexton), and James Preston
whispered to Canon Wilders, the man who had
preached for both of them looked on grimly.
“As you seem bent upon conducting your
own case,” said Wilders, leaning back, “ you may
possibly prefer a chair at the table ; if so, there is
one at your disposal.” And he pointed into the
well of the court.
Carlton thanked him in the voice that all his
will could not purge of all its scorn; he was
perfectly comfortable where he was. Then he
looked pointedly at Preston, and his face and
tone softened together. “But I shall not forget
the suggestion,” he said; and again his friend
changed colour.
The decrepit hero of the overweening hallu-
cination had hobbled into the witness-box mean-
while. Carlton had not come in contact with
him since the morning before the fire, and he
little thought that his last conversation with the
sexton was about to come up in evidence against
him. Yet such was the case.
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Peccavi
Old Busby had been responsible for the
lighting of the church. He had kept the paraffin
and filled the lamps. But in the month of June
the lamps were rarely needed. They had not
been lighted on the Sunday before the fire.
There would have been even less occasion for
them—by one minute—the following Sunday.
And yet, on the Saturday morning, the prisoner
had ordered the witness to see that the lamps
were full !
So Busby deposed; and the point seemed of
sinister significance. It took the prisoner plainly
by surprise: the circumstance had escaped his
memory. In a minute, howeverg he had re-
called it in detail; and his cross-examina-
tion, though provocative of some mirth, and
curtailed in consequence, was by no means
ineffectual.
“You remember when the lamps went out,
through your neglect, in the middle of even-
song ? ” V
“ I’m like to remember it. That was when I
swallowed the frog.”
The court laughed, but not the prisoner, who
was too much in earnest even to smile.
“ I reminded you pretty often about the lamps
after that ? ”
“ Ay, you were for ever at me about ’em.”
“ Now, on the morning you mention, where
was I when I told you to go and fill the lamps?”
The sexton thought.
“ In your study, sir.”
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His own Lawyer
“ And what were you doing there? Do you
remember P”
“ I do that ! I was telling you about the
frog.”
This time the prisoner smiled himself.
“And did I listen to you P” he demanded, a
sudden change upon his face, as though the act of
smiling had put him in pain.
“ N 0, that you didn’t,” the Old man grumbled ;
“you fared as though you didn’t hear.”
“ So I told you to go away and fill your
lamps,” said Carlton, sadly, “even though it was
Midsummer Day ! I have finished with the
witness.”
He was as one who had brilliantly parried a
deadly thrust, and yet received a secret wound in
the onset. He rested his head upon his hand to
hide his pain, and only raised it at the sound of
James Preston’s voice putting the first question
from the bench :
“As sexton, did you keep the key of the
church P”
“ In the old days I did, sir; but that’s been
open church ever since Mr. Carlton come.”
“ You mean that the church was open day and
night P”
“ To be sure it was.”
“Thank you,” said Preston hastily, as though
glad to relapse into silence. Carlton did not add
to his embarrassment by a glance, but his heart
throbbed with gratitude for the goodwill he could
no longer question.
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Peccavi
“ Did you fill the lamps ?” asked the chairman
as the witness was preparing to hobble from the
box.
“Yes, sir, I did.”
And, watching the chairman’s face, Carlton
was still more thankful to have one friend upon
the bench; for it seemed to him that the young
gentleman in the tall collar and the tight trousers
was alone in preserving a Rhadamanthine
impartiality.
What surprised him equally was the strength
and the nature of the evidence produced. In his
complete innocence of the crime imputed to him,
he had been unable to conceive or to recall a
single incriminating circumstance not susceptible
Of an easy and immediate explanation. Yet more
than one arose during the afternoon, when first
the saddler, and afterwards Tom Ivey, went into
the box to bear witness against him; and more .
than once the explanation, so full and clear in his
own mind, was incapable of confirmation or
admission in the form of evidence. The more
striking instances were afforded by Fuller, whose
testimony, though convincing enough, and not
the less so for its real or apparent reluctance,
came as a complete surprise to the prisoner. It
appeared that the saddler had returned to the
rectory on the fatal night, more than an hour after
his first visit and summary dismissal, in order to
have his “ say,” and “not let the reverend have it
all his own way.” The midnight visitor had found
a light in the study, but the door shut, and only
170


His own Lawyer
the dog within. He had not entered, but had
waited about the drive, till, seeing a light in the
church, he had made up his mind that “the
reverend” was there, and had decided not to
interrupt him. So the saddler had gone home
and to bed, and was fast asleep when the church~
bells sounded the alarm.
“And what made you so sure that it was
Mr. Carlton in the church with the light P”
inquired Mr. Preston.
“Because I couldn’t find him in the rectory.”
“ But you did not go in?”
“I knocked and called, but I only made the
dog bark.”
The chairman leaned forward in his turn.
“ Was the barking loud P” he asked. “ Loud
enough to be heard all over the house? ”
Carlton sprang to his feet. He had been
accommodated with a chair, of_ which he had
quietly availed himself during the examination of
this witness, and the suddenness of his movement
brought all eyes to his face. It was quick with
impatience and sarcastic disregard.
“ If you are labouring to prove that I was not
at my house, but in the church,” he cried, “your
worship may save himself the time and trouble. I
was in the church. I lit one of the lamps.”
This did not strike the prisoner as the sensa-
tional statement that it was; he was therefore
amazed at its effect upon the bench, where even
Rhadamanthus came to life, while James Preston
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Peccavi
opened eyes of horror, and Wilders whispered to
the clerk.
“That,” said the chairman, “is an extremely
serious statement, and one that you are surely ill-
advised in making. It is not evidence, but it is
being taken down in writing, and may be given
in evidence against you at your trial. I should
certainly advise you to refrain from further state-
ments of the kind."
“ I thought you wanted to get at the truth? ”
“ So we do. But I have warned you. Have
you any questions to ask the witness P ”
“ Not one; he is equally correct in his state-
ments and his suppositions.”
Thomas Ivey was then sworn, amid the hush
of deepening interest, and gave his evidence in
a manly, straightforward, level-headed fashion,
that added its own weight to what he said for
good or ill; and his testimony told both ways.
He described the scene in the church on his
arrival ; the character of the fire, and the attitude
of Mr. Carlton; both of which, he admitted (in
answer to a question from the chairman), had
struck him as suspicious at the first glance.
“ But did you see him do anything that you
thought suspicious P ” asked the well-meaning
Mr. Preston.
“I did, sir.”
“ What was that P ” from the chairman.
“He threw something into the flames. But
I couldn’t see what that was.”
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His own Lawyer
“ Did you afterwards find out? ”
“ No, sir.”
Once more the prisoner attracted every eye.
It was felt that he would make another of his
reckless and voluntary declarations. But this
time he was silent enough; and though the evi-
dence now took a turn in his favour, that silence
left its mark.
Everybody knew how the clergyman had
risked his life, when it was too late, to save
the church. But the story had not yet been told
as Mr. Preston contrived to elicit it from the lips
of Tom Ivey. The Rector of Linkworth had
been from home when the fire took place. There
was nothing unnatural in his desire for details,
nor did he put an improper question. The
chairman, however, betrayed more than a little
impatience, while the junior justice, on the other
hand, displayed excitement of another kind, and
actually put in his word at last.
“ Do you mean to say you let him throw the
water single-handed,” said he, “while the rest of
you stayed outside ?”
“There was no stopping him, sir,” said Ivey.
“ He would have all the danger to himself.”
“Then you could not see what use he made
of the water?” suggested the chairman, dryly.
“ No, sir,” said Tom; “I could only see the
steam.” And his tone was still more dry.
Wilders looked at the clock as the examination
concluded. The case had not been taken till
the afternoon; it was now nearly five. Wilders
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Peccavi
beckoned and spoke to the inspector, subsequently
addressing the prisoner in his coldest tone.
“I understand that this is the last witness to
be called against you,” said he. “ Do you propose
to cross-examine him P ”
“I do.”
“ And may I ask if you have any witnesses to
call for your defence P”
“ I may have one.”
“ Then it becomes my duty to adjourn the
case.” He whispered again to the inspector, and
at greater length with his colleagues, James
Preston appearing tenacious of some point upon
which the chairman ultimately gave way. “ As
the police have completed their case,” continued
Wilders, “a remand of one day will be sufficient,
and we shall simply adjourn until tO-morrow
morning. But you may, if you like, apply for
bail; though the question, having due regard to
the evidence which we have heard, is one that
would now require our grave consideration.”
“You may spare yourselves the trouble,” said
Carlton shortly. “ I don’t want bail.”
And he went back to prison to lament his
temper, but not to go through the form of further
prayer for patience and humility ; for he felt that
these were beyond him in that public court, packed
with prejudice from door to door.
“ I told you what he’d say,” grumbled Wilders
in the retiring-room.
“I don’t blame him,” said Mr. Preston. “ My
dear sir, he’s innocent of this! ”
I74


His own Lawyer
“ I Shall form my opinion to-morrow,” returned
the canon, with dignity. “ Meanwhile I confess to
some curiosity as to whom he thinks of calling as
his witness.”
“The Chappie shows us sport,” quoth Rhada-
manthus, “ guilty or not guilty ; and I’m not
giving Odds either way.”
I75


XVI.
END OF THE DUEL.
RHADAMANTHUS reappeared without a visible
garment that he had worn the day before. He
came spurred and breeched from the saddle, with
a horseshoe pin in his snowy tie, a more human
collar, and a keener front for the proceedings
withal. Carlton felt his eye upon him from the
first, and returned the compliment by taking a
new interest in the nameless youth; he had long
read the minds of the other two ; his fate was in
this young fellow’s keeping. He had no time,
however, for idle speculation as to the result.
Tom Ivey was back in the witness-box, and the
accused was invited to cross-examine without
delay.
Carlton soon Showed that the interval had
enabled him to profit by the experience of the
previous day. His questions were cunningly pre-
pared. He began with one not easy to put in an
admissible form, yet he succeeded in so putting it.
“You have sworn,” said he, “that your very
first glimpse of me in the burning church was
sufficient to create a certain suspicion in your
mind. Did you mention this suspicion to any—
body—that night P”
176


End of the Due!
“ Not that night.”
“That month P ”
“Nor yet that month, sir.”
“And why P ” _
“ I didn’t suspect you any more, sir.”
Carlton tried hard to suppress his satisfac-
tion, as a sensation to which he was no longer
entitled. He had come back to this in the
night ; but it was harder to abide by it during the
day. He paused a little, in honest effort to rid
his mind and tone of any taint of triumph; but
his advantage had to be pursued.
“May I ask when this suspicion perished P ”
“Before we had been five minutes together,
trying to save the church ! ”
“You are getting upon dangerous ground,”
said the chairman. “ What the witness thought,
or when he ceased to think it, is not evidence.”
“ Another point, then,” said Carlton : “do
you remember the appearance of the lamps P”
“ Yes.”
“ What was it P”
“They were crooked.”
“ Did you notice any paraffin spilt about P”
“Yes, when my attention was called to it.”
“Where was this paraffin P”
“On the pews that were catching fire.”
“ And who called your attention to it P ”
“ You did yourself, sir.”
“I did myself!” repeated Carlton, struggling
with his tone. “That will do for that. I am
going back for a moment to those suspicions of
177 N


Peccavi
yours. Have you never mentioned them to a
human being ?”
“Yes, sir, I have.”
“As things of the past?”
“ As things of the past.”
“When was it that you first spoke of them?”
“Last Friday—the eighteenth, sir.”
“ And did you then speak of your own accord,
or were you questioned ?”
“ I was questioned.”
“As the first man to reach the burning
church ? ”
“ Yes, sir.”
“Take care!” cried Wilders. “That was a
leading question.”
“It is the last,” replied Carlton. “I have
finished with the witness. I would take this
opportunity, however, of apologising to your
worships for the various errors and excesses which
I have committed, and may still commit, in my
ignorance and inexperience of the law, and my
indignation at the charge. In this respect, and
this alone, I crave the indulgence of the bench,
and beg leave to rectify one of my mistakes. I
spoke in haste when I said, yesterday, that I had
no questions to ask the witness Fuller. I desire,
with your worships’ permission, to have that
witness recalled.”
The chairman was rather sharp: subsequent
evidence might make the recall of witnesses a
necessity, but the lost opportunities of counsel, or
of accused persons conducting their own defence,
178 ’


End of the Duel
were an altogether insufficient reason. However,
the man was in court, and the application would
be allowed.
“I appreciate the privilege,” said Carlton,
“and promise that it shall not detain us many
moments.”
He was becoming as fluent and adroit as a
past practitioner; in the pauses of the fight he
felt ashamed of his facility, a haunting sense that
it was indecent in him to defend himself at all.
Yet he was one against many, and, in this
matter, an innoCent man. Fight he must, and
that with all the skill and spirit in his power.
His liberty, his self-respect; his one remaining
chance, object, and desire in life; nay, his very
life itself was at stake with these. It was no
time for dwelling upon the past. The sin that
he had committed was one thing ; the crime that
he had not committed was another. It was his
duty to be just to himself. Yet this was how he
treated himself, whenever he had time to think!
He resolved to give himself fairer play than he
seemed likely to receive at the hands of others;
and his resolve declared itself in the ringing
voice that shocked not a few who heard it.
having found him guilty already in their hearts.
“About that very story of the empty rectory
and the light in the church,” he began, with
Fuller—“about that perfectly true story,” he
added, wilfully, “which you told us yesterday.
Did you tell it to anybody at the time?”
“Only Tom Ivey.”
179 N 2


End of the Duel
fastened upon his face with the glitter of fixed
bayonets.
“Yes,” said he. “I wish you to call Sir
Wilton Gleed.”
Quietly though distinctly spoken, the name
clapped like thunder on the court. Amazement
fell on all alike, for the issue between these two
had been the common theme for days. Popular
sympathy had rightly Sided with Imorality, and
its champion had lost nothing by his tactful
magnanimity in refraining from sitting upon the
bench; that he should be put in the box instead,
and by his shameless adversary, was an audacity
as hard to credit as to understand. There was a
moment’s hush, then a minute’s buzz, to which
the justices themselves contributed. VVilders
muttered that the man was mad; his colleague
on the right confessed himself nonplussed; his
colleague on the left dropped his shaven chin
upon his gold horseshoe, and his shoulders shook
with joy. Meanwhile Sir Wilton had forced a
grin and found his voice.
“ You want me in the box, do you P”
“ I do.”
“Very well ; you shall have me.”
And he was sworn, still grinning, with an odd
mixture of malevolence and deprecation for those
who ran to read. “ I meant to keep out of this,”
the florid face said; “but now I’m in it—well,
you’ll see! It’s the fellow’s own fault; his blood”
etc., etc. But this was not what Sir Wilton was
saying in his heart.
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Peccavi
Carlton began at the beginning.
“You are the patron of the living of Long
Stow, are you not P”
“You know I am.”
“I want the bench to have it from you ;
kindly answer my question.”
“I am the patron of the living of Long
Stow,” said Sir Wilton, with mock resignation.
“ In the year 1880 did you, of your own free
will and accord, present that living to me P ”
“Yes, and I’ve repented it ever since!”
There was a sympathetic murmur at the back
of the court. It was immediately checked.
Every face was thrust forward, every ear strained,
every eye absorbed between the prisoner in the
dock and the witness in the box. It was no
longer the uphill fight of one against many; it
was single combat between man and man, and
the electricity of single combat charged the air.
“You have repented it more than ever of
late P” asked Carlton in steady tones. The skin
upon his forehead seemed stretched with pain;
the veins showed blue and swollen ; but the many
judged him from his voice alone.
“ N aturally,” sneered Sir Wilton.
“ So much so that you were resolved I should
resign P”
“ I hoped you would have the decency to
do so.”
“ Did you come to the rectory on the fifth of
this month, and tell me it was my first duty to
resign the living P”
182


End of the Duel
‘ I don’t remember the date.”
“ Was it the Saturday before Bank Holiday ? ”
“I daresay. Yes, it must have been. I
didn’t expect to find you there. I went to see
the wreck and ruin of your home and church,
not you.”
“ But you did come, and you did see me, and
you did tell me it was my first duty to resign my
living ? ”
“Certainly I did.”
“ Do you remember your words ? ”
“ Some of them.”
Carlton looked at his pocket-book—at a note
made overnight.
“ Do you remember making use of the follow-
ing expressions: ‘ Law or no law, I’ll have you
out of this! I’ll hound you out of it! I’ll have
you torn in pieces if you stay ’ ? ”
“I may have said something of the kind,”
said the witness, with assumed indifference.
“Did you, or did you not?” cried Carlton,
slapping his hand on the rail of the dock; the
voice, the look, the gesture were familiar to
many present who had heard him preach; and
thrilled them for all their new knowledge of the
preacher.
“ Really I can’t recall my exact words. I
rather fancied they were stronger.”
Some one laughed at this, and the witness
managed to recapture his grin ; but his demeanour
was unconvincing.
“I am not talking about their strength,” said
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Peccavi
Carlton. “Will you swear that you did not say,
‘ I’ll have you out of this! I’ll hound you out
of it’ P”
“ No, I will not.”
“I thank you,” said Carlton ; and his ringing
voice fell at a word to the pitch of perfect
courtesy. He ticked off the note in his pocket-
book, and the court breathed again; but its
worthy president did more: he had forgotten his
position for several minutes, and he hastened to
reassert it with the first observation that entered
his head.
“I don’t see the point of this examination,”
said Canon Wilders.
“ You will presently.”
“ If I don’t I shall put a stop to it!”
Carlton raised his eyes from his notes, but
not to the bench ; they were only for the witness
now.
“ DO you remember when and where we met
again P”
“You had the insolence to call at my house.”
“ Was it on a Monday morning, the first after
the Bank Holiday?”
“ I suppose it was.”
“ I do not ask you to recall your exact words
on that occasion. I simply ask you to inform
the bench whether I did, or did not, offer to
resign the living then and there—0n a certain
condition.”
“Yes; you did,” said Sir Wilton, doggedly.
He was very red in the face.
184


End Of the Duel
Carlton could not resist a moment’s enjoyment
of his discomfiture: it heightened the pleasure of
letting him off.
“ And did you decline ? ” he said at length.
“ Stop a moment,” said the chairman. “ What
was this condition, Sir Wilton ? ”
“Am I obliged to give it ? ”
“ Oh, if you think it inexpedient——-”
“ I think it unnecessary,” said the witness,
emphatically. “I think it has nothing whatever
to do with the case.”
“In that case, Sir Wilton, we shall be only
too happy not to press the point.”
Carlton had a great mind to press it himself.
He had invited his enemy to build the church out
of his own pocket. The invitation had been
declined. Would it also be denied ? Carlton
was curious to see ; but he overcame his Curiosity.
It would not strengthen his defence, and to mere
revenge he must not stoop. So one temptation
was resisted, and one advantage thrown away,
even in the final phase of the long duel between
these good fighters. But the other saw the
struggle, and felt as he had done when Carlton had
returned him his stick in the ruins of the church.
“And did you decline ?” repeated Carlton, in
identically the same voice as before.
“ I did."
“ Did I then point out to you that I was not
only entitled, but might be compelled, to keep my
chancel, at any rate, ‘in good and substantial
repair, restoring and rebuilding when necessary’ ?
18 5


End of the Duel
“ I share your opinion,” said Rhadamanthus,
in a tone that went further than the words.
The chairman threw up his chin with an air,
and fixed the accused with his sternest glance.
“Pray what are you endeavouring to estab-
lish by this round-about and impertinent exami—
nation P”
“ In plain language P ” asked Robert Carlton.
“ The plainer the better.”
“Then I am endeavouring to establish—and
I will establish, either here or at the assizes—the
fact that that man there "—pointing to Sir Wilton
Gleed—“ has tried by fair means and by foul to
rob me of a benefice which is still mine in more
than name. And I will further establish, either
here or at the higher court, if you like to send me
there, the patent and the blatant fact that this
very charge is the last and the foulest means by
which that man has attempted to get rid of me ! ”
His clear voice thundered through the little
court; his fine eye flashed with as fine a scorn.
But it was neither look nor tone that made the
silence when he ceased. It was the first un-
restrained expression of a personality incom—
parablygstronger than any other there present ; it
was the first just and unanimous—if unconscious
—appreciation of that personality in that place.
There was a round clock that ticked many times
and noisily before the presiding magistrate broke
the spell.
“A-bom-in-able language!” cried he in the
separate syllables of his most important moments.
187


Peccavi
“ You deserve to answer for your words alone in
the other court of which you speak! ”
“ I intend to prove them in this one,” retorted
Carlton, “ if you give me fair play.”
“Oh, by all means let him have fair play!”
exclaimed the witness, in high tones that trembled.
“ I can take care of myself; don’t study me.
Let him say what he likes, and let those who
know his character and mine judge between him
and me.”
Carlton looked at the quivering lip between
the cropped whiskers, and his jaws snapped on a
smile as he returned to his pocket-book. But
the whole of his examination of Sir Wilton Gleed
does not call for elaborate report: its weakness
and its strength will be recognised with equal
readiness. With a stronger spirit on the bench,
or a weaker spirit in the dock, or even a capable
solicitor to prosecute for the police, much of it
had never been; as the play was cast it was the
accused clergyman who presided over that country
court for the longest hour in his enemy’s life ; nor,
when he had won his ascendancy, did he use his
power as unsparingly as in the winning of it.
The witness was allowed to come out of the corner
into which he had been driven before his appeal
to the bench; he had contradicted himself, and
the contradiction was left to tell its own tale
without being pressed home. On the other hand,
some startling admissions were obtained in regard
to the responsibility with which the witness had
finally sought to saddle the accused ; he had bade
188


End of the Due!
him build the church because he believed Carlton
would find it an impossible task; he recklessly
admitted it, with a pale bravado that imposed
upon few people in court, and on but one upon
the bench.
“ You were still determined to get rid of me,”
said Carlton, “one way or another P”
“I was.”
“ And this struck you as another way P”
“ It did—at the moment.”
“Ah,” murmured the chairman, “we are all
subject to the impulse of the moment! ”
Carlton put this point aside.
“ And why did you think that I should find it
an impossible task to rebuild the church P”
“ I thought you would find a difficulty in
getting local men to work for you.”
“Your grounds for thinking that P ”
“I considered your reputation in the district.”
“Any other reason P”
“One or two builders and masons had spoken
to me on the subject.”
Carlton found a new place in his pocket-book,
and read out a list of nine names.
“Were any of these local men among the
number P ”
“Yes.”
“ All of them P”
“ Ye—es.”
“ \Vhat! You admit having discussed me,
during the present month, and since I first spoke
189


Peccavi
to you about rebuilding the church, with these
nine local builders or stonemasons ?” .
“ I don’t deny it,” said Sir Wilton, stoutly.
“And do you know of any builder or stone-
mason in the neighbourhood with whom you
have not discussed me ?”
“ Can’t say I do.”
“That’s quite enough,” said Carlton. “I
shall not ask you what you said; Ido not pur-
pose calling these men, at this court; time
enough for that at the assizes.” And without
further comment he took the witness through
one or two details of their last interview in the
ruins; by no means all ; indeed, the date was the
point most insisted upon.
“And so the very next day was last Friday,
the 18th of August?" concluded Carlton with
apparent levity.
The witness refused to answer, appealed to
the bench, and secured another reprimand for
the accused.
“I harp upon that date,” said Carlton,
“because, as I have already remarked, it seems
to have been a fatal date for me. It has arisen
so many times in the course of this case! This,
however, is not the precise moment for enumerat-
ing those occasions; let us first finish with each
other. Did you, Sir Wilton Gleed, on the
eighteenth day of this present month, have
separate or collective conversation with the
witneSSes BUSby, Fuller, and Ivey ?”
190


End of the Due!
“Yes, I did,” said Gleed, hot, white, and
glaring.
“Separate or collective? Did you speak to
them one at a time or all together P ”
“Both, if you like ! ” cried the witness, wildly.
“ I can’t remember. Better say both !”
“ You interviewed these witnesses, separately
and collectively, on the very day that the other
witness, Frost, laid an information against me
before yourself as Justice of the Peace P ”
“I said it was that day. You ask the same
question again and again! ”
The man was fuming, trembling, near to tears
or curses of mortification and blind rage.
“I have but two more questions to ask you,
and I am done,” rejoined Carlton. “Did the
witness Fuller tell you of the light in the church,
and the witness Ivey of what he saw later
on, during these conversations of the fatal
eighteenth? ”
“They did.”
“And was this the first you had heard of
those experiences ? ”
“ It was.”
“That is my last question, Sir Wilton
Gleed.”
The justices put none. Gleed glared at them
as he left the box.
“I think,” said he, “that this is the most
scandalous incident—~most disgraceful thing I
ever heard of in my life ! ”
.“ I quite agree with you,” whispered Wilders.
191


Peccavi
“And I also,” said Mr. Preston, in a different
tone.
But no word fell from Rhadamanthus. His
small eyes did not leave Carlton’s face for above
one second in the sixty. But their expression
was inscrutable.
“May I now claim the indulgence of the
court for a very few minutes?” asked the
clergyman in the dock.
The clergymen on the bench looked at the
clock and at each other. It was already past the
hour for luncheon.
“Better go on,” urged Preston, “and get it
over.”
“If you mean what you say,” said Wilders
to the accused, “we will ' hear you now; if
you proceed to treat us to a mere display of
words, I shall adjourn the court. Meanwhile
it is my duty to remind you that whatever
you say will be taken down in writing, and
may be given in evidence against you upon your
trial.”
“In the event of my committal,” returned
Robert Carlton, “I am prepared to stand or fall
by every word that I have uttered or may utter
now; and I shall not detain you long. I am
well aware how I have trespassed already upon
the time of this court, but I will waste none
upon vain or insincere apology. I came here to
answer to a very terrible charge ; it was and it is
my duty to do so as fully and as emphatically as
I possibly can. Yet I have little to add to the
192


End of the Due!
evidence before you; a comment or two, and I
am done. _
“It seems to me that the witnesses called by
the police have between them produced but three
points of any weight against me, or worthy of the
serious consideration of this or any other cOurt of
law. I will take these three points in their proper
order, and will give my answer to each in the
fewest possible words in which I can express my
meaning to your worships.
“Arthur Busby has sworn that on the morning
before the fire I ordered him to fill the lamps with
paraffin, though it was extremely unlikely that any
artificial light would be required in church next
evening. But on the man’s own showing he was
wearying and distressing me beyond measure at
the time—a more terrible time than this!” cried
Carlton from his heart; and was brought to
pause, not for effect (though the effect was
marked) but by the very suddenness of his
emotion. “ And on the man’s own showing,” he
continued in a lower key, “he had once omitted
this important duty of filling the lamps, and I was
‘for ever at him ’ on the subject. What more
natural than to tell him to go away and fill his
lamps, as one had told him a dozen times before,
but this time without thinking and simply to get
rid of the man? On the other hand, if the
paraffin had been wanted for the felonious pur-
pose suggested, could anything be more incrimi-
nating and incredible than the suggested method
of obtaining it? I submit these two questions,
193 O


Peccavi
with the highly important point involved, to the
consideration of the bench; and I do so with
some confidence.
“The next point, I confess, is more difficult
to dismiss. I shall not attempt to dismiss it from
any mind in court. I shall simply leave it to the
consideration of your worships as men of the World
and students of the human heart. It is near
midnight. I am not to be found at the rectory,
and a light is seen in the church. I admit that I
was in the church, and that I lighted one of the
lamps.
“ Here I am forced to allude to another
matter: a matter in which, God knows, I have
never denied my guilt, as I do deny my guilt of
the crime of arson : a matter in which I have never
sought to defend myself, as I have been compelled
to do in this court for a very long day and a half.
“Consider my case on the night of the fire.
Iwill not dwell upon it; it is surely within the
knowledge or the imagination of most present . . .
There was my church. I had held my last service
there. I felt that I could never hold another. And,
whatever I had been, I loved my church! You
upon the bench . . . you Members of Christ’s
Church . . . I ask not for your sympathy but for
your insight. Can you think that I went into the
church I loved, wilfully and deliberately to burn it
to the ground? Can you not conceive my going
there, in the dead of that dreadful night, to look
my last upon it—to bid my church' good-bye P”
His emotion was piteous, but never pitiful. It
194


End of the Duel
shook nothing but his voice. It neither bowed his
head nor dimmed the brilliance of an eye turned
full upon his fellows. And so he stood Silent for
a space, and none other spoke; then through
Tom Ivey’s evidence with a lighter touch. It was
evidence in his favour: he scorned to enlarge
upon it. The one adverse point was lightly——
perhaps too lightly—dismissed. He had been
seen to throw something into the flames. Did the
prosecution suggest that he had thrown fresh
fuel? Other points, already made in cross
examination, were left to take care of themselves:
the paraffin on the pews, to which he himself had
called Ivey’s attention, was one. Indeed, in the
whole course of the prisoner’s speech, it was
never admitted that the church had been pur-
posely set fire to at all ; the suggestion had been
made in the heat of cross-examination, but it was
not made again. It even seemed as though
Robert Carlton had grown either certain, or care-
less, of the result of the inquiry—and the impression
was not removed by the close of his remarks.
“And now,” he said, “I have to deal with
the evidence of Sir Wilton Gleed. I shall
endeavour to deal with that evidence as dis-
passionately as I can, and as summarily as it
deserves. Sir Wilton Gleed is a man with a
genuine grievance, which you all know and I have
never denied. But I do not propose to enter
into the matter at issue between Sir Wilton Gleed
and myself, or to suggest for an instant that he
was anything but right in determining to rid his
195 O 2


Peccavi
village of one who had brought himself to bitter
but merited sorrow and disgrace. I am not here
to defend my sins; nor have I defended them
elsewhere ; nor have I shrunk from suffering from
anything I have done. But here have I been
brought to book for something I never did—-
taken prisoner and brought to you on a criminal
charge and no other. And I tell you that
this criminal charge is as false as another was
true, but for which this one would never have
been made. But enough of mere assertion; let
me crystallise some of the evidence that has come
before you.
“The witnesses swear to three or four sus-
picious circumstances between them. Yet they
seem scarcely to have opened their lips—-—nobody
seems to have heard of those circumstances—
until Friday of last week. On Friday last—my
fatal date—these witnesses open their mouths
with one accord. And, curiously enough, it is in
Sir Wilton Gleed that they are one and all led to
confide!
“ But there is a still more curious and inform-
ing coincidence. Sir Wilton Gleed and I have
several very stormy interviews, in which he tries,
first by one artifice, then by another—all frankly
admitted in his evidence—to drive me from a
position which I have finally refused to resign.
My refusal may be just as obdurate and indefen-
sible as you are pleased to think it; that is not
the point at all. The point is this contest of
tenacity on his part and on mine, culminating in
196


End of the Duel
a final interview between us on the eve of the
day upon which all these witnesses break their
more or less complete silence concerning my
movements on the night of the fire, and break it
in the ear of Sir Wilton Gleed !
“I invite you to consider the obvious infer-
ence. My enemy has tried every other means of
dislodging me. He has threatened and insulted
me. He has set every builder and mason in the
neigthurhood against me. He has deprived me—
as he thinks—of the means of building my church,
and then he turns round and tells me to build it
or take the consequences! I make a beginning
in spite of him; he has to think of some new
method of expulsion; so, with infinite ingenuity,
he trumps up this present charge against me.”
Wilders opened his lips, but the prisoner’s
hand flew upward in arresting gesture.
“With infinite ingenuity, your worship, but
not necessarily in bad faith. I have never yet
questioned the mo fides of Sir Wilton Gleed;
nor do I now. On the contrary, I am convinced
that he honestly and sincerely believes me capable
of any crime in the calendar; but my capability,
again, is not the point; and belief and proof are
very different things. If your worships hold that
this horrible charge has been proved against me
—proved sufficiently for this court—then send me
to a higher one as your duty dictates. But if
you think that hatred and prejudice, however
deserved, have played the part of genuine and
spontaneous suspicion; that facts have been
I97


Peccavi
distorted to fit a preconception, and the wish,
however unconsciously, allowed to father the
thought ; that, in short, an honest man has been
quite honestly blinded and misled by very loathing
of me and all my doings; then I implore your
worships to dismiss this charge against me—and
let me get back to the work I left to meet it!”
The last words came as an after-thought, but
they came from the heart, and as no anti-climax
to those who knew the nature of the work named.
In absolute silence Carlton availed himself of the
chair in the dock, dropping all but out of sight,
and bending double, his heart throbbing, his head
singing, his hot hands pressed across his eyes.
It was the sudden hum of talk which told him
that the justices had retired; days passed in his
brain before a hush as sudden announced their
return. Meanwhile there were the scraps of
conversation that found their way to his ears.
Hearing all, he could distinguish little; but now
and then a familiar phrase leapt home, as familiar
faces declare themselves afar. “The gift of the
gab” was one, and “He’d argue black was
white ” another. But some one said, “Give the
devil his due”; and with that single crumb of
justice Robert Carlton had to crouch content until
his present fate was sealed.
But the hush came at last, and sank to pro-
found silence as the magistrates took their seats
—Rhadamanthus keen and grim—the clergymen
plainly angry with each other. Preston’s honest
face hid no more of his feelings than heretofore,
198


End of the Duel
but the chairman cloaked annoyance with the
fraction of a smile, and only his voice betrayed
him as he addressed the prisoner.
“After a long and patient hearing,” said
Wilders, “the bench find this a case of ve-ry
con-sid-er-able doubt in-deed. But,- upon the
whole, and taking all the cir-cum-stances into
care—ful con-sid-er-ation, they are of o-pin-i-on
that there is not enough ev-i-dence to justify
them in sending the case to the assizes. The
charge is therefore dismissed. I should like,
however, to add one word in respect to a witness,
who might, had he been a less chiv-al-rous
opponent—a less mag-nan-i-mous man—have sat
here upon the bench instead of entering the
witness-box to suffer the remorseless cross-ques-
tioning of a personal enemy. I could wish,
indeed ”—with covert meaning—“ that Sir Wilton
Gleed had seen fit to take his proper place in this
court! I need hardly say that he quits it without
stain or slur, of any sort or kind, upon his
character; and that he does so with the heartfelt
sympathy of one, at all events, of his colleagues
upon the bench.”
Rhadamanthus turned his back to hide his
face, but James Preston did not rise till he had
finished as be begun. He caught Carlton’s eye,
and nodded once more to him, but this time
unblushingly and with much vigour. There was
a little hissing as the prisoner vanished, a free
man; and some hooting in the street, in which he
reappeared, contrary to expectation, within a
I99


Peccavi
minute. It was like his brazen face, so they
told him as he strode through the little crowd as
one who neither heard nor saw a man of them.
But no hand was lifted, no missile thrown, for
the deaf ear is no earnest Of physical passivity,
and it was notorious that this man could take
care of himself with his hands as well as with his
tongue. Such a very deaf ear did he turn, how-
ever, that a flyman had to follow him to the out-
skirts of the town, and shout till he was hoarse,
before Robert Carlton paid more heed to him
than to his revilers. And all the time it was a
decent man from Linkworth, only begging him to
jump in, as the clergyman at last discovered with
instant suspicions of the truth.
“Who sent you after me ?”
“Mr. Preston, Sir; leastways, he told me to
be here all day, in case you wanted me.”
“God bless jim Preston ! ” muttered Carlton,
and jumped into the fly forthwith. ’
But presently they were at some cross-roads.
And the driver drew rein with a troubled face.
He wanted to go a long way round, but his
reasons were wild and unintelligible. Carlton,
however, divined the real reason, and whose it
was, and he himself pulled the other rein.
“NO, no,” said he; “drive me through my
own village! They drove me through it on
Saturday; take me back as they took me away
But it was like Mr. Preston to think Of it.
Tell him I said so, and that I’ll never forget his
kindness as long as I live!”
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End of the Duel
It was the red-gold heart of the August after-
noon, and the shrill little choir of the ruined
church sang a welcome to the friend who had
never sinned against them ; and Glen came
bounding and barking defiance at the outside
world; and the unfinished stone, the first stone
that Robert Carlton was to dress and to lay with
his own hands, it was just as they had made him
leave it on the Saturday evening. But the story
of his return was still being bandied from door to
door, when a new sound came with the song of
birds from the ruin in the trees, and a new ending
was given to the story.
The sound was the swish, swish, swish of the
mason’s axe, with the stiletto’s point, through
sandstone as soft as cheese.
20l


XVII.
THREE WEEKS AND A NIGHT.
CARLTON completed that historic stone within
another hour, and actually laid it that night.
Jaded in body and brain, with every nerve
exhausted, he must needs do this or drop in the
attempt. It was the first stone in the new
church. It was finished at last. He touched it
here and there with the straight-edge. He felt
its angles with the square. This stone would do.
He whipped out his foot-rule and measured
carefully. The stone was eleven inches all ways
but one. It was the exact depth for the lower
courses, but it was seventeen inches long. A
seventeen-inch gap must therefore be found or
made for it. And Carlton went prowling round
the blackened walls, with his foot-rule and his dog,
before resting from his labours. The job should
be finished this time, the first stone should be laid
that night.
A place was found in the base of the east end,
over a stable portion of the plinth; the situation
was of sacred omen, and Carlton cleared away
the old mortar with immense energy. Then his
difficulties began. There was new mortar to
make; this was an altogether new undertaking.
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Three Weeks and a Night
It had been Tom Ivey’s affair. Carlton had tried
his hand at most branches of the masonic art, but
he had never attempted to mix the mortar. He '
barely knew how to begin. There was a heap of
sand at one end of the shed, and a load of lime
under cover. These were the ingredients. That
he knew ; but it was not enough.
Suddenly, he remembered his Building Can—
structz'on in two volumes; the bulkier of the two
treated of materials. In a minute the book was
found, deep in dust, and carried to the shed for
consultation on the spot. And there was only
too much about mortar; the subject monopolised
a column of the index; its vastness oppressed
Carlton, who nevertheless attacked it then and
there. A great disappointment was in store: so
he was to begin by “ slaking” his lime. He had
forgotten that step ; now he hada dim recollection
of the process. According to the book it took
two or three hours at least; even this minimum
presupposed that the lime was a “fat lime,” what-
ever that might be. Carlton, lacking all means
of deciding such a point, gave his inclination the
benefit of the doubt, and left his shovelful of
quicklime under water and sand for exactly two
hours and a half. '
This check came in the nick of time. It
reminded Robert Carlton of the flesh, whose
needs he had once more neglected, though now
he would have cooked and eaten if only to have
killed an hour. He lit a fire. He put on the
kettle. He toasted some very stale bread; be
203


Peccavi
boiled an egg warm from the hen-house, then
another; and having eaten he rested while he must.
The sun set; the new moon whitened in the sky,
but as yet could not light a man at his work
when it was really dark. And that was why the
lantern stood so long upon the ground outside
the shed, in a whirl of tiny wings, while the
mortar was being mixed at last.
But the lantern stood longer still upon a
salient fragment of the razed east end, while the
trowel rang, and the mortar flopped, until all lay
smooth and glistening in its light. Then Carlton
knelt, and lifted his handiwork with bursting
muscles; and the mortar spattered his waistcoat
as the great stone dropped into place. A wrench,
a push, a tap with the trowel ; a finishing touch
with its point, a word of thanksgiving before he
rose ; and Robert Carlton had laid the first stone
of a new church, and of his own new life.
Next morning he began systematic work,
rising at five, lighting his fire, making his bed,
sweeping, dusting, pumping, rinsing, all before the
day’s work started after breakfast, with the gentler
arts of scraping and re-pointing, and all in strict
obedience to the schedule which Carlton had
drawn up before his arrest. The working day
ended, as then arranged, with a violent assault
upon that black disorder which had been the
nave; but this also acquired system as the days
closed in ; while the influence of time was not less
apparent in the gradual disappearance of that
tendency to morbid reaction which had been
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Three Weeks and a Night
inevitable in the first days of bodily and spiritual
strain, of incessant and excessive hardship, of a
solitude consummate and profound. But here
time was assisted by the good sense and the
strong will of Carlton himself, who knew how
little virtue there is in mere remorse, and who
struggled against it with all his might. It was a
long time, however, before even he was master of
himself in this regard. One day, in the exaltation
of overwork, the high excitement of nervous and
of physical exhaustion, he was actually heard
whistling at his walls, and it was all over the
village before he caught himself in the act; but
none seemed to hear how suddenly he Stopped at
last; none Saw the raised face, the clasped hands,
the lips moving in meek apology for an instant’s
joy. Nor did any man dream how this one would
still mortify himself, after such a lapse, with
deliberate dwelling on the past. There was but
one link, indeed, in all the mournful chain of recent
events, upon which Robert Carlton would never
permit his thoughts to concentrate; that was his
successful conduct of his own case before the
magistrates, culminating in his final triumph over
Sir Wilton Gleed. He had made the rule in
the hour of his release, and he called in all his
strength of mind to its rigorous observance.
It was now three weeks since he had spoken
to a human being, none having come near him to
his knowledge; then one morning the air was
full of whispers, though the yellowing elms hung
stagnant in an autumn mist; and the outcast,
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Peccavi
looking over the wall which he was scraping,
beheld a bevy of school-children perched on that
of the churchyard.
He bent a little lower to his work. The wall
was that thirteen~foot strip, to the left of the porch,
upon which he had spent the first morning of all
in getting rid of the unsound upper courses. It
was still his own height in most places; so the
children could not watch him at his work; but
the sound of them was enough. Poor little
children! To grow up with such an example
and such knowledge as would be theirs! His
heart had seldom smitten him so hard.
“ Then said He unto the disczjoles, [t is impos-
sihle hut that ofknoes will come : hut woe unto him
through whom they come ./
“It were better for him that a millstone were
hanged about his neoh, and he cast into the sea,
than that he should ofiend one of these little
ones.”
The text came unbidden; it cut the deeper
for that. Woe unto him, indeed! Of all men,
woe unto him ! Hammer and chisel slipped from
his hands ; he hid his face. His thumbs went to
his ears, but were drawn back. The children’s
voices were more than he could bear, so he bore
them for his sin until another aspect of the case
was driven home to his intelligence. Next
moment he appeared in the porch, and the
children were vanishing from the wall.
“Don’t run away,” he called. “ Come back,
you bigger ones ! ”
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Three Weeks and a Night
It was his old voice, come unbidden like the
text ; he might have been using it all these weeks.
The children had never disobeyed that quiet but
imperious summons. They did not begin to-day.
“Why aren’t you all at school P”
There was silence, broken eventually by some
bold but still respectful spirit.
“Please, sir, it’s a holiday.”
“ Not Saturday, is it P ”
He was beginning to loose count of the week-
days; once already the Sabbath school-bell had
nipped a day’s work in the bud.
“ No, sir, it’s an extra holiday.”
“Then spend it better. Get away into the
fields, or down the river. I won’t have you
hanging about here. There’s nothing for you to
see—nothing that will do you any good. Run
away all, and forget who has spoken to you.
But don’t let me have to speak again ! ”
There was no need for another word. And
the workman went back to his wall; but his
hands had lost their cunning; his heart was as
heavy as the stones themselves.
Why had he never been harassed in this way
before? He had not to think very long. He
was without that friend of friendless man, his dog.
The good Glen, his second shadow in these days,
had chosen this one to desert him; and Carlton
was glad, for nothing else would have made him
appreciate the dog at his true worth. Now he
thought of it, how often the faithful brute had
gone barking to wall or gate, and come back
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Peccavi
wagging his tail ! Preoccupied with his work, he
had taken no thinking heed at the time. But
now he remembered and understood.
Instead of working all the afternoon, he went
in search of Glen. It surprised him to find how
much he missed a companion whose presence he
had often ignored for hours together; he felt as
though he could do no good without the animal
now; its dumb sympathy seemed to have had no
small share in all that he had done as yet. That
wag of the tail, how well he knew it after all! It
was like the grasp of a good man’s hand. That
wistful eye, watching over him at his work, was it
a blasphemous conceit to think of it as the mild
eye of the All-seeing, shining through the mask of
one of His humblest creatures, upon another as
humble, and countenancing the work if not the
man ? If this was blasphemy, then Robert Carlton
blasphemed for once in his heart; and had his
deserts in an unsuccessful quest.
He had searched the garden and the house;
had stood whistling at the gate, and in each of the
far corners of the glebe. Night fell upon him
sawing a huge tie-beam through and through to
shift it, and sawing with all the irritable energy of
the unwilling workman, very remarkable in him.
And for once he was glad to put on his coat.
What could have happened to the dog? Its
master could scarcely eat for wondering. Now
he sat frowning heavily. Anon his brow cleared,
and a fixed purpose glittered in his eyes. A little
later he was in the village street once more.
208


XVI I I.
THE N IGHT'S WORK.
THE night was as dark as it could possibly be.
The day’s mist still lingered, impervious to stars,
and there was no moon. Carlton was not sorry,
for he had no wish to be seen by more people
than was absolutely necessary; neither was he
allowing for the shabby tweeds he had unearthed
to work in, for his cloth cap and untrimmed
beard, which obliterated the clergyman and
changed the man.
He had not gone far before he stopped in
astonishment. He had met no one, and the
village was as dark as the firmament ; in the first
few cottages there were no lights at all. Carlton
groped his way up the path of one, and knocked
twice without receiving an answer or detecting
any sound within. It was as though his sin had
driven his parishioners to the four winds.
He went on with increasing amazement,
still without encountering a soul; then swerved
of a sudden from the middle of the road, and
hugged the wheatfield wall on the right-hand side
while passing the Flint House on the left. Here
were lights, and more. The front door stood
209 P


Peccavi
open, pouring a broken beam of lamplight into
the road. And on the single step, leaning upon
his great stick, towered the silhouette of jasper
Musk, only less colossal than his shadow in the
lighted slice of road.
Carlton half expected a Challenge, and passed
slowly and openly, instead of Slinking as his
shame dictated. But there was neither word nor
sign of recognition from the gigantic figure on the
step ; and the lights ended where they had begun.
There were none beneath the gabled thatch
immediately beyond the wheatfield; and so for
another hundred yards; not a glimmer to right
or left, with the single exception of a lattice
window over the post-office, where the bed-ridden
Mrs. Ivey lay as she had been lying for many
months. Carlton saw the shadow of a flower-
pot on the widow’s blind; no doubt it was the
geranium he had taken her in early summer; he
remembered placing it on the sill. His pace
quickened. He was now at the long lane leading
to the Plough and Harrow; and there at last
were the missing lights. The inn was lit up in
every window, and not only the unmistakable
sound, but the very smell of feasting travelled to
the road, where Robert Carlton hesitated longer
than his wont. He might as well go home. It
was quite bad enough to face his people piece-
meal. On the other hand, there was the dog;
a characteristic fixity of purpose in its owner ; and
a natural curiosity to know more of the entertain-
ment that cOuld empty every home. I
no


Peccavi
doors, but slightly deadened by its passage
through the open air.
“May I ask what is going on?” inquired
Carlton.
“That’s the biggest spread ever seen in Long
Stow,” said the stout youth, drawing his sleeve
along his lips and turning a shade more florid
than before.
“ Not the harvest-home already P ”
“ No ; that’s a dinner given by the squire to
every sowl in the parish—men, women, an’ kids—
all but one.”
The questioner stood absorbed.
“ All but one,” repeated the temporary barman
with knowing emphasis. And he winked as he
leant across the bar.
“Ah!”
“ Their reverend ain’t here—not much ! ”
“I don’t suppose he is. And why is the
squire doing this sort of thing on this scale? ”
“ Why, in honour of the victory, to be sure.”
“ What victory P "
“Why, the one we’ve just had in Egypt.
Tel-el——but here that is, in the Bury Post, and
a fair jaw-breaker, too.” '
It was the first newspaper which Robert
Carlton had seen for several weeks. His
Sfaudard subscription had run out at mid-
summer; he had never renewed it. The world
had renounced him utterly, and so must he
renounce the world. To live as he was living,
and yet to have an ear for the busy hum—he could
212


The Night’s Work
not do it. For already he recognised the startling
truth : it was its very completeness which rendered
his isolation endurable.
Yet his eyes glistened as he ran them down
the stirring columns, and his tanned face wore a
coppery glow as he returned the paper across the
bar.
“Thanks very much,” he said. “I am glad
to have seen that.”
“ Is it the first you’ve heard of it?”
“ Yes ; I don’t often see a paper.”
The young barman was eyeing him up and
down, from the old tweed trousers to the old
cloth cap.
“ On the tramp, are you ?”
Carlton did not choose to reply.
“ Yet you seemed to know all about their
reverend here ! ”
“Who does not?” cried the man in tweeds,
with involuntary bitterness.
“Ah, you may well say that! And what do
you think of him ?”
“ I think the same as everybody else.”
“That he’s the biggest blackguard unhung ? ”
“ Indeed, one of them ! ”
“ That’s what the young gentleman from the
hall say, when he was in here this afternoon.
But the governor, Master Palmer—O Lord !
‘ how he do hate him ! ‘ Unhung ? ’ he say.
‘ Why, hangun’s too good for him.’ An’ so it is,
come to think of it : to go and do what he done,
an’ to top all by settun fire to his own church l”
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Peccavi
“Come,” said Carlton, “that wasn’t proved.”
“ But everybody know it, bless you ! ”
“Though the charge was dismissed in open
court P ”
" Bah! ‘ Not guilty, but don’t do that
again ! ’ ”
And the stout youth nodded sagely over his
tankard’s rim.
“ So that’s the opinion of the neighbourhood,
is it P”
“That is, and that’s not likely to change.”
Carlton was not astonished. He had foreseen
thisieven from the prisoner’s dock, in that pause
of the proceedings when he had felt ashamed of
his facility in self-defence, a haunting doubt of
the propriety of his defending himself at all.
And yet the virile instinct which had inspired
him then was not yet dead in his breast; he could
not let all this pass; the conversation was none
of his seeking, yet he must say something more.
“I have never stuck up for him,” he began;
“but give even him his due! What possible
object could a man have in burning down his own
church P”
“What I asked the governor,” replied the
barman. “ ‘ Dog in the manger,’ he say; ‘ didn’t
want the next man to reap where he’ve sowed.
What’s more, that give him an excuse for stoppun
in the place,’ he say.”
Carlton was under no temptation to confute
these arguments; his only difficulty was to sup-
press a smile.
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The Night’s Work
“ So his people don’t think any the better of
him for getting himself off, eh ? ”
“ The better? That’s made them right mad !
The governor here, he say that was the gift of
the gab and nothun else; all parsons have their
fair share; but this here reverend, he do seem to
be a holy terror, an’ no mistake. A gentleman
like Sir Wilton Gleed haven’t a chance agen
him; so they’re all a-sayun, all but Sir Wilton
himself. The young gent who was in here
this afternoon, he was a-sayun as how the
squire wouldn’t have the reverend’s name so
much as spoken at the hall; and he’s never been
heard to name it himself since the day of the
trial, he’s that mad. But have you heard the
latest?”
Carlton had heard quite enough, and his hand
was on the latch, nor did he withdraw it as he
turned his head.
“Against the reverend ?” inquired he.
“That’s it,” said the young barman with
renewed gusto. “ And I nearly let you go
without tellun you ! ”
“ What has he been doing now ? ”
Carlton was curious to hear.
“That’s not what he’ve been doiin, but what
keep comun 0’ what he’ve done,” his informant
said ominously. “ The latest is that some young
chap would go to the devil because the reverend
had, so he ’liSted, and he’ve been in the very
battle there’s all this to-do about !”
Of Mellis’s enlistment Carlton had heard ; the
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Peccavi
rest was news indeed ; and his hand tightened on
the latch.
“Has anything happened to him, then?” he
faltered, sick at heart.
“Not as we know on yet,” said the stout
youth, hopefully. “But the lists ain’t in, and,
if this young chap’s killed, everybody says it’ll be
another death at the reverend’s door.”
“ So they want his blood ! ” exclaimed Carlton.
“ But what they say is true.”
As he opened the door a burst of cheering
came round from the barn.
“That’s for the squire,” he left the barman
saying. “He’ve been on his legs these ten
minutes.”
The outcast had shut the door behind him,
and was groping his way in a darkness no deeper
than before, though perfectly opaque after the
strong light within.
“And one cheer more!” screamed a voice
from the barn.
Carlton need scarcely have left his rectory to
have heard the final roar. Yet it was not the
end.
“And three groans . .
This voice was hoarse; the name was lost in
the night; but the outcast well knew whose it
was. And he stopped instinctively, standing firm
upon his feet While the groans were given—
as though they lashed him like wind and rain.
Then he turned his face to the storm. He could
not help it. There was more clapping of the
H
216


The Night’s Work
hands. Something further was to come; he
might as well hear what.
The barn was a clash of violent lights and im-
penetrable shade. Its outlines were inseparable
from the sky ; but its great doors had been flung
flush with their wall, which gaped twenty feet
from jamb to jamb. This space, illumined by
slung lanterns and naked candle-light, and
streaked with tables which ran the full length of
the barn, stood out like the lighted stage of a
darkened theatre. Outside hovered the unworthy
element which the smallest community cannot
escape, or the largest charity embrace; these
vagabonds were absolutely invisible to those
within; and were themselves too dazzled and
disgusted to take note of each addition to their
number.
Sir Wilton Gleed, on his legs oncemore, at
the high table furthest from the doors, was
making that preliminary pause which is a little
luxury of the habitual orator and an embarrassing
necessity to the novice. He was supported by
the schoolmaster on one side and by his own son
on the other. The former wore the shiny flush
which was the badge of every reveller visible
from without; but that was not many while all
heads were turned towards the squire.
Sir Wilton began by observing, with sparkling
eyes, that he was very sorry to hear that name :
he himself would have preferred such an occasion
to pass over without a reminder of the fact that
they had a leper in their midst. It was many
217


Peccavi
moments before the speaker was suffered to pro-
ceed ; then he repeated the successful epithet at
the top of his voice, and drove it home with a
synonym ; recovering his own composure during a
second outburst, and continuing with conspicuous
self-restraint. Now that the matter had come up,
he would not let it drop, even upon that inappro-
priate occasion, without one word from himself;
but, he promised them, it should be his last
public utterance on the subject, in that parish at
all events, as it was most certainly his first. And
another deliberate pause ended in a sudden
gesture and a new tone.
“What’s the use of talking?” exclaimed the
squire. “The law of England is against us;
there’s no more to be said while the law remains
what it is. I’m not thinking of my brother magis-
trates’ decision the other day ; it would ill become
me to pass one single syllable of comment upon
that. No, gentlemen, I confine my criticism to
that law which empowers a clergyman, convicted
of the vilest villainy, to retain his living in the
teeth of every protest, and to continue poisoning
the clean air of this parish by wilfully remaining
in our midst.”
“Shame! Shame!”
“Shame or no shame,” cried Sir Wilton, “I
intend to bring the matter before Parliament
itself ”—-a further outburst of vociferous approval
—“ intend to lay this very case before the House
of Commons at the earliest possible opportunity.
And I think that I can promise you some
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The Night’s Work
amendment of the law before another year is
out. Meanwhile ”—and Sir Wilton raised his
hand to quell renewed enthusiasm—“meanwhile
let us respect the law while it lasts. In signify-
ing our detestation of this monstrous wrong, let
us be careful not to drift into the wrong our-
selves. There must be no more broken windows,
mind!”
And it was now a single finger that Sir Wilton
Gleed held up.
“ But,” he continued, “ What we can do—what
we are justified in doing—what it is our bounden
duty to do—is henceforth to ignore this man’s
very existence in our midst.”
“ Don’t call him a man!”
“That’s a devil out of hell ! ”
“Man or devil,” cried Sir Wilton, “let us
absolutely ignore his existence among us. Don’t
go near him; don’t even turn to look at him as
you pass. There he is—pretending to rebuild the
church—posing as a martyr—really laughing in
his sleeve and crowing over all right-minded men.
We shall see who laughs last ! Meanwhile, take
no notice of him, one way or the other; forbid
your children the churchyard, if not that end of
the village altogether; nothing that can feed
the morbid appetite for notoriety which makes
me sometimes think the man’s a lunatic after
all. But if he dares to show his nose among
you, that’s another thing; hunt him out of it as
you would hunt a mad dog! He won’t show
himself twice. But for the present my advice
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Peccavi
to you is to leave the cur in his kennel, and the
lazar in the lazar-house ! ”
The unseen listener left amid the musketry
of prolonged clapping, mingled with a banging
of tables, and a dancing of glass and silver,
that followed him into the outer darkness as a
sound of cymbals and big drums. He was not
sorry to have heard what he had heard: in his
position it was a distinct advantage to know the
worst that was being said. Certainly he would
not go into the village again without necessity—
as certainly as he would do so the moment such
necessity arose. It was as well, however, to go
prepared. The present experience might rank as
a narrow escape; but Robert Carlton would not
have been without it if he could.
He began to think better of his opponent.
So he was going to Parliament as the final court!
That was legitimate; that he could admire.
There is infinite stimulus in the man who does
not know when he is beaten—to an adversary
resembling him in that respect. And this seemed
to be the one characteristic common to Mr.
Carlton and Sir Wilton Gleed.
Yet the outcast felt a little hardened. And his
critical faculty, always keen, though only of him-
self unsparing, went insensibly to work upon the
new material, even as he strode on through
the deserted village, not to give up his dog
just yet.
“I believe he had that speech by heart, for
all its opening. It came too pat.”
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The Night’s Work
That was Carlton’s first conclusion. The next
made him stop dead.
“I’ll be shot if the whole function wasn’t a
peg to hang that speech on ! ”
And on he went with a short laugh of scornful
conviction; there was no doubt whatever in his
mind; but the speech was not worth a second
thought. There was Glen to find, and there was
George Mellis to think about, since think he
must. Poor lad ! Yes, that was his fault again ;
the people were right; he would be blood-guilty
if the boy fell. One thing, however, was quite
certain: if the worst news came it could be
trusted to come to him ; meanwhile he could pray
for his friend, as his heart was praying now, a
clean sky above him, and the untrammelled air
of an open country all around.
The village had been left behind ; the Laken-
hall road followed for half a mile, then left at a
tangent in its turn; and this open country, upon
which Carlton of all men had the audacity to
trespass, was the vast rabbit-warren of Sir Wilton
Gleed. The dog might be caught in one of the
traps; that was at once its master’s fear and
hope; for a broken leg would mend, and his one
friend think twice before deserting him again.
Carlton could even enjoy the prospect of the
cripple’s complete dependence upon himself: it
would be something to be indispensable to a living
creature now. But meanwhile he could neither
see nor hear anything of his dog, though he
walked, and stopped, and whistled till he was
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Peccavi
tired, and then called, “Glen! Glen! Glen!”
No sound came back to him in reply; not even
the echo of his own voice; and at midnight he
gave up the search.
At midnight also the Long Stow festivities
culminated in the National Anthem, its secular
companion, and much hoarse roystering on the
way home; all this as Carlton approached the
village; and for once he was deterred. To
march into the middle of a tipsy crowd, freshly
inflamed against himself, was to provoke a brawl
at best. He would go round instead by the
river that flowed parallel with the village street.
So he crossed at the lock near the mill at this end
of Long Stow, and recrossed by the white wood
bridge on the Linkworth road at the other end.
But this was an hour later ; for three-quarters had
been wasted opposite the Flint House, with its
river frontage of trim mead and wild garden, and
a very faint light in one back room.
By this time all was so still that the returning
rector became the earlier aware of an erratic
lantern and tell—tale voices in the road ahead;
and he was walking slowly to let these people
pass the rectory gate, when in the light went
lurching before his eyes. He hurried softly. The
intruders were half-way up the drive, whispering
thickly, but leaving a continuous sound in their
wake, from something or other that they had in
tow. Carlton followed on the grass, a horrible
suspicion already in his heart; but he recognised
their voices first.
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The Night’s Work
“Where shall we plant ut? Which is his
winder?”
“That there near the end. '0 Lord, what
a lark ! ”
“Yes—to think he come talkun to me while
you was all in the barn. The cheek! But here’s
his answer for him.”
The first and last speaker was the stout
young barman from the Plough and Harrow;
the other was Jim Cubitt, an unworthy character
who had been turned out of the choir some
months before. And Robert Carlton’s “answer”
was his missing dog, lying dead in the lantern’s
light, with particles of gravel glistening in his
lacklustre coat.
At this, the climax of his long night’s search,
with its ironic interludes—all as honey matched
with this—a very madness seized on Carlton, so
that he sprang out of the dark into the lighted
area where these two young ruffians stood, and
fell upon them like a fiend. Not a word was
said; there was no time even for a cry.
But Cubitt came first, and had the muddled
senses shaken out of him and new ones kicked
in before his comrade could so much as attempt
a rescue. This, however, the young barman
did so gamely that the ex-chorister was flung
in a heap and his champion sent tripping
over him with a boxing crack upon the jaw.
And Carlton towered breathless, his fists still
doubled, waiting for the fallen youths to rise and
fall again.
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Peccavi
The one from the public house merely sat
upright, ruefully and sullenly enough, but with a
sound discretion which the Long Stow lout had
the wit to imitate.
“ We never ’urt your dorg,” the former vowed.
“He was dead before I see him, and I don’t
know now who done ut. I never knew anything
about that till after you was in to-night, whenI
heared who it must ha’ been.”
“I don’t care !” cried Carlton, in a fury still.
“You helped to drag it here—my poor dog!
You would spite me like that, you whom I
never saw before to-night! You’re worse than
Jim Cubitt; he at least had an old grievance
against me; and you’re both of you worse
than the man who did this foul thing, whoever he
may be, and I don’t want to know. Out of my
sight, both of you, and spread this as far as you
please : what you got from me, and what you did
to get it. You’ll find yourselves the martyrs of
the countryside! ”
“I’m sorry,” said the young barman, getting
up. “ I’m sorry, and I can’t say no fairer, ’cept
that I must ha’ been an’ got right tight. But I
ain’t tight now. I’m not a Long Stow chap, sir,
and I shall tell them, Where I come from, that
you’re a man, whatever else you are. But as to
spreadun, I don’t think I shall do much 0’ that;
what do you say, mate P”
“I never killed his dog,” said the former
choirman.
Nor did Carlton ever actually know, or seek
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The Night’s Work
finally to ascertain, the author of a deed even
more detestable than it had appeared at first
sight. For when the study lamp had been
brought out into the still night, the first thing it
revealed was that the poor beast had been neither
shot nor poisoned; its brains had been beaten
out. And Carlton felt as though his own heart
had been beaten out with them, as he fetched a
spade from the Shed, and dug a grave by lamp
light a few yards from his Study door.


XIX.
THE FIRST WINTER.
THE last leaf had filtered from the elms; the
horse chestnuts had long been bare. And now
there was no more cover for the blackened stump
of Long Stow church, in its ring of rotting leaves,
and its meshes of trunk and twig, than for the
guilty genius of this mournful spot. All the
world could see him now, and gauge the crass
pretence of his preposterous task; there was no
deceiving such a wise little world; but it had
been requested not to look, and was accordingly
content with passing glimpses of a drama in
which its interest was indeed upon the wane.
There were some things, however, which even a
docile and phlegmatic community could not help
noticing as winter set in. It might not be honest
work, but it was making a thin man thinner.
And he was always at it. Yet it no longer
seemed to give him any pleasure. Indeed, his
face was changed. Its dominant expression was
grim and dogged. There were no more lights
and shadows. It was the face of a workman
who has lost interest in his work. ,Nevertheless,
the work went on.
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The First Winter
It went on in all weathers. At first Carlton
had tried devoting the wet days to indoor work.
He had cleaned his house from top to bottom,
emptied most of the rooms, stored furniture in
the others, and covered with sheets like a careful
housewife. Not that he cared greatly for his
things; but his hermitage should not grow foul.
The two rooms which he retained in use were the
kitchen and his study (in which Carlton slept), with
the flagged scullery for his bath. The rest of the
house he shut up, after robbing his picture-frames
to patch the broken windows, which he treated so
ingeniously that they looked quite wonderful from
the road ; but on windy nights the constant rattle
and the occasional crash were one long outcry for
putty and a glazier. There was no more to be
done indoors. And still it rained. So one day
he marched through the village (unmolested after
all), and it was duly ascertained that he had
taken a return ticket to Felixstowe, of all places,
apparently for change of air. But through the
very next day’s rain he could be seen (and heard)
very busy at his walls : in a suit of oilskins and a
sou’wester. Thus the work went on once more.
By Christmas every stone that was to stand
had been scraped and pointed ; a few sound ones
had been scraped and relaid; here and there an
entirely new stone had been cut to fit the place
of one charred out of shape; but in the lower
courses such instances were rare, too rare to suit
his own creative taste, but Carlton was determined
to deal with the lowest courses first, and to raise
227 Q 2


The First Winter
him any more. There was, however, all the half-
burnt woodwork of the church; most of this
would burn again; and, with economy, might
keep him in firing throughout the term of his
suspension. Meanwhile, lamp, rug, and overcoat
gave all the heat that Carlton would allow himself
in the study. Once, when his stock of paraffin
had run out, he had to tramp for fresh supplies
into a town where his face was unknown ; and that
experience made him more than ever economical
of such fuel as he had.
Unparalleled position for an endowed clergy-
man of the Church of England, the incumbent of
an enviable living, an Oxford man, a man of
family, a zealous High Churchman, an enlightened
and alluring preacher, towards the latter end of
the nineteenth century ! Scandalous priest though
he had also proved himself, his case was as
pitiable as unique; a pariah in his own parish;
the outcast of his own people; an inland Crusoe,
driven to the traditional expedients of the cast-
away, and living the very life of such within sight
and hail of a silent and unseeing world. It was
a position which few men would have faced for
an instant. This man maintained it throughout
the winter. And throughout the winter his work
went on. And the spring found him technically
sane.
But his brain bore it better than his heart.
Some vital part of him was certain to suffer. His
brain escaped altogether, his body for a time;
but his heart was hard within him ; all his prayers
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The First Winter
only through his prayers that he ever discovered it
at all. They were not only unanswered ; they no
longer brought their own momentary comfort, as
heretofore. Of old it had been much more than
momentary ; now it was no comfort at all. There
must be some reason for this; he asked himself
what reason ; and the answer was this revelation
of the true character of his prayers. They were
poisoned at the fount. He tried to purify them,
but all in vain. Self would creep in. So then he
prayed only for a renewal of the faculty of pure
and unselfish prayer. And this was the most
passionate of all his prayers. But it also was
unanswered. So he prayed no more.
He was unforgiven: so Carlton explained it to
himself. And a little brooding convinced him of
his idea. If God had forgiven him, He would have
shown some sign of His clemency through men.
But what had men done P They had broken his
windows; they had burnt his church; they had
closed up every avenue to such poor atonement as
was in his power; they had forced him into a
position which he had never sought, though for a
little it had consoled him; then tried, by false
accusation, to force him out of it ; and now they
had cut him off from themselves, had set him
apart as a thing eternally unclean, had even
stooped to destroy the one dumb being that clung
to him in his exile!
The murder of the dog was no little thing in
itself; coming at the foot of such a list, at the
bitter end of a night of bitterness, it was the last
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Peccavi
drop that petrified a truly humble and a strenuously
contrite heart. .
But it did not petrify his hand ; and the work
of that hand went on without ceasing, save on
that day which was now the Day of Rest indeed-
and nothing more. The other six, his energies
were redoubled. If he was now more than ever
a traitor to his Master, well, there was still this
one thing that he could do for the Master's sake.
And he did it with all his might.
No day was too wet for him ; no day was too
cold. His fingers might turn blue, his moustache
might freeze; it is beside the point that the
winter chanced to be too mild for the latter
contingency. While five fingers could control the
chisel, and the other hand strike true, no weather
could have deterred him. And no weather did.
So the New Year came, and the work went
on through January and February without a
break. But the month of March, as it often will,
made late amends for the insipidity of its pre-
decessors. A spell of colourless humidity was
broken by bright skies and a keen wind; the
latter grew bitter with the day; the former
darkened before it was time. And when Robert
Carlton opened his study doors next morning,
to air the room while he took his bath, a little
snowdrift came tumbling in through the outer one.
Carlton looked forth upon a white world in
dazzling contrast to the clear dark grey of a.
starless sky; at first there was no third tint.
But every moment seemed lighter than the last,
2 32


Peccavi
thought beyond the next hour’s rest (he had
seldom been so tired), and the meal that he must
then prepare as mere munition of war. Yet on
his study threshold he paused and turned, as
doomed men may at the door of the dreadful shed.
There was little in the scene itself to stamp
it on the mind. Already the snow was beginning
to disappear; but the sky was still hard and
clean; and the east wind cut to the bone. The
ridge of firs, cresting the 'ploughed uplands beyond
the lane, notched the bleak sky with dark
cockades on russet stems; white clouds floated
above, a white moon hung higher. A robin
hopped in the snow at Carlton’s feet; he was a
good friend to the birds, and had not forgotten
them that morning. Somewhere a blackbird
sung him indoors; somewhere a starling smacked
its beak. And this was all; but Robert Carlton
carried the impression to his grave.
Instead of sleeping for an hour, he slept far
into the night; and spent the rest of it in misery
between bouts of shivering and of intolerable
heat. His throat was on fire, to quench it he
coughed, and already his cough hurt queerly. In
the morning the man was ill enough to know that
he was going to be worse. He took characteristic
measures while he could.
It was a fine instinct which had inspired him
to economise his coal; now was the time when
that little hoard might save his life. But he had
only one scuttle, and for the moment felt baffled ;
then he dried his bath, and put the coals in that,
234


The First Winter
thus eventually getting them to the study in one
load. These exertions hurt Carlton like his cough.
In both cases it was as though his body had been
transfixed. His head swam with the pain. Yet
next moment he was reeling back for wood ; and
not less than ten infernal minutes did he spend
on such errands, a furious fever alone sustaining
him. It was constructive suicide, yet not to have
these things was certain death. Now it was all
the alcohol in the house, in a bottle that had
lasted nearly a year; now a basin of eggs, of
which he had always a fair store indoors; now
pail upon pail of water for his kettle. Carlton
had been a great visitor of the sick, and seen
many a death from the disease he was preparing
to resist. He had therefore a rough idea of what
to do for himself; he was only doubtful as to how
long he might be able to do anything at all. The
lightest breath had now become apang. Already
he was alarmingly ill, and must inevitably grow
much worse. But he did not intend to die. He
trusted the constitution of a lean and hardy race,
and he trusted his own nerve.
At last the fire was alight, a full kettle
mounted, and the spout trained upon the pillow,
the bed itself being drawn up close to the fire.
Under the bed was the bath full of coals, and
within as easy reach the eggs, the whisky, a break-
fast-cup, and the pails of water. But even now
the sick man was not in his bed ; he was lying in
a heap upon the floor, where he had fallen the
moment he could afford to faint.
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Peccavi
On recovering he shook off half his clothes,
crawled between the blankets, and beat up an
egg with whisky. This was all he took that day.
And there he lay, breathing needles and coughing
daggers until he slept.
“ I’m not going to die. They shan’t get rid of
me like that. I don’t die like a rat in his hole! ”
That seemed to be the burden of his thoughts
for many days ; in reality the time was forty-eight
hours. And whenever the determination rose
afresh in his heart, and the dry lips moved with
its expression, the whole man would rouse him-
self to an effort beside which the building of
the church was pastime. He would sit up and
put on more coals with a hand black from the
constant operation. Then he would lean as close
as possible to the singing kettle, and inhale the
steam until the gaunt arm supporting his weight
could do so no more. Even then he would make
a still longer arm before lying down, and replenish
the kettle from one of the pails, using the break-
fast-cup for a dipper. So the kettle would cease
singing for a time, and, each occasion entirely
exhausting the spent man, the chances were that
he would fall into a sleep that was half a swoon.
But he never slept very long. He would dream
that the fire was black, and start up to mend it——-
often before the kettle had recovered its voice. SQ
far from the fire going out, for sixty hours it never
went down. Carlton would mend it almost in his
sleep. Even on the third day, when a kind
delirium destroyed sensation for some hours, he
236


The First Winter
never forgot his fire; the lean black hand would
still feel its way to the bath beneath the bed, and
there grope weakly for the smaller coals. All
lucid thought and all delirious whispers were
gradually monopolised by the fire. It became the
sick man’s life. He would not let it out while he
lived. And live he would. When the fire died
out, then so would he. But he was not going to
die this time. ,
“Their latest dodge to get rid of me, is it?
Trust to Général Février—no, March! Never
mind; he shan’t lay his bony finger on me . . .
You’ll burn 'em if you try! . . I tell you the
law’s on my side.”
Delirium grew from the exception into the rule.
The kettle sang no longer; the bottom was out
and the whole thing red-hot; for the fire had
never been so good. The fender was inches deep
in ashes. With or without his reason Carlton
knew enough to thrust the poker through and
through the lower glow. It was a clear fire all
the time.
And the heat of it at such a range! It
singed the sheets; it flayed the} face; but it also
helped incalculably to keep this stricken body
and this strenuous soul together.
The crisis came before its time. Carlton grew
too weak to hold the poker or to lift a coal, but
cruelly clear in his mind. Thus far he had never
prayed. He had abandoned prayer with all
deliberation and in all his vigour. It needed more
than the fear of death to make him pray again,
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Peccavi
least of all for mere life. Now that the fire was
going out, and recovery no longer possible, the
case was changed; and this erring servant broke
his long silence with God, to pray both for forgive-
ness and for a speedy issue out of his afflictions.
And in the same hour came the seeming answer,
as if to assure him that even his prayers had still
some value in the eyes of the Most High. For
delirium had dwindled into coma, with these few
lucid minutes between, and the fever and the
pain had passed away.
- Yet it was in this world that Robert Carlton
awoke yet again, to find his precious fire alight
after all, and a dilapidated figure nodding over it
to the song of a fresh kettle. It was old Busby,
the sexton. The sick man could not speak; his
little finger seemed to weigh a stone; it was
some minutes before he achieved movement
enough to attract the sexton’s attention. But all
this time the live coals had been warming his
soul. And already he lay convinced that he also
was going to live.
The sexton turned his face at last. It was a
startling face for sick eyes at such a range. The
toothless mouth, which never closed, had often
reminded Mr. Carlton of one of his own gargoyles.
It did so now. And a continual trickle of saliva
added a disgusting realism to the image, which
was, however, immediately dispelled by a human
grin of profound slyness.
“ And have you been bad ?” inquired the
sexton.
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The First Winter
“ Beat—up—an egg. I—can’t—speak.”
Evidently he could not, for Busby was bending
a horrid ear.
“ Eh P eh P”
Carlton made a fresh effort with shut eyes.
“No food . . . faint for want . . . there no
eggs P” ‘
“ Eggs? Why, yes, here’s one.”
“ Beat up for me . . . too bad to speak.”
The sexton looked more sententious than
ever.
“ Ah, I thought as how you’d been bad,” said
he, with all the nods of the successful seer. ' “I
thought as how you’d been bad! ”
“ It’s only been a cold,” whispered Carlton, in
sudden terror of the public pity.
“Only a cold?”
“Oh, yes—that’s all.”
“Then you’ve not been as bad as me! ” cried
Busby, triumphantly. “ Do you mind what I
had inside me last year? That’s there still! I
can hear that ”
“ Will you do what I ask P”
It was a peremptory whisper now.
“I would, sir, but I don’t fare to know the
road.”
“Then give me the egg, for heaven’s sake,
and you hold the cup.”
Carlton managed to rise a few inches in his
impatience; but his fingers had less power than
those of the babe new-born, and the egg slipped
through them. With fortuitous dexterity, the

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Peccavi
sexton caught it in the cup; there was a crack;
and accident had accomplished the design.
“ Look what you’ve gone and done,” said
Busby, reproachfully, displaying the yolk in the
cup. Thereupon he received instructions which
even he could follow; and at length the mess
was down, stinging with the sexton’s notion of a
teaspoonful of whisky. This second accident was
even happier than the first; there was instant
agitation in every vein. And now Busby could
hear without stooping.
“ When did you find me ? ”
“ That fare to be an hour ago, I suppose.
Ah, but I thought as how you looked bad! Soon
as ever I see you, I say to myself, ‘ The reve-
rend’s found what beat him at last,’ I say; ‘he
do look wunnerful bad,’ I say. And you see, I
was right.”
There was the tiniest gleam in the great
bright eyes.
“ You were partly right,” said Carlton, “ and
partly wrong. I’m not done with yet, Busby.
So then you lit the fire for me ? ”
“ That wasn’t wholly out.”
“ Ah!”
“ That soon burnt up. Then I went and got
another kettle.”
The great eyes flashed suspicion.
“ And told everybody you saw, I suppose! ”
“I should be very sorry,” said the sexton,
significantly. “ No, I come an’ went by the lane,
an’ took wunnerful care that nobody set eyes on
240


The First Winter
I. I thought as how you might fare to like a cup
0’ tea, an’ that was a rare mess you’d made 0’
your kettle.”
“ You’ve done well,” whispered Carlton.
“You’ve saved my—saved my cold from getting
worse. You shall never regret it, Busby; only
don’t you tell anybody I’ve had one—do you
hear? Don’t you tell a single soul that you
found me in bed! ”
“ No fear,” chuckled the sexton. “I should
be very sorry to tell anybody I’d found you at all.
They might hear 0’ that somewhere else! ”
Carlton lay still with thought and purpose;
and death itself could not have given the lower
part of his face a harsher cast ; but the hot eyes
were fixed upon the fading diamonds of the
window over the table. At last he spoke—and it
was a pity there was but the sexton to hear the
firm tones of so faint a voice.
“ Find my keys, Busby. I’m going to give
you a sovereign ”
“ A what P”
“The first of several if you do what I
want!”
Not much later the sexton was hobbling
towards Lakenhall, for the first time in many
years; and the sick man lay greatly doubting
whether he should ever see him again. His
weakness was terrible now. The excitement of
conversation had provoked a relapse as grave as
it was inevitable in one so weak. The flickering
lamp was only fed by the stimulus of suspense,

241 R


The First Winter
master’s son. Busby had been dismissed with a
present, as long ago as the month of August;
but that was not all. He had thereupon left the
Church in justifiable dudgeon, and thrown in his
spiritual lot with the Particular Baptists in the
little flint chapel between the Linkworth turning
and the Flint House. He now exhorted Mr.
Carlton to do the same.
“If you do, sir,” said Busby, “you’ll never
fall no more."
Carlton winced. But the man had saved his
life. Nothing should annoy him from the kind
old imbecile who had come to his succour while
the sound world stood aloof.
“ You don’t know that,” he said quietly.
“ But I do,” declared the other. “I’m like
to know. God’s children can’t sin, and I’m one
on ’em.” '
Carlton opened his eyes.
“ Do you mean to tell me you never sin?”
“I mean to tell you, sir,” said the solemn
sexton, “that, since God laid his hand on me,
now seven month ago, I’ve never once committed
the shadder of a sin.”
“Then, if I were you, I should remember
what St. Paul says—‘ Let him that thinketh he
standeth take heed—lest—he—fall. ’ ”
The text faltered; it was terribly two-edged ;
but Carlton had not perceived the pitfall until he
was over the brink. He had forgotten himself in
his scorn, and spoken impulsively as the man that
he had been the year before. But the inveterate
243 n 2


Peccavi
egotist was conveniently full of himself, and his
pat retort quite free from offence.
“Fall?” said he, with his foolish eyes wide
open. “ Why, I couldn’t do that if I tried; and
I have tried, just to see; but I fare to have for-
gotten how to sin. Do you believe me, sir, I
can’t even raise a swear at this little varmin
what’s killun me inch by inch. Why, I’m grateful
to it! But I do sometimes fare to cry to think I
have to stay another day in this world 0’ sin,
when I know there’s a place prepared for me in
heaven above.”
This stupendous speech was too much for
even Mr. Carlton’s self-control. Its snivelling
tone, its evident conviction (confirmed by a
gargoyle’s grin of infinite self-esteem), were aggra-
vated by the complete surprise of this spiritual
revelation; and between them they awoke a
dormant nerve. Robert Carlton did not exhibit
that annoyance which he had determined to
conceal; he did much worse. He burst out
laughing in the sexton’s face. And his laughter
was long, loud, high-pitched and hysterical, alike
from weakness and from long disuse.
The sexton on his legs, in a perfect palsy of
horror and offence, alone put a stop to it.
“I beg your pardon,” gasped Carlton, his
eyes full of tears ; “ oh, I beg——”
And again that hysterical, high-pitched
laughter got the better of him, ringing weirdly
enough through the empty house.
“Ah ! ” said the dotard, when it had stopped
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The First Winter
at last; and the monosyllable contented him for
some moments. “Well,” he at length continued,
with a brisker manner and a brighter face;
"well, thank God I pulled you through; thank
God I didn’t let you die in your sins and go
to everlasting hell without another chance of
immortal life. You wicked man! You wicked
man! I’ll go and I’ll pray for you; but I’ll
never come near you no more.”
SO the solitary regained his solitude; when
he spoke again, it was to himself.
“ Well, he has his money,” he reflected aloud :
he had paid the sexton some seven pounds in all.
“And my gratitude!” he cried later. “I must
never forget that I owe my life to that egregious
old man.”
Yet the greater gratitude was beginning to stir
within him, as the sap was even then stirring in
the trees. It was a mild, bright day, one of the
last in March. The invalid had not yet been
out; he would go out now. In an instant he was
wrapping up.
Oh, but it was wonderful! the feel and noise
of the moist gravel under the soles of his boots ;
the green, damp grass; the watery sun; the
beloved birds; the mild, beneficent air.
His steps took the old direction of their own
accord. In a minute he was there, at the church,
and seated on the very wall which he had been
building a fortnight before, surveying his work.
Had some one been carrying it on in his ab-
sence? Or was it only that one noticed no
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difference from day to day, but all the difference
in the world after an unaccustomed absence?
Yes, this was it; and he drew the deep breath
which his first idea had checked.
Still it was wonderful: one wall seemed so
much higher, another so much cleaner than before ;
and yet there was no stone either laid or scraped
which Carlton did not recognise at a glance,
with sudden memories of special travail; and the
string was still where he had stretched it to keep
the line. He had under-estimated his progress at
the time; that was all ; but again it was as though
the sap was rising in his heart.
The very tangle of blackened timber, which
still cumbered nine-tenths of the inner area, no
longer struck Carlton as the unconquerable chaos
it had appeared on that bitter day which seemed
so many days ago ; yet, when he laid white hands
upon such a beam as he had easily shouldered
then, he could not lift it an inch. Ah, that day!
It would take him weeks to undo its evil work.
The wet feet and the cutting wind, he could feel
them both again, with the sweat freezing on his
body, and every pore an open door to death.
There was the ridge of red-stemmed firs, too far
east to blunt the cold steel of that deadly wind;
and here beneath him the barrier he had been
building last, and must finish now before he did
another thing. How firm and true was this top
course, that he had laid that day with the bony
fingers at his throat ! Well, he WOuld have died
with a good day’s work behind him . . . It
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XX.
THE WAY OF PEACE.
THREE years later the man was still alone, and
the church still growing under his unaided but
untiring hand. Indeed, from one end, it looked
almost ready for the roof, the west gable rising
salient through the trees, with the original window
intact underneath. But this window was the
exception, the sole survivor from the fire, and for
the past year the rest had been one long im-
pediment. Even now, only the three single
lights, in either transept and to the right of the
porch respectively, had been wrought to a finish
from sill to arch; a mullioned window was just
begun; the remainder all yawned to the sky in
ragged gaps of varying width. But the village
looked daily on the one good end, flanked by the
west walls of either transept, which happened not
to have a window between them, and was con-
sequently finished. And the village was softening
a little towards its outcast, though no man said
so above his breath ; nor was a living soul known
to have been near him all these years, unless it
was the new sexton to dig a grave, or a Laken-
hall curate to make an entry in the parish
register.
There had, however, been one or two others ;
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The Way of Peace
the first knocking at the study door on the
evening of the first funeral, some months after
Carlton’s illness.
Carlton was reading at the time. His heart
stopped at the sound. It was repeated before he
could bring himself to open the door.
“Tom Ivey ! ”
“That’s me, sir; may I come in P”
“ Surely, Tom.”
The hulking mason entered awkwardly, and
refused a chair. His large frame bulked abnormally
in a ready-made suit of stiff black cloth. He
seemed to take up half the room, as he stood and
glowered, a full-length figure of surly embarrass-
ment and dark resolve.
“There was a funeral to-day,” he began at last.
“ I know.”
“ That was my poor mother, Mr. Carlton.”
“Yes, I heard. Tom, I’m so sorry for you! ”
Their hands flew together, and were one till
Carlton winced.
“ There’s nothun to be sorry for,” said Tom,
with husky philosophy. “ Her troubles are over,
poor thing. So’s one 0’ mine! You can start
me to-morrow.”
“ Start you, Tom P”
“ Yes, sir, I mean to work for you now. I’d
like to see the man who’ll stop me! You’ve
shown ’em all the man you are; now that’s my
turn.”
And the broad face beamed and darkened
with alternate enthusiasm and defiance. Carlton
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beheld it with parted lips and startled eye; and
SO they stood through a long silence, till Carlton
sat down with a smile. It was a singularly gentle
smile, as he leant back in his worn Old chair, and
the lamplight fell upon his face.
“ After all these months,” he murmured ;
“after all these months ! ”
“ I fare to hide my face when I count ’em up,’
admitted Ivey, bitterly. “ But what was the
good of comun when I couldn’t come for good?
And how could I in poor mother’s time? 'It’d
have meant—there’s no sayun what that wouldn't
have meant.”
“You mean as regards Sir Wilton ? ”
“I do, Mr. Carlton.”
“ He will have been a good friend to you ? ”
“ Oh, yes.”
“ Did those repairs, did he ?”
“Yes,” sighed Ivey, “ he was better than his
word about them; you would hardly know'the
place now. It made a lot of difference to mother.
And I had the jo .”
“ Oh ! "
“ He’s kept me busy, I must say. I’ve never
wanted work.”
“ Until now, I suppose ? ”
“To tell you the truth, sir, I’m at work for
him still.”
“ For Sir Wilton Gleed ?”
“ Yes—odd jobs about the estate.”
“Then my good fellow, what do you mean by
offering yourself to me ?”
7
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The Way of Peace
“ Mean P” exclaimed Ivey, his black determina-
tion leaping into flame. “ I mean as I’ve made
up my mind to give him the go-by for you. I’d
have done that long ago if it hadn’t been for
mother; but better late than never. You’ve
shown ’em the man you are, and now that’s my
turn. Look at what you’ve done with your own
two hands--there’ll be other two from to-morrow !
You shan’t work yourself right to death before
my eyes. Why, your hair’s white with it
already! ”
Carlton wheeled further from the lamp.
“ Not white,” he murmured.
“But that is, sir. When did you look in a
glass P”
“I don’t know.”
“ Then do you look to-morrow. That’s white
as snow. And your beard’s grey.”
“ It’s certainly too long,” said Carlton, covering
half with his hand.
“And your hand—your hand ! ”
It was scarred and horny as the mason’s own.
Carlton removed it from the light, but said
nothing.
“That’s done it’s last day’s work alone,”
cried Tom. “I start with you to-morrow,
whether you want me or not. I’ll Show ’em! I’ll
Show ’em! ”
And he stood nodding savagely to himself.
“ My dear fellow, you can’t behave like
that.”
The words fell softly after a long silence.
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“Why can’t I P”
Carlton gave innumerable reasons.
“ It would put us both in the wrong,” was the
last . . . “Go on working for Sir Wilton—at
any rate for another year. You owe it to him,
Tom. And don’t you fret about me; I am a
happier man than I ever deserved to be again.
Last winter it was different ; but God has shown
me infinite mercy and compassion. And now He
has sent you to me, as a sign that even man may
forgive me in the end! That is enough for me,
Tom. You cannot do more for me than you
have done to-night. But your duty you must do,
by God's help, as long as it is as clear as it is
now. Don’t bother your head about me! I am
getting into the knack. Perhaps by the time I
come to the roof—if I ever do—the want of a
church may induce others to help me finish mine.
Then, if you like, you shall come back; but I
won’t have you made an outcast on my account ;
one is enough.”
There were no more visits from Tom Ivey.
This one came to the ears of Sir Wilton; and
that diplomatist, instead of playing into the
enemy’s hands by discharging his man, capped
all his kindness to the mason by getting him the
offer of an irresistible berth in that London dis-
trict for which he himself sat. Thus Sir Wilton
removed a wavering ally, and at the same time
renewed the lease of his allegiance.
Carlton heard of it some months later, when
there was another funeral, and the Lakenhall
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curate came in again to make the entry. This
curate was a gentleman. He had a good heart
and better tact. He not only conversed with
Carlton as with the perfectly normal clergyman,
in perfectly normal circumstances, but he would
prolong these conversations as far as he deemed
possible without exciting a suspicion of the pro-
found pity which inspired him. He would bring
bits of local gossip, or the latest national event;
once he let fall that Sidney Gleed was up at
Cambridge, and said to stand a chance of
“ coxing the eight,” while Lydia was now a Mrs.
Goldstein, the mistress of a splendid mansion in
Holland Park, and another up the Thames. It
was from the same source that Carlton obtained
belated news of George Mellis, who had come
through two campaigns without a scratch, yet
never been back to play the hero on his native
heath. In a word this curate, who was a very
young and rather commonplace fellow, came soon
to stand for the outside world, the world of news-
papers and talk, to Robert Carlton, who liked
him none the less because his older eye saw
through the artless arts with which the lad sought
to mask his charity.
The visitations of the curate, who also con-
ducted the one weekly service in the village
school, was a little arrangement between those
fast friends, Sir Wilton Gleed and Canon Wilders,
who would have been interested to learn the way
in which their delegate improved the rare occasion
of a funeral. For marriages and baptisms the
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Long Stow folk had taken to walking across the
heath to Linkworth.
Early in the second year there came a visitor
whom Robert Carlton knew at a glance, though
he had never before seen him in the flesh. This
was a person with the appearance of a rather dis-
sipated sporting man, who tooled tandem through
the village, and pulled up at the ruins in broad
daylight. The thing was thus a scandal from the
first moment of its occurrence, and the cockaded
groom was beset by hOrrified rustics before his
master’s red neck had disappeared among the low
and ragged walls. /
Carlton had withdrawn into the invisible seclu-
sion of the west end, where he was nervously
scraping at the nearest stone when the visitor
appeared, only to stop short with a whistle.
“ I thought this was the church the parson was
building with his own hands P ”
“ So it is, my lord.”
“ And you are what he calls his own hands ! ”
“ No, I am he.”
The visitor stared.
“ You the parson P”
“ I know I don’t look like one,” admitted
Carlton, glancing from his ruined hands to the
shabby clothes in which he worked; “nor can I
fairly consider myself one at present. Yet I am
still the only rector of this parish, and it was I
who wrote to your lordship about the stone.
Yours are the only quarries in this part of the
country. The stone I am now using came front
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them. But it is just finished, and unless you will
let me have some more I may have to stop;
otherwise I believe that I could build up to the
roof, in time, without assistance.”
“ And why should you ? ”
“ My church was burnt down through my
own—fault.”
“I know all about that,” said his lordship.
“What I ask is, why should you insist upon
building it up single-handed ?”
“I didn’t insist originally,” sighed Carlton.
“ It is a very long story.”
The earl regarded him with a pair Of very
penetrating little eyes ; he was an ugly man with
an ugly reputation, but one of those who take as
little trouble to conceal their worst characteristics
as to display their best.
“To be quite frank with you,” said he, “I
happen to know something of your story; and
I consider it a jolly sight more discreditable to
others than to you. That’s my opinion, and I
don’t care who knows it. So you are really and
literally doing this thing with your own two
hands ?”
“ Literally—as yet.”
“And who looks after you ?”
“ Oh, no one comes near me ; but I am bound
to say that I have learnt to look pretty well after
myself. I have found it absolutely necessary for
my work.”
“Cookin’ for yourself, and all that sort of
thing ?”
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“Cooking and even killing when necessary.”
“ Is the boycott as wide and as bad as all
that?”
“ It is no worse than I deserve.”
The visitor, looking sharply to see whether
this was cant, was convinced of its sincerity
at a glance, though he loudly disagreed with the
opinion.
“I call it a jolly shame,” said he; “but I’m
not going to hurt your feelings by expressing
mine. I’m the last man to rake up the past.
But it would be a different thing if you had really
fired the church ; that was the last iniquity, charg-
ing you with that! How do I know you didn’t P
There was a y0ung friend of mine on the bench,
and I had it from him as a fact, with a jolly
lot more besides. Now show me what you’ve
done before I go.”
This did not take a minute; there was so
little to show for the first long year and more of
scraping, re-pointing, or rebuilding from the
ground. Save at the end where they had stood
talking, there was searcely a wall that reached to
their shoulders, and their tour of inspection was
closely followed from the road. It was con-
ducted with few words on either side, though
the noble Earl muttered several which would not
have been muttered in other company. In the
end he made a startling undertaking. He would
not only send as much more stone as was required,
but neither the stuff nor its delivery should cost
Mr. Carlton a penny.
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The Way of Peace
Carlton turned a deeper bronze, but begged as
a favour to be allowed to pay. The new church
was his debt to the parish. It was the one debt
that he could pay. The uttermost farthing and
the least last stone were to have come out of his
own pocket. That had been his undertaking; it
was still his heart’s ambition ; but as such he saw
its unworthy side; and would place himself in his
lordship’s hands, sooner than be swayed by false
pride in such a matter.
“Then you shall pay through the nose ! ” the
other promised him; “and I’m damned if I don’t
think all the more of you. I beg your pardon. I
was trying not to swear. But I never could
stand parsons, and I suppose it’ll shock you when
I tell you straight that you’re the best I’ve
struck! You’re a man, you are, and I take off
my hat to you.”
He did so openly before the wide eyes and
wider mouths of those watching from the road;
and so ended an incident which Sir Wilton Gleed
described as one of the most scandalous in all his
experience. “ Birds of a feather,” was, however,
his ready and untiring comment; and the saying
went from door to door, as “not guilty but don’t
do it again,” had gone before it; for there is
nothing like a timeworn saying to crystallise a
widespread sentiment.
This one did not come to Robert Carlton’s ears,
but he was perhaps the first to whom the obvious
comment had occurred, and its easy justification
did a little damp the glow in which his latest
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champion had left him. It were better to have
won the allegiance of a better man. Yet who was
he to judge his fellows? He had forfeited the
right to criticise another. Let him then be truly
and duly thankful ; for with each waning year he
had more and more occasion. Surely the heart
of man was beginning at last to soften towards
an erring brother, who repented very bitterly of
his sin, and who was doing faithfully the little
that he could to undo the least of his sin’s results.
Ah, that he could have done more! Ah, that by
dying he could bring the dead to life !
He was only a man; he could only suffer in
his turn. That he had done, was doing, and was
still to do. And he thanked God for it again;
so much of the old spirit still endured. Yet was
he none the less thankful for every token of
pardon or of pity from mere men. He knew that
many would justly execrate his name until the
end. He knew of one at least who would never
forgive him in this life.
This one came on a moonlight night in the
spring of this fourth year; came limping into the
churchyard, leaning on his great stick, and
growling savagely to himself; little suspecting
that he had Carlton caught in the ruins, listening,
watching, fascinated, from one of those ragged
interstices with which even his perseverance and
even his ingenuity could scarcely cope. To be
exact, it was, or was to be, the mullioned Window
in the south transept; and as Musk advanced
past this angle of the building, the clergyman
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The Way of Peace
first leant, then crept, over the sill to watch
him.
He stole into the open. Musk had his back
turned; his shoulders were very round. Carlton
knew well at what grave the other stood staring,
and his heart stirred heavily within him. Oh,
his wickedness! Oh, his sin! How could there
be any forgiveness, in heaven or on earth, for
him a clergyman? The poor old man, so old,
so bent ! He must speak to him ; he must throw
himself at his feet; so bent, so lame! Oh, that
that stick might strike the life out of him then
and there !
He was creeping forward; suddenly he
stopped. Musk was stooping, moving his stick
to and fro across the grave, with a sweeping
movement, as of a scythe. What was he doing?
Carlton remembered—divined—and his blood ran
cold. The snowdrops were out; he had put '
some on the grave. It had no stone, no name.
It was only the tidiest and the greenest mound
in all the churchyard. He saw to that. And yet
his flowers desecrated it; must be swept to the
winds . . .
Musk had come away. He was looking at
the south wall where it had obviously been re-
built. Carlton was skulking in the porch. The
high moon fell heavily on the upturned face,
covering it with white patches and black wrinkles;
and these were working like a seething mass;
but for a long time the great frame stood motion-
less. Then, in a flash, a huge fist flew from the
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Peccavi
huge Shoulder, struck the sandstone a sickening
blow, swung round and was shaken at the
rectory through the trees until the blood dripped
from the mangled knuckles. Carlton was so near
that he could both see and hear the heavy drops.
He drew further within the porch: he had also
seen his enemy’s face.
Carlton had the fair mind and the true eye of
the exceptional man. He saw most things im~
mediately as they really were, not as he wished
to see them, Still less as they affected himself.
He saw the moonlit face of jasper Musk for
many a day. It did not haunt him. He could
have dismissed the vision from his mind at will;
he preferred to consider it calmly in a white
light. There was hate undying and invincible.
That was something to respect. Carlton com-
pared the petty though persistent enmity of Sir
Wilton Gleed with the great dumb hatred of
jasper Musk; the last was inexorable as it was
just; the first not wholly one or the other, or
Carlton was mistaken in the smaller man. Sir
Wilton might be the last man on earth to forgive
him, yet in the very end he would follow the
world, supposing for a moment that the world
ever led. But jasper Musk would hate the
harder as the hate of others dwindled and died.
This conviction cast no new shadow across
Carlton’s life, but it brought a new name into
his prayers, and put the fine edge on an old anxiety.
He had always been anxious about his child,
though in the beginning that sense had been
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and the impossible roof. He was at once artist
and man enough to be stimulated by these. He
drew in chalk, upon the bare floors of his disused
rooms, full-sized diagrams of all his arches, divided
into as many parts as there were to be stones,
according to the easy rule set forth in his precious
book. Then he collected all the boxes, tin, wood,
and cardboard, that he could find upon the
premises, and cut these up into numbered patterns
coinciding exactly with the diagrams on the floor,
thus providing himself with evening occupation
for a whole winter, and having all in readiness
by the spring. Summer, however, found him
still in travail with the mullioned window in the
north transept; and the mullion and the tracery
he was omitting altogether; the bare arch beat
him long enough.
Prolonged solitude may debase a man to
the savage or exalt him to the saint; it never
leaves him the mere man he was. Robert Carlton
was still too human to merit for a moment the
hyperbole of saint; nevertheless he developed in
his loneliness several of those traits which are
less of this world than of a better. His mind
dwelt continuously upon holy things; it had
ceased altogether to feed upon itself. He had
suffered no more sickness, either of body or of
soul, such as that which had threatened to destroy
both in the first awful winter. The whole man
was chastened, purified, simplified and refined, by
the consuming fires through which he had passed.
His faith had never been stronger than it was
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The Way of Peace
now; it had never, never been so near in sheer
simplicity to the faith of a little child. In aword,
and little as he knew it, this great sinner, proven
libertine, suspected incendiary, was now living in
the very sight and smile of God; and even His
humblest creatures loved and trusted him as never
in the days of prosperity and good report; for
now he loved them first. Nature, indeed, had not
endowed him with that sympathetic insight into
inferior life—that genius for herself—which is born
in most people who are to have it at all. To
Robert Carlton the talent only came in his lonely
and dishonoured prime, as the solace of his exile,
as a new interest and occupation for his mind, and
surely also as a sign of grace returning. There
grew upon him in these years the knowledge and
love of very little things, trodden under foot or
brushed aside until now; a larger passion for
nature in all her moods, and all their manifesta-
tions; and, above all, the equal peace and inde-
pendence of him to whom the grasses whisper
and the elements sing.
So one wind braced him to titanic effort, and
another confirmed him in patient toil, and another
relaxed both mind and members in merited ease ;
so he came to know the birds about him, almost
as a shepherd knows his sheep, and even to
discover some individuality beneath the feathers.
There was one huge sparrow, a perfect demon
for the crumbs which Carlton strewed every
morning near the scene of his day’s work, so that
he might not be quite alone. The lowest human
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qualities came out in this small bird until finally,
and with infinite ingenuity, it was trapped,
rationed, and compelled to watch a feast of the
smaller fry through the wires of a cage. Then
there was a robin which in time came to perch
upon the solitary’s hat while he worked; only in
the beginning were there crumbs in the brim.
And again there was a starling that entertained
him by the hour together, and all for love, from
an elder-bush close to the shed.
But each of these years brought riper know-
ledge, until God’s leafy acre, with its canopy of
changing sky, both teeming with life to his
quickened vision, became not only the outcast’s
second Bible, but all the almanac he needed or
possessed. With no newspaper to distract his
mind, and perhaps not a letter or a human voice
for months, it was on bird and leaf that he came
to rely for the time of year; while the field of his
research was greatly extended by nocturnal
exercise upon the pine-serrated plateau beyond
the church. Now the tips of the chestnut twigs
might bulge and bud, but spring was not spring
until the plover paraded his new black breast, or
a peewit rose screaming at the midnight intruder.
All summer the small bird was king; hedgerows
twittered ; crumbs were scorned; man was jilted
for slug and worm. But the end came in sight
with the homebred mallard, flying feebly in his
summer feathers ; and the flight of the wild duck
was the end of all. The third year found
Carlton watching for the mallard as his bird of
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ill-omen, and redoubling his efforts while his ear
prepared for the shrill music of the full-grown
quills in final flight. Harsh experience had
taught him how little he could do, with any
certainty or any continuity, in the season when
the little birds and he were best friends.
It was late in May, and the church would
soon be hidden for another summer; meanwhile
Carlton was still at work upon his transept window,
in a corner which a great stack of undressed sand-
stone made invisible from the lane, as it already
was from the road. The folk from other villages
were beginning to stop and watch him longer
than he liked, and he did not care to be a cynosure
at all. He only asked to build his church in
peace, and with it an example which Should do at
least a little to counteract the one he had already
set; and he meant both for his own people, not
for the outlying world. He really feared a reaction
in his favour on the part of the sentimental out-
sider. It would do him fresh injury in the eyes
of many whom he honestly longed to win back in
the end. Moreover, his head was very level in
these days. He saw nothing heroic in his own
conduct. With all his wish to undo a little of the
harm that he had done to others, there was a
very human eagerness to redeem his own past, so
far as that was possible upon earth. Carlton was
never unaware of this incentive. He entertained
no illusions about himself, nor did he wish to
create any in Others. For example, there was
his work. It was never easy, sometimes hope-
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less, always fascinating. But the man himself
desired no credit for devotion to labour which he
loved for its own sake, and in which he was still
capable (but no longer ashamed) of forgetting
the past.
The transept window engrossed him to the
last degree; mullion or no mullion, it involved
the largest arch that Carlton had yet attempted ;
and already it alone had occupied many weeks.
The patterns had been the easy recreation of his
winter evenings, but it had taken him all the
spring to reproduce a score of these in solid stone ;
for though the walls were coursed rubble, the
windows must have ashlar facings, to be as they
had been before ; and ashlar is to coursed rubble
what broadcloth is to Harris tweed. What with
indefatigable labour, however, and the general
proficiency which he had now attained in his self-
taught craft, Carlton had his jambs up by the end
of May, and his arched framework fixed between
them, all ready to support the arch itself. He
was now engaged upon the nine wedge-shaped
stones to form the latter, working each to the fine
ashlar finish, as also to the exact dimensions of its
fellow in tin, wood, or cardboard, and laying them
in couples on alternate sides of the wooden centre,
so as to weight it evenly as the book ordained.
It was the middle of the afternoon, and the
quiet corner Was already in shadow; beyond, the
wet grass glistened, for the day was a duel
between sun and rain. Carlton was taking the
_ busier advantage of a brilliant interval, and
266


The Way of Peace
roughing out a new voussoir with the bold pre-
cision of the expert mason. Ting, ting, ting, fell
the hammer on the cold-chisel; the soft, wet
sandstone peeled off in curling flakes; the quick
strokes rang like a bell through the cool and
cleanly air. It had been honest rain, and it was
honest sunshine. The green world broke freshly
upon all the senses. Every colour was more
vivid than its wont, from the reddish yellow of
the rain-soaked stone to lilac and laburnum in the
rectory garden; from the creamy castles of the
full-blown chestnuts to the emerald sprays which
were all that the slower elms had as yet to show
against an uncertain sky. Every inch of earth,
every blade and petal, was contributing its quota
to the sweet summer smell. The birds sang ; the
bees hummed; the hammer rang. And Carlton
was so intent upon his task, so bent upon making
up for time lost that day, that it might have been
midwinter for the little he looked and listened;
yet he heard and saw none the less ; and his face
was filled with quiet peace.
In appearance he was many years older; at a
distance he might have passed for the father of
the man who had drawn a larger congregation
than the {old ’church would hold. His hair
was grey; his beard was grizzled. Incessant
manual toil had aged him even more by giving
his body a constant stoop. And the hands were
the hands of a labouring man. But the brown
eye, once inflammable, was now all gentleness
and humility; the whole face was sweetened
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Peccavi
and exalted by solitude and suffering; in expres-
sion more patient, less austere ; though the
untrained beard and moustache, hiding mouth
and jaw, had something to do with this.
To his gentleness, however, there was striking
testimony even now, as his hammer rained ringing
blows upon the cold-chisel ; for within easy reach
of it perched the tame robin on another stone,
quizzically watching the performance. Then, in
the same moment, three things happened. The
robin flew away, Carlton turned his head, and
the ringing blows broke off.
268'


XXI.
AT THE FLINT House.
“ THE child must have a name, Jasper.”
“ All right, you give it one. That's nothun to
me.”
“ But he must be christened properly.”
“ Why must he P” I
“Oh, Jasper, if you don’t fare to believe, his
mother did, poor thing!”
“ And a lot of good that did her . . . but do
you have your way. Make a canting little
Christian of him if you like. Do you think I
care what you do with the brat? I know what
I’d do with it, if that wasn’t for the law ! ”
So, in the early days, while Robert Carlton
was still learning to live alone, his son was
trundled across the heath to Linkworth, and there
christened George after no one in particular.
Followed the remaining period of extreme
infancy, during which Jasper Musk seldom set
eyes upon the child, and was more or less
, oblivious to its concrete existence. Then one
afternoon, the second summer, as Jasper sat
smoking at a back window, in the big chair to
which his sciatica would bind him from morning
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Peccavi
till night, there was a shuffling and a grunting in
the passage, and in came the child on all fours,
with the lamp of adventure alight and Shining in
grimy cheeks and great grey eyes.
Musk took the pipe from his mouth, and met
the small intruder with an expressionless stare.
Had his wife been by, no doubt he would have
hidden her take the little devil out Of his sight;
he had done so before, using a harsher and more
literal epithet for choice. But this afternoon he
was alone, and very weary of his solitary con-
finement. So for the moment Musk sat stolidly
intent; and the child, after a halt induced by the
creaking of the open door and the austere appari-
tion within, advanced once more, with the infantile
equivalent for a cheer.
“Well, you’ve got a cheek!” said jasper,
grimly.
The boy had reached his legs, and was pulling
himself up by the particularly lame one, chattering
the while in the foreign tongue of one year Old.
Musk winced and muttered, then suddenly
encircled the small body with his mighty hands,
and set the child high and dry upon his knee.
“And now what?” said he. “And now
what ? ”
For answer a chubby hand flew straight at his
whiskers, grabbed them unerringly, and pulled
without mercy, but with yells of delight that
brought Musk’s wife in hot haste from a far
corner of the rambling house. In the doorway
she threw up her arms.
270


At the Flint House
“ Oh, Georgie!” she cried aghast. “ You
naughty boy—you naughty boy! ”
Jasper had already created a diversion in
favour of his whiskers, and was in the act of
blowing open an enormous watch when, his wife
appeared.
“ Now you take and mind your own business,”
snapped he, “and we’ll mind ours . . . Blow—
can’t you blow P Like this, then—p-f-f-f—and
there you are! Now you try; blow, and that'll
open again."
Georgie walked before the summer was over ;
and this was the year in which Jasper scarcely set
foot to the ground, so he made use of the child
from the first. Now it was his pipe, now his
spectacles, now the newspaper; these were the
first familiar objects which the child came to know
by name before he could speak; and he never
saw any one of the three without taking it as
straight as he could toddle to the great grey man
in the chair.
Mrs. Musk suddenly found half her work with
Georgie taken entirely off her hands. She was
even quicker over another discovery. Jasper
would not own that he had taken to the child ; in
her presence, on the contrary, he ignored its very
existence as utterly as heretofore. Yet now
every day she could have found them together at
most hours ; only she knew better.
Cheerless environment for this new life—a
gloomy old house—a grim old couple. Neverthe-
less, and in very spite of all the circumstances of his
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Peccavi
birth, Georgie from the first evinced that tempera-
ment which is a sun unto itself. An expansive
gaiety was his normal mood, and for years the only
variant was a terrible and overwhelming indigna-
tion with all his world. He was, in fact, an
entirely healthy little savage, with all the wild
spirits and facile affections of his age, and no
exemption from its traditional ills. Once he had
croup so severely that two doctors came in the
middle of the night, and Georgie never forgot
their grave faces and his grandfather’s grim one
at the foot of the bed. Indeed, the scene formed
his first permanent impression, though the sequel
was more memorable in itself. Georgie seemed
to go to sleep for days and days, and to awake in
another world, though the bed was the same, and
the medicine-bottles, and the singing kettle; for it
was day-time, and the room full of sun, and the
doctors gone; but in the sunlight there stood
instead the loveliest lady whom Georgie had
beheld in his three or four years of earthly
experience. Thereupon he lay with his firm little
mouth pursed up, his grey eyes greater than even
their wont, and his mind at work upon some
surreptitious teaching of his grandmother. It
was a very simple question that he asked in the
end, but it made the lady kiss him and cry over
him in a way he never could understand.
“ Are you a angel P” Georgie had said.
Gwynneth happened to be somewhat morbidly
aware of her own poverty in angelic qualities,
though it was not this that made her cry. She was
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At the Flint House
alone at the hall for the winter, which Sir Wilton
and Lady Gleed were spending upon a well-
beaten track abroad, while Sidney was still at
Cambridge. Gwynneth also might have drifted
from Cannes to Nice, and from Nice to Mentone,
for she had been taken from school on Lydia’s
marriage, and assigned a permanent position at
the side of Lady Gleed. In this capacity the
girl had not shone, though her peculiar character
had lost nothing by the duty and faithful practice
of consistent self-suppression. On the other
hand, there was the demoralising sense of per-
sonal superiority, which was thrust upon
Gwynneth at every turn of this companionship,
causing her to take an unhealthy interest in her
own faults, in order to preserve any humility
at all; for she was full of mental and of bodily
vigour, and her aunt was signally devoid of both.
Consequently when Lydia petitioned to go instead
(having become a mother to her great disgust,
and demanding an immediate separation from her
infant), the proposal was adopted to the equal
satisfaction of all concerned. Gwynneth, for her
part, was very sorry not to travel and see the
world; but she knew, from a tantalising experi-
ence, that hotel life was all that one could count
upon seeing with Lady Gleed; and from every
other point of view it was infinite relief to be
alone. Literally alone she was not, since the
little German housekeeper never left the hall.
But Fraulein Hentig was a self-contained and
entirely tactful companion, with whom it was
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Peccavi
possible to enjoy the delights of solitude while
escaping the disadvantages. The two were very
good friends.
Gwynneth was now in her twentieth year, a
tall and graceful girl, albeit with the slight stoop
of the natural student that she was. At her
school she had won all available honours, but it
was not a modern school, and in those days such as
Gwynneth had no definite knowledge of any wider
arena. So she left her school without great
regret. She had learnt all that they could teach
her there. And she taught herself twice as much
in stolen hours spent in the hall library, which
had been bought with the place, and hitherto only
used by Sidney on wet days. But now there was
no need to steal an hour; the girl’s time was all her
own, and she held high revel among the books.
Moreover, it was the dawn of the University
Extension system, and Gwynneth heard of a
course of lectures upon English literature, only
eight miles from Long Stow, just in time to
attend. To do so she had to fight a weekly
battle with the coachman, but Fraulein Hentig
took her side, and the opposition did not endure.
Gwynneth took voluminous notes and wrote
elaborate essays, bringing to the whole interest
that energy, thoroughness and enthusiasm, to
which, though each was an essential characteristic,
she was only now enabled to give free play. Yet
the young girl was no mere bookworm, though at
this stage of her career she seemed little else. It
was a phase of intellectual absorption, but all the
274


At the Flint House
while it needed but atouch of human interest in
her life to awake the deeper nature of the eternal
woman. Such awakening had come with the most
alarming period of Georgie’s illness. Gwynneth
was starting for her lecture, primed with sharp
pencils and her new essay, when she heard in the
village that two doctors had been at the Flint
House in the night. She did not go to that
lecture at all, but for two days and nights was
scarcely an hour absent from the bedside of a
little boy whom she had barely known by sight
before. And his first comprehensible words
formed the question which Gwynneth, worn out
by watching, had answered in the fashion he
could never understand.
Well, she was destined to be the boy’s good
angel, though he never mistook her for one
again ; and sometimes She looked the part. The
dark eyes, so ardent in the pursuit of knowledge,
or of any other of her heart’s desires, could yet
sparkle with childish glee, or soften with the
tenderness Of the ideal Madonna. The self-willed
mouth and nose were only sweet as Georgie saw
them; and none but he knew the warmth of the
pale brown cheek or the crisp electric touch of the
dark brown hair. Little knowing it before, and
never dreaming of it now, Gwynneth had long
been hankering for all that the little child gave
her out of the fulness and purity of his tiny heart.
She supposed that She was happy because at last
she was being of some trifling use to somebody;
it made her think more of herself. Looking
275 T 2


Peccavi
deeper (as she thought), through the deceptive
lenses of her inner consciousness, Gwynneth took
a still less favourable view of her latest interest
in life. It was that and not much more to the
imperfect introspection of her morbid mood.
Nevertheless, this was the happiest time that
she had ever known. Georgie and she became
inseparable, even when the boy was well again;
and on him Gwynneth was really lavishing all the
love and tenderness which had been gathering in
her heart since the hour when she had kissed a
dead forehead for the last time. The fact was
that the girl had an inborn capacity for passionate
devotion, and was now once more enabled to
indulge this sweet instinct to the full. She still
went to her weekly lecture, read every book in
the syllabus, and wrote her essay with as much
care for detail as her innate energy would permit.
Nor was her work the worse for the counter-
attraction which now filled her young life to the
brim. Georgie spoke of Gwynneth as his “lady,”
with a sufficient emphasis upon the possessive
pronoun, and to her by a succession of pet names
of their joint invention.
Croup is an enemy that lives to fight another
day, as Dr. Marigold said when he paid his last
visit; and that word was sufficient for the Musks.
Thenceforward Georgie had only to sneeze to be
put to bed, where he wasted many days before
the winter was over. But Georgie was not to
be depressed, and as Gwynneth would come and
clay with him for hours it was perhaps no_
276


At the Flint House
wonder. They both had some imagination; one
showed it by extemporary flights of downright
romance, and the other by following these with
immense eyes and not a syllable of his own from
beginning to end. Then and there they would
dramatise the story, for it was usually one of
adventure, and Georgie had a clockwork paddle—
steamer called the Dover, which sailed the bed
manned by cardboard sailors of Gwynneth’s
making. In these seas the roughest weather was
experienced in crossing Georgie’s legs, but the
best fun was in the polar regions, where the
vessel lay wedged for months between two
pillows, while the crew hunted bear and walrus
over Georgie’s person, and dug winter quarters
under the clothes.
One day, when he really had a cold, and had
fallen asleep upon the icebergs, Gwynneth took
up0n herself to search the cupboard for some
picture-book which he might not have seen
before; and in so doing she came across the
photograph of a comely young woman, not much
older than herself, which compelled her attention
rather than her curiosity, for she guessed at once
who it was. Moreover, the face was striking and
interesting in itself. The eyes had a strange
look, half reckless, half defiant, but, even in a
faded and inartistic photograph, of a subtle fasci-
nation. There was some slight coarseness of
eyelid and nostril; but for all that it was a fine
expression, full of courage and full of will. The
will was obvious in the mouth. It had the
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Peccavi
strength of Musk himself. Yet there was some-
thing about the mouth—so firm—so full-—that
Gwynneth did not like. She could not have said
what it was, but she preferred looking into the
eyes. They fascinated her, and she did not lift
her own eyes from them till Mrs. Musk entered
and caught her thus engaged.
“Oh, where did you find that? Give it to
me—give it to me!" and the poor soul held
out hands that trembled with her voice. “ That's
Georgie’s poor mother,” she sobbed, “and I didn’t
know there was another left. I thought he’d
taken and burnt them every one!”
And she slipped the photograph inside her
bodice, and pressed her lean hands upon it, as
though it were the babe itself at her breast once
more. Next instant Gwynneth’s arms were about
the old woman’s neck, and her fresh lips had
touched the wet and shrivelled check of Georgie’s
grandmother.
“Ah! but you are good to us,” said Mrs.
Musk. “I never would have believed a young
lady could be so sweet and kind as you!”
Not that Gwynneth was in the habit of going
among the people; that was a practice which
Lady Gleed would not permit in a young lady
over whom she exercised any sort of control.
Consequently there was some talk in the village
at this time, and a little scene at the hall soon
after Sir Wilton and his wife arrived for the
Easter recess. But Gwynneth argued that in no
sense could the Musks be accounted ordinary
278


At the Flint House
villagers; and the squire himself took her side
very firmly in the matter.
“I won't have you rate Musk among the
yokels,” said Sir Wilton afterwards. “ He is the
one substantial man in the place, and a very good
friend of mine.”
“Well, I don’t consider it nice for Gwynneth
to be always with that child.”
“She doesn’t know the child’s history; you
have only to hear her talk about him to see
that.”
“I don’t think it nice, all the same,” Lady
Gleed repeated.
“ Then take her back to town with you.”
“ No, she is out now, and I can’t be bothered
with her this season. She is not like other girls.
I’ve a good mind to send her abroad for a year.”
“You can do as you like about that. It
might be a very good thing. Meanwhile I’m not
going to have Musk’s feelings hurt; only yester-
day, when I went to see him, he was telling me
all Gwynneth has done for them during the
winter. I’m not going to break with a man like
that by suddenly forbidding her to do any more.”
So it was decided that Gwynneth should go
for a year to a relation of Fraulein Hentig’s at
Leipzig, for the sake of her music, which the girl
had neglected rather disgracefully since leaving
school, but of which she was none the less fond,
given the proper stimulus. Gwynneth herself
acclaimed the plan, and indeed had a voice in it ;
there was only one reason why she was not
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Peccavi
entirely glad to go; and her devotion to Georgie
was more constant than ever during the few
weeks which were left to her.
Summer was beginning, and the boy was well
and strong, with chubby cheeks and sturdy bare
legs. Often Gwynneth had him to play in the
hall garden—this on Sir Wilton’s own sugges-
tion—but more often she took him for a walk.
There were beautiful walks all round Long
Stow. There was the windy walk across the
heather towards Linkworth ; there were cool
walks by the tiny river that ran parallel with the
village street, bounding the hall meadow and
both meadow and garden of the Flint House;
there was a fascinating expedition, with spade
and pail, to the sand-hills off the road to Lakenhall.
Yet it was on none of these excursions that
Gwynneth lost Georgie, but while leaving some
papers at the saddler’s workshop, in Long Stow
itself.
Fuller would keep her to talk politics, or
rather to listen to his own: it was the year of the
first Home Rule Bill, and even Mr. Gladstone
had never stirred the saddler’s anger, hatred and
contempt to such a pitch as they reached in this
connection. Gwynneth, on her side, had an
insufficient grasp of the measure, but an instinc-
tive veneration for the man; and she was young
enough to grow heated in argument, even with
the saddler. When at length she turned away,
more flushed than victorious, there was no
vestige of the child.
28o


At the Flint House
“Georgie! Georgie!"
Neither was there any answer. Gwynneth
turned upon the politician.
“ Didn’t you see him, Mr. Fuller P”
“Gord love you, miss, I thought you come
alone!”
And the saddler leant across his bench until
his spectacles were flush with the open window at
which Gwynneth stood.
“Alone? Georgie Musk was with me; and
I’ve lost him through arguing with you.”
She inquired at the next cottage. Yes, they
had seen him pass “ with you, miss,” but that was
all. There were no cottages further on; the
saddler’s was the last on that side and at that end
of the village. Opposite was the rectory gate,
with the low flint wall running far to the right,
overhung at present by the great leaves and heavy
blossoms of the chestnuts. And all at once
Gwynneth noticed that the chestnut leaves were
very dark, the sky overcast, and another shower
even then beginning.
“ He will get wet—it may kill him ! ”
And the girl ran wildly on along the road;
but it was a straight road, and she could see
further than Georgie could possibly have travelled.
So now there was only the lane running up by the
church.
Gwynneth took it at top speed; an instant
brought her abreast of the east end, gaping
wide and deep for the east window, yet built
like a rock on either side to the height of the
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Peccavi
eaves. Another step, and Gwynneth was
standing still.
Already her sub-consciousness had remarked
the silence of hammer and chisel, which had
tinkled in her ears as she brought Georgie up the
village, ringing more distinctly at every step, and
quite loud when first they had stopped at the
saddler’s window. Then it must have ceased
altogether. But now Gwynneth heard another
sound instead.
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Peccavi
“Of course I’m not angry ; but ”-for he must
know for certain—“ what’s your name P”
“Georgie.”
“ That’s not all.”
“Georgie Musk."
Carlton filled his lungs.
“And who sent you here, Georgie?”
“ Nobody di’n’t.”
“Then how have you come P ”
“ By my own self, course.”
“What! all the way from the Flint House?
That’s where you live, isn’t it P”
Carlton put the second question with sudden
misgiving. The name was not unique in that
country; he might be mistaken» after all. And
already—in these few moments—he could not
bear the idea of being thus mistaken in this
sturdy, friendly, independent boy.
“Yes, that’s where,” said Georgie, nodding.
“Then what can have brought him here P ”
“Well, you see,” said Georgie, confidentially,
“ my lady taked me for a walk ”
“Your lady P”
“ And I wunned away.”
“ But who do you mean by your lady P”
“ My lady,” said Georgie, turning dense.
“Your governess P” guessed Carlton.
“ Oh, my governess, my governess ! ” cried
Georgie, roaring with laughter because the word
was new to him, but made a splendid expletive:
“ oh, my governess gwacious me! ”
“ Well, whoever it is,” muttered Carlton,

284


A Little Child
“she oughtn’t to have lost you; and you Stay
with me until she finds you.”
“ That’s good,” said Georgie, with conviction.
“ I liker stay wif you.”
Carlton caught the child up suddenly, and
swung him shoulder-high. What a laugh he had !
And what a firm boy, SO heavy and straight and
strong! Carlton sat down in his barrow, taking
the little fellow on his knee, yet holding him at
arm’s length for self-control.
“ How can you like being with a person you’ve
never seen before?” asked Carlton, tremulous
again, for all his strength.
“’Cos I heard you makin’ somekin,” said
Georgie, who was looking about him. “What
are you makin’, I say? ”
It was here that, without any particular pro-
vocation, Robert Carlton’s resolution suddenly
failed him, so that he hugged and kissed the child,
in a sudden access of uncontrollable emotion.
This, however, was as suddenly suppressed.
Georgie had wriggled from his knee ; but instead
of running away (as the other feared for one
breathless moment), he continued looking about
him as before, bored a little, but nothing more.
“What are you buildin', I say?” he now
inquired.
“ A church.”
“ What’s a church ? "
Carlton came straight to his feet.
“ Do you never go to one ?” he asked; but
his tone was nearly all remorse.
285,


Peccavi
“No, I never.”
“Then have you never heard of God P”
And now the tone was his most determined
one.
“ Yes,” said Georgie,’ subdued but not
frightened.
“ You are sure that you have been told about
God P”
“ Yes, sure.”
“ Who has taught you P”
“ My lady and granny—not grand-daddy.”
“ You say your prayers to Him P”
“ Yes, I always.”
“ Sure P ”
“ Yes, sure.”
Carlton stood with heaving chest. He was
spared something at last; his cup was not to
overflow after all. And, as he stood, the grass
whispered, and the rain came down.
Again Georgie was caught up, to be set down
next instant in the Shed; but this time he was
really offended.
“ I don’t want to come in,” he whimpered. “ I
want to build wif your bwicks. They’re much,
much bigger’n mine ! ”
“ But it’s raining, don’t you see? It would
never do for Georgie to get wet.”
“ Oh, I wish I would play wif your
bwicks ! ” '
“ Why, Georgie, you couldn't lift them;
you’re not strong enough.” "
“But I are, I tell you. I really are l”
286


Peccavi
“ Oh, he’s broken his nose, he’s broken it to bits ;
oh, oh !”
Carlton made a dive for the other gargoyle;
but this was a peculiarly sinister face ; and
Georgie’s tears only ran the faster.
“ Oh, I don’t like that one. It’s a ho’ble face.
I don’t like it.”
Carlton cast the thing from him, and at the
same moment became and looked inspired.
“Shall I make you a new face, Georgie? A
better one than either of the others ? ”
“ Yes, do, I say ! A new face ! A new face! "
And shouts of delight came from the tear-
stained one: such was the sound that Gwynneth
heard in the lane.
A very inspiration it proved. All unpractised
in their earliest accomplishment, the hard-worked
hands had never been so deft before; nor ever
stone softer or chisel sharper than the first of each
that could be found. They were trembling, those
tanned and twisted fingers, but that only seemed
to impart a nervous vigour to their touch. When
the thing had taken rough shape, and a deep
curve or two suggested a whole head of hair;
when eyes and nose had come from the same
sure delving, and the mouth almost at a touch;
then the mouth of Georgie, long open in mere
fascination, recovered its primary function, and
yelled approval in surprising terms.
“ Oh, my Jove, my Jove !” he roared. “ What
a lovely, lovely, lovely face! Oh, my Jove, I must
show it to my lady I”
288


A Little Child
Carlton looked upon a baby face on fire with
rapture; and for once no dissimilar light shone
upon his own.
“Will you—give me a kiss for it, Georgie P”
Without a word the little arms flew round
a weatherbeaten neck that bent to meet them,
and the glowing cheeks buried themselves, volun-
tarily, in the beard that had only hurt before;
and not one kiss, but countless kisses, were
Georgie’s thanks for the lump of sandstone that
had grown into a face before his eyes. And such
was the scene whereon Gwynneth Gleed arrived.
At first she drew back, hesitating in the rain,
because neither of them saw her, and she could
not, could not understand! But her hesitation
was shortlived, or, rather, it had to be conquered,
and it was. So with flaming cheeks—because
they would not see her—and dark hair limp from
the rain—eyes sparkling, lips parted, teeth peeping
—came Gwynneth to the shed at last.
And the child ran to her, while the man’s eyes
followed him hungrily, climbing no higher than
Georgie’s height.
“Oh, look what a lovely, lovely face the
workman made me; do look, I say! Is it wery
kind of him to make me such a lovely thing P ”
Gwynneth had been dragged to where the new
head stood mounted upon a misfit; and Carlton
had been obliged to rise. But his eyes had not
risen from the child.
“ Is it kind of him, I tell you P” persisted
Georgie.
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Peccavi
“ Very kind,” said Gwynneth, “indeed.”
And civility compelled Carlton to look up at
last.
“It was only to pass the time,” he said. “I
was obliged to bring him in out of the rain.”
“ It was so good of you,” murmured Gwynneth.
“ But it. was not good of Georgie to run away as
soon as my back was turned ! ”
Georgie paid no heed to this reproach ; he was
busy playing with the uncouth head.
“Oh, don’t say that,” said Carlton, quickly;
“ I don’t get so many visitors ! Are you the little
chap’s governess?” he added, yet more quickly,
to undo the visible effects of his words.
“ NO, I’m—from the hall, you know.”
He could not but start at this. But now he
was guarding his tongue. And, as he reflected,
there came back to him the vague memory of a
face in church, followed by the Sharper picture
of a very young girl at the piano in a pleasant
room—the last that he had ever been in.
Gwynneth had recalled the same scene, and
could see him as he had been, while She gazed
upon him as he was.
“I remember,” he said, gravely. “SO you
take an interest in this little chap, Miss Gleed ? ”
“ Rather more than that,” replied Gwynneth,
taken out of herself in an instant, and declaring
her innocence by her sudden and unconscious
enthusiasm. “ I love him dearly,” she said from
her heart: and together their eyes returned
to the round sailor hat, the brown pinafore and
290


A Little Child
the browner legs which were all that was now to
be seen of Georgie the engrossed.
“ He is indeed a dear little fellow,” said
Carlton, smothering his sighs.
“ And so affectionate!” added Gwynneth,
thinking of the strange pair together as she had
found them.
“ Marvellously independent, too, for his age.”
“ He is not quite four. You would think him
older.” '
“Indeed I would . . . And so you are his
‘lady’ ! ”
“ So he insists on calling me.”
“You seem to be very much to him,” said
Robert Carlton, jealously enough at heart, as he
looked for once into the fine, kind, enthusiastic
eyes of Gwynneth; but they fell embarrassed,
and his own were quick enough to wander back
to the boy.
“I have been more or less alone since last
autumn,” said Gwynneth. “Georgie has been as
much to me as I can possibly have been to him.”
“ But he lives at the Flint House, does he not P
I-—I gathered he was a grandchild of the Musks.”
“So he is.”
“Are they bringing him up P ”
“Yes.”
“ Kindly P ”
“ Oh, yes—kindly. But ”
“ Are they fond of him P”
“ Touchingly so; but, of course, they are two
old people.”

291 U 2


Peccavi
“And so you stepped in to lighten and
brighten a little child’s life! ”
Gwynneth blushed unseen; for all this time
he was looking at Georgie and not at her.
“ 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 P”
“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 P”
“ To-morrow.”
“ Far P ”
“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
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Peccavi
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 P 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 allow-
ances 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; “allow-
ances ! ”
294


A Little Child
“ 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.
295


Peccavi
“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 you 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 certain 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, mutter-
ing, frowning; and the third time his lameness
was palpably less.
298


Peccavi
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 indepen-
dent 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
300


Peccavi
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 P”
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 P”
“ N0,” sighed the boy, screwing about on the
one thin thigh ; “ I think it’s only a little comfy.”
“ That better P”
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 P”
“ 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
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Design and Accident
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
303


Peccavi
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
304


Design and Accident
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 lan-
guage 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 0’ 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
305 X


Design and Accident
only to see him sometimes, and not even to see
him if you set your face against it. I would be
content—at least I would try to be—if I knew
he was going to good schools, if—if I might have
hand or voice in his life. You say I have no
rights. That is my punishment; a new one, that
I never felt until I saw the boy for the first time
the other day; but if you knew how I have felt
it since ! If you knew what it would be to me to
do anything—give anything—-——”
“I knew that were comun,” said Musk,
nodding to himself . . . “So you’d like to do the
handsome, would you P” His whole face becar'ne
suddenly suffused, as with walnut-juice; the very
whites of his eyes seemed white no longer, while
the pupils shrank to steel points in their midst.
“I know you!” he cried, beside himself again;
“but don’t you try them games with me. That’s
your line, that is—buy your way back! You’d
buy it with the parish, by making them a church ;
and you’d buy it with the boy, by making things
for him ; but that’s what you never shall do, not
while I live to prevent it . . . What you got
there, George P You give that here I”
It was the sandstone head with the sunken
eyes, and Georgie was clinging to it in his trouble
underneath the scaffolding; in an instant Musk
had seized it from him, and dashed it with all his
might against the wall, so that the soft stone flew
into a dozen pieces. It was like blood to a wild
beast: the demon of destruction broke loose in
Jasper Musk.
307 x 2


Peccavi
“And that’s how I’d treat the rest of your
damned handiwork,” he roared, “if I was the
village! I’d have no church of your building;
I’d bring that down about your ears right quick ! ”
His wild eye lit upon the wooden centre of the
unfinished arch, and “This is what I’d do,” he
shouted, lunging at the woodwork with his heavy
stick. “ Hypocrite ! Pharisee ! Disgrace to God
and man! Leper as———”
But the centre had been dealt a heavy thrust,
as from a battering ram, with each expression;
with each it had budged a little; but the last
lunge drove the whole framework from under the
unfinished arch, which came crashing down amid
a yellow cloud. Musk shuffled backward in time
to save his toes ; for an instant then both he and
Carlton stood aghast.
Robbed of his latest treasure, and moreover
having seen it smashed to atoms before his eyes,
Georgie had been howling lustily when the crash
came: when the yellow cloud lifted he lay silent
enough, in a little brown heap below the scaffold-
ing, and already the blood was through his
hair.
Carlton had him in his arms that instant.
“ He’s insensible,” he said quietly. “ A nasty
scalp wound, and may be more. What day is
this ?”
“ Wednesday.”
Musk did not know what he was saying, but
the cool question had elicited a correct though
unconscious reply.
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Design and Accident
“Wednesday used to be the doctor’s day at
the dispensa ”
“And is still,” cried Musk, coming to his
senses.
“Then one of us must run for him.”
“ I can’t run!”
“Then you must hold him while I do.
Stop! I’ll take him to the house; you must
bathe his head while I’m gone.”
Another minute and the boy lay in the rectory
study, upon the little bed in which Carlton had
fought death and won three years before; yet
another, and up limped Jasper, crooked with
pain, out of breath, but gasping for news of
Georgie as though he had been a week on the
way.
“ Has he come to yet P ”
“ No, and there’s a lot of blood. We must
stop it if we can. Wait till I get a sponge and
some water.”
Jasper Musk was bending over the boy, look—
ing huger than ever upon his knees, when Carlton
returned to the room.
“What have I done?” he was muttering.
“ What have I done? What have I done P ”
“Nothing that you could help,” replied
Carlton, briskly. “ Now you keep squeezing this
sponge out over his head—never mind the bed—
till I get back.”
Georgie lay insensible for hours. It was not
the loss of blood, which looked much worse than
it was, and ceased altogether with the dressing of

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Peccavi
the wound. There was, however, somewhat
serious concussion underneath ; and Dr. Marigold
bluntly refused to guarantee the event.
“ The pity is to move him,” he grumbled
towards night. “ But is there anybody here who
could nurse the boy ?”
“Only myself,” said Carlton, who had been
quiet and quick to help all the afternoon.
The doctor shot an upward glance through
his shaggy white eyebrows.
“ Well, you’re handy enough, I must say ;
and, as we know, the very devil to do things
Single-handed ; but this you couldn’t do. No,
I’d like to take him straight to the infirmary, only
I’m on horseback.”
“ There are traps in the village.”
“ They would jolt too much.”
“ Then let me carry him.”
“ It’s five miles.”
“ Never mind. I could do it. And he shouldn’t
jolt—he Shouldn’t jolt ! ”
The mellow voice that had charmed the
countryside in bygone years, it fell and quivered
with infinite tenderness and love, and it sped to
the heart of the gaunt old doctor. SO this time
Marigold raised his whole head, and his look was
open, prolonged, and penetrating.
“ No, no, Mr. Carlton,” he said at length, and
in the tone of old times. “ It might do no good,
after all. But I’ll tell you what you shall do: you
Shall carry him to the Flint House, and I’ll spend
the night there if I must.”
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Design and Accident
All this while Jasper Musk was sitting stunned
and staring in the rector’s chair. He had not
moved for an hour, nor did he now until Carlton
touched him on the shoulder.
“We are going, Mr. Musk. I am carrying
Georgie to your house.”
Musk raised a ghastly face.
“ He isn’t dead P”
“ N o.”
“ Nor going to die P”
“ God forbid! But the danger is great. The
doctor is going to stay with him all night.”
And there was a touch of jealousy in his tone,
lost upon Jasper Musk, but not on him who
inspired it. Silently they left the house, and
stole down the drive in the blue twilight. Carlton
led, treading almost on tip-toe, as if not to wake
a child that only slept in his arms. And so they
came to the Flint House, its master limping on
the doctor’s arm.
“ Go in, Mr. Carlton,” said Marigold. “There’s
no one else to carry him upstairs.”
And he detained Jasper below.
“ You must let that man stay till he is out of
danger,” the doctor said.
“ Why must I P”
“ Because I am not justified in staying all
night; and he will look after the boy as you and
your wife cannot, and as no one else will, now
that Miss Gleed is away.”
Jasper bowed sullenly to his fate. But the
doctor was not done.
311


Peccavi
“ Besides,” said he, his kind hand on the
other’s arm; “besides, he feels this as much as
you do, and God knows he’s gone through enough !
To-day, I tell you candidly, but for him your little
lad would be in a worse way than he is. Now
don’t you think after this that all of us—even you
—-might begin to be just a little less hard—even
on him P ”
312


Peccavi
Conservatoire, were singularly kind to Gwynneth
from the first. In some ways they were the best
friends the girl ever had. They taught her the
duty of gaiety at her time of life, and the absolute
necessity of a certain amount of vanity in every
human being. Gwynneth was given to understand
that she had more to be vain about than most.
Attracted themselves by the uncommon girl with
the fine eyes and the shy manner, her new friends
did much to mitigate the latter by making the
very most of her looks and accomplishments, and
seeing to it that Gwynneth did the same. She
was not allowed to dress as she liked in Leipzig,
nor to spend the whole of a fine afternoon at her
piano, nor to be out of anything that was going
on. The gaieties of the English colony were of
a simple character in themselves, but they were
Gwynneth’s high-water-mark in dissipation, and
ere long she was throwing herself into them with
that enthusiasm which she brought to every
pursuit. She had learnt to waltz remarkably
well, and to talk brightly about nothing in
particular to the acquaintance of a minute’s
standing. She was none the less assiduous at
her practising and her harmony, and was still
capable of immediate and immense excitement
over this poet or that composer; but these were
no longer her only topics. Nor was a holland
pinafore and the small urchin it contained entirely
forgotten in these days. Gwynneth wrote to
Georgie oftener than to anybody else in England.
And yet it was to the theatres and a real ball
314


Glamour and Rue
or so that she first ‘looked forward upon her
return.
Lady Gleed was much more than agreeably
disappointed in the new Gwynneth; herself
incapable of seeing beneath the thinnest surface,
she COuld scarcely believe it was the same girl.
Gwynneth was better-looking and had more to
say for herself than had ever appeared possible
to Lady Gleed, who decided to keep her niece in
town for the rest of the season, if not to present
so creditable a dééutante at the next drawing-
room. And a much more critical person, her son
Sidney, coming up from Cambridge for a night,
was not less favourably impressed.
Gleed of Trinity, a third-year man, was in his
turn a vast improvement upon the private scholar
who had seldom addressed a syllable to Gwynneth
in his holidays, but had gone past whistling with
his dogs. He was now a really handsome little
man, with a clear brown skin and a moustache
as mature as his manner; looked and spoke like
a man of thirty; and could be amusing enough
with his sly satire and his ready repartee. Cynical
this youth must always be, but the cynicism was
more good-humoured and less ill-natured than
formerly, and not abhorrent in the man as it
had been in the boy. At'all events it amused
Gwynneth, who was furthermore surprised and
excited to find that Sidney had read quite a
number of great books, and rather entertained
than otherwise by his blasphemous opinions of
many of them. SO they had something in common
315


Glamour and Rue
“Yes,” said Sidney; “ do you P"
“Rather!”
“Get some in Leipzig P”
“All that there was to get.”
“They dance well out there P”
“ I don’t know.”
“ But you do, of course P”
Gwynneth saw the drift of this examination,
and showed that she saw it, but Sidney liked her
the better for her dry reply :
“ You’d better try me.”
“ You’d better try me,” he rejoined adroitly.
“Very well,” said Gwynneth. “ Here P”
“Come on,” said Sidney, his eyes sparkling,
his brown skin a warmer hue; and in an instant
they were threading their way between the
cumbrous chairs and tiny tables of the big room,
ploughing through its heavy pile, he in patent
leather boots, she in her walking shoes, and not
so much as a piano-organ in the street to set the
time. Yet, even under these conditions, a turn
was enough for Sidney, though he did not want
_ to stop, and was very quick in asking whether
he would do.
“ You know you will,” said Gwynneth, for-
getting everything in the prospect of so excellent
a partner.
“ And you dance rippingly,” declared her
cousin; “by Jove, I wish we could have you at
the First Trinity ball ! ”
So did Gwynneth ; but, instead of betraying
further eagerness, sat down at the piano, and,
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Peccavi
saying it was nothing without the music, forthwith
treated Sidney to snatch after snatch of the waltzes
of the hour, rendering each with a brilliance of
touch and a delicacy of execution alike worthy of
a better cause. A year ago Gwynneth would not
have done this.
Sidney, his hands in his pockets, but a sparkle
still in his eyes, stood watching her without aword
until the end.
“Look here,” he then announced, “you’ve
simply got to come, and that’s all about it. Of
course the mater couldn’t get away, but Lydia
isn’t so full up, and I should think she’d jump at it.
I’ll write to her and fix it up. There’s a piano in
our rooms, and we’ll have it tuned for you; no,
we’ll get a grand in for the week ; and the whole
court will be full of men listening.”
“ Who are ‘ we ’ ? ” inquired Gwynneth.
“Oh, I share rooms with another fellow; an
Eton man ; you’ll like him.”
And once more Sidney looked a little criti-
cally at his cousin, as though he wanted to be
quite. sure that the Eton man would like her.
But at this moment the dressing-gong threw him
into consternation. It appeared that he was
dining out at some club, had come up for this
» dinner, was only sleeping in the house, and would
be gone first thing in the morning. So he had
better say good-bye ; and did so with rather
unnecessary warmth, Gwynneth thought; never-
theless, it was the dullest evening she had yet
spent in Hyde Park Place, though there was a little
318


Peccavi
been so loud and near; all this was even more
entrancing than the ball itself, and Gwynneth
moved as in a dream. She had had the audacity
to divide her dances between Sidney and the
Eton man; but one of them was given cause to
complain towards the end, and the more so since
the girl had never looked so radiant in her life.
The next day Gwynneth and Lydia (who would
not speak to her) were to return to town. It had
never been arranged that Sidney was to accom-
pany them ; yet he did ; and before evening there
was trouble in Hyde Park Place.
Sir Wilton would not hear of it at first;
he was soon obliged to do that. But he stood
firm in refusing his consent to a formal engage-
ment between Sidney and his first cousin, and
found an unexpected ally in Gwynneth herself.
The girl was paying for her week’s delirium
by a deeper depression than her face betrayed
or, her heart admitted. Already she was begin—
ning to disappoint her cousin. But this was too
much.
“You agree with him? ” gasped Sidney.
“You’d rather not be engaged? Then why, my
darling, did you ever say ‘ yes ’ P”
“It wasn’t to that question, dear,” said
Gwynneth, colouring.
“It amounted to the same thing.”
“ It will amount to the same thing,” Gwynneth
said earnestly; “at least I hope and pray that it
may. But, of course, it’s quite true that we’re
both very young; and at least it’s within the
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Peccavi
Only, there seemed to be such a spell between
us before we were sure of each other. But
perhaps it’s always like that.”
In the end they were engaged, but it was
not to be a public engagement for six months.
Meanwhile Sidney returned to Cambridge for
the Long, having taken only a part of his degree;
and Gwynneth quickly recovered her reputation
as a reformed character in the eyes of Lady
Gleed, who was less against the match than her
husband, and who took the girl to innumerable
parties, each of which Gwynneth made a deter-
mined effort to enjoy as thoroughly as the first
half of the First Trinity ball.
She seemed always in the highest spirits ; and
there was no one about her who knew her well
enough to know also that this perpetual bright-
ness was hard and unnatural in Gwynneth.
Closer observers than Sir Wilton and his wife
might indeed have suspected as much; but
there was only one occasion upon which Gwynneth
betrayed the livelier symptoms of a troubled
spirit. This was on her birthday at the begin-
ning of July; upon the breakfast table was a
registered packet with the Cambridge post-mark,
and in its morocco case Gwynneth presently
beheld a richer necklace ,than she had ever
dreamt of possessing as her own. Yet the look
in her face was so strange that Lady Gleed was
obliged to speak.
“ Don’t you like pearls, my dear P”
“ Oh! yes, oh! yes.”
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Glamour and Rue
“ But you don’t look pleased.”
“ No more I am!”
And she rushed from the room in unaccount-
able tears, and upstairs to her own, where she
was presently discovered writing a letter at top
speed, and crying bitterly as she wrote; it was
Lady Gleed herself who discovered her.
“ What is the matter, Gwynneth ? ”
" I am writing to Sidney. I cannot take such
presents from him. I am writing to tell him
why.”
“ I think you are very silly,” said Lady Gleed.
“But your uncle wants to see you in his study;
that is really why I came up; and I don’t think
you’ll be so silly when you have heard what he
has to tell you.”
There was an air of mystery about Lady
Gleed, who furthermore kissed Gwynneth before
they separated on the landing. The girl went
downstairs with chill forebodings. Sir Wilton
was seated at his massive desk, but rose fussily
as she entered, and wheeled up a chair with
almost excessive courtesy. Gwynneth had seldom
seen him looking so benign.
“I sent for you,” said Sir Wilton, resuming
his own seat, “because I have some news for
you, Gwynneth, which I am sure you will be as
glad to hear as I am to communicate it. It is
against the law to dwell upon a lady’s age, but at
yours I think you can afford to forgive me. I
believe that you are twenty-one to-day?”
Gwynneth had not thought of that before,
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Peccavi
’and at the present moment she could scarcely
believe she was no more. She made her admission
with a sigh.
“Then for twenty-one years,” pursued Sir
Wilton, beaming, “or let us say for as many of
them as you can remember, you have, I presume,
looked upon yourself as an entirely penniless
young lady? That has not been the case; at
least it is the case no longer. I—I hope I am
not giving you bad news P”
Gwynneth was trembling all over. She had
lost every vestige of colour.
“My mother!” she gasped. “ Why did she
never know P”
_ “Because, under the terms of your grand-
father’s will, nobody but myself was to know any-
thing at all about it until to-day.”
“It was cruel,” cried the girl, in a breaking
voice; “it might have kept her here}! It makes
me not want to hear anything now . . . but of
course I must . . . forgive me, please.”
“ My dear child," said Sir Wilton, kindly, “ it
is natural enough that you should feel that. I
can only ask you to believe that I at least had no
choice in the matter. And there were reasons;
it is too painful to go into them; your father
was my brother, and I had rather say no more.
I, for my part, was obliged to fulfil the conditions.
I have tried to do my duty. I would gladly have
done more, but your dear mother was the most
independent woman I ever met. I honoured her
for it. But what could I do? I must beg of
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Glamour and Rue
you, my dear, to look upon the bright side ; and,
believe me, this business has the very brightest
side it is possible to imagine.”
Gwynneth did her best. It was fine to be
independent in her turn. But the thought of
her mother made her ashamed to touch a penny.
And it was a matter of several thousand pounds,
invested all these years at compound interest,
yet with that absolute safety which distinguished
the financial operations of Sir Wilton Gleed.
Sir Wilton could not say off-hand what the
present capital would yield if left where it was at
simple interest, but he fancied it would work out
at seven or eight hundred a year at the very least.
And these figures, which sounded fabulous to
poor Gwynneth, were obviously in themselves
the bright side upon which her uncle had harped.
Yet he continued to beam as though there was
something more to come, and looked so knowing
that Gwynneth was obliged to ask him what
it was.
“Can’t you see?" he said. “Can’t you
see P”
“ It is an immense amount of money. I can't
see beyond that.”
“You heard me say that nobody knew any-
thing at all about it except myself, and, of course,
my solicitors P”
“Yes.”
“Even your aunt did not know until I told
her just now.”
“Indeed.”
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Peccavi
“ And Sidney won’t know until you tell
him! ”
Then Gwynneth saw. Sir Wilton took care
that she should. He did not on principle approve
of marriages between cousins ; he said so frankly;
he might be wrong. But there was one thing
which made him very proud of his son’s choice.
And this was that thing; there were others also
upon which Sir Wilton touched with much
playful gallantry.
“ But perhaps,” said he, “ you won’t have
anything more to say to the poor lad now! ”
328


X XV.
SIGNS OF CHANGE.
GEORGIE was a short head taller, and no pinafore
concealed the glories of his sailor suit ; but it was
still the same baby face, round as the eyes that
greeted all comers with the same friendly gaze.
His sentences were longer and more ambitiously
constructed; but he still said “ somekin” and “I
wish I would,” and, when excited, “my Jove! ”
And his lady once more danced attendance by
the hour and day together; for Sir Wilton and
Lady Gleed were paying visits until September;
and Sidney was still understood to be making up
for lost time at Cambridge.
Gwynneth had enjoyed the child’s society the
year before ; now she seemed dependent upon it.
She would have him with her daily on one pretext
or another, sometimes upon none at all. She said
she liked to hear him talk, and that was well, for
Georgie’s tongue only rested in his sleep. But
now there was often an intrinsic interest in his
conversation. He gave Gwynneth many an
item of village news which was real news to her.
Thus it was from his own lips that she first
heard of his accident, on seeing the scar through
his hair.
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Signs of Change
“ Mr. Carlton P”
“Yes.”
“So he came to see you P ”
“Yes, he often. I love him,” Georgie an-
nounced with emphasis ; “he makes lovely, lovely,
lovely faces ! ”
“ And does he ever come now P”
“ No, not now, course he doesn’t; he’s too
busy buildin’ his church.”
“ So he’s building still ! ”
“ Yes, 'cos he builds wery nicely,” Georgie
was pleased to say; “better’n me, he builds,
far better’n me.”
“And is he still alone P”
“All alone,” said Georgie; “all alonypony
by his own little self! ”
And the inconsequent nonsense sent him off
into untimely laughter, louder and more uproarious
than ever, quite a virile guffaw. But Gwynneth
could not even smile. And now when neither
listening to Georgie nor haunted by her engage-
ment, Gwynneth began to think of the lonely
outcast behind those trees, as she had begun
indeed to think of him the spring before last,
while her mind and life were yet unfilled by the
motley interests which this last year had brought
into both.
The thought afflicted her with a sense of
personal hardness and cruelty; there was this
lonely man, doing the work of ten, not spasmodi-
cally, but day after day, and year after year, still
unaided and unforgiven by the very people in
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Signs of Change
impulse; but she still remembered the look of
pleasure that had flashed through his pain, and
the kind sad voice which both answered her
question and thanked her for asking it. That
must have been only a day or two before the fire ;
the same summer there was the silent scene
between them in the drawing-room, when she
longed to shake hands with him, to show him her
sympathy, but did not dare. Then came the
finding of Georgie in the stonemason’s shed, only
the spring before last ; but Gwynneth found that
she had been gauche as usual even then, that she
had never risen to any of these occasions, but
that her one small attempt to express her sympathy
had been nothing less than a piece of tactless
presumption on her part. And yet she felt so
much!
Well, it was something that Musk had opened
his doors to him, if only under pressure of a
harrowing occasion ; even then it was much, very
much, in the prime infidel of the parish. It was a
beginning, an example; it might show others the
way. Gwynneth presently discovered that it had.
She had not brought Georgie to see the saddler
this time, and she was trying to follow that
thinker’s harangue as though she had really come
to him for political instruction; but all the while
the sound from among the trees distracted her
attention and mystified her mind. It was neither
the ringing impact of iron upon iron, nor the swish
of a sharp steel point through the soft sandstone.
It was the drone of a saw, as Gwynneth knew
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Peccavi
well enough when she asked what the sound was
in the first opportunity afforded her.
“ That’s the reverend,” said the saddler, dryly.
“ It sounds like sawing," said disingenuous
Gwynneth. “ Has he reached the roof P "
“ Gord love yer, miss, not he! ”
Gwynneth was consumed with an interest that
she feared to show, especially with the saddler
looking at her through his spectacles as others
had done when Mr. Carlton supplied the topic of
conversation. It was a look that seemed to ask
her how much she knew, and it always offended
her. She did not want to know what he had
done; all her interest was in what he was doing,
alone there behind the trees. Yet now she felt
that speak she must, if it was only to soften a
single heart, in the very slightest degree, towards
that unhappy man; and she had come to the
saddler with no other purpose.
“ Does no one go near him yet P” she asked
point-blank.
The saddler leant across his bench; the girl
had refused the only chair in the little workshop,
and was standing outside at the open window, as
all his visitors did. ,
“ You won’t tell Sir Wilton, miss P”
“ I shan’t go out of my way to make mischief,
Mr. Fuller, if that’s what you mean. But you
had better not tell me any secrets,” said Gwynneth,
with a coldness that cost her an effort ; however,
the saddler’s skin was in keeping with his calling.
“Then you can keep that or not,” said be,
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Signs of Change
“ as you think fit ; but I go and see him now and
then, and, what’s more, I’m not ashamed of it.”
“I should think not!” the girl broke out;
and Fuller sunned himself in the warmth of fine
eyes on fire. “I mean,” stammered Gwynneth,
“ after all this time, and all he has done ! ”
“ What I said to myself last Christmas, miss ;
and I’m the only man that say it to-day, in this
here village full of old women .and hypocrites ; if
you’ll excuse my blunt way 0’ speaking to a young
lady like you. ‘ This here’s gone on long
enough,’ thinks I; ‘an’ it’s the season of peace
an’ good-will,’ I says to myself; ‘darned if I
don’t step across the road to cheer up the poor
old reverend, an’ Sir Wilton can turn me out of
house an’ home if he find out an’ think proper.’
Don’t you mistake me, miss; I wasn't thinking
of Sir Wilton in what I said just now, and ought
not to have said to a young lady like you. No,
miss, Sir Wilton has his own quarrel with the
reverend; and I had my quarrel, as far as that
go; but, Gord love yer, a man of my experience
can. afford to forgive an’ forget, an’ be generous
as well as just. There isn’t a juster man alive
than me, Miss Gwynneth ; and not a soul in this
parish, or out of it, that can say I’m not generous
too.”
“I’m sure of it, Mr. Fuller. But did you go
over to the rectory ?”
“ There and then,” cried Fuller ; “ there—and
-—then. And I told him Straight that I for one—
but that’s no use to go over what I said and he
335


Signs of Change
to take my pipe across now and then as though
nothun had ever happened. Not that he fare
to care much for that, neither; he’ve been so long
alone, I do believe he’ve got to like his own
society as well as any. Yes, miss, shut off from
the world he have been and he is; but he won’t
be shut off from the world much longer!”
“ Oh P”
Gwynneth's interest was re-awakened.
“ No,” said Fuller, with the air of mystery in
which his class delights ; “ no, miss, he’s not one
to be shut off longer than he can help. Hear
that sound P”
“ I do indeed.”
Latterly she had been listening to nothing
else.
“ That’s a saw ! ”
“Well?”
“ Do you know what he’s sawun P ”
“ No.”
“ Planks for benches ! ”
Gwynneth repeated the last word in a
puzzled whisper; and so stood staring until the
obvious explanation had become obvious to her.
It remained inexplicable.
“I don’t see the good of benches before the
church is finished, Mr. Fuller.”
“ He mean to hold his services whether that’s
finished or not. And I mean to attend ’em,” the
saddler said with an air.
“ But—-—I thought ”
“ He was suspended for five year, and the

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Peccavi
and wished others to admire. She gloried in the
man’s achievement, and possibly also in her own
appreciation of it and him. That was her real _
point of contact with the saddler. But for Fuller
there was the excuse of unconsciousness, and for
Gwynneth there was not. So she read herself
that Sunday morning, under an August sky with-
out a fleck and a sun that drew the resin from those
very pine-trees upon which the outcast had so
often gazed. It was thereabouts that Gwynneth
lingered, of self-analysis all compact. Then the
hoarse bell began—came calling up to her from
the clump of chestnuts and of elms—calling like a
friend in pain . . .
Gwynneth reached church by way of the strip
of glebe behind it and the gate into this from the
lane, thus escaping the throng already gathered
at the other gate. She saw nothing but the rude
benches as she entered in; the last of these was
too near for her; She shrank to the far end of it,
close against the wall, and the bell stopped as She
sank upon her knees. The beating of her heart
seemed to take its place. Then there came a light
yet measured step. It passed very near, with a
subdued and subtle rustle, that might yet have
meant one other woman. But Gwynneth knew
better, though she never looked.
“I will arise, and go to my father, and will
say unto him, Father, I have sinned against heaven,
and before thee, and am no more worthy to he
called thy son.”
Already the girl could not see; all her being
340


A Very Few Words
was involved in an effort to suppress a sob. It
was suppressed. There were no tears in the
voice that so moved Gwynneth. How serene it
was, though sad! It began to soothe her, as she
remembered that it had done when she was quite
a little girl. She was a little girl again: these
five years fled . . . But oh, why had he chosen
that sentence of the scriptures? Gwynneth
looked at her book (for now she could see) and
found that some of the others would have been
worse.
At last she could raise her eyes; and there
was Fuller in the very front; and not another
soul.
But Gwynneth cared for nothing any more
except the gentle voice that it was her pride
to follow in the general confession, kneeling
indeed, yet kneeling bolt upright in her proud
allegiance.
A strange picture, the rude benches, the
ragged walls; the east window still a chasm, the
hot sun streaming through it down the aisle ; and
over all the blue cruciform of sky, broken only by
the nodding plumes of the taller elms. And a
congregation yet more strange—only Gwynneth
and the saddler. But this did not continue.
Gwynneth heard movements in the porch behind
her, and presently a stumble on the part of one
driven in by the press; but no voices; not a
whisper ; and ere-long he who had been forced in,
tired of standing, came on tiptoe and occupied the
end of Gwynneth’s bench.
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Peccavi
Now it was the second lesson. The rector
was reading it in the same sweet voice, with all
his old precision and knowledge of his mother
tongue, and never a trip or an undue emphasis.
N 0 one would have believed that that voice had
been all but silent for five whole years. And yet
some change there was, something different in
the reading, something even in the voice; the
clerical monotone was abandoned, the reading
was more human, natural, and sympathetic. The
change was in keeping with others. The rector
wore no vestments in the naked eye of heaven,
but only his cassock, his surplice, and his Oxford
hood. There were flowers upon the simple table
behind him, such roses as still grew wild in his
tangled garden, but no candle to melt double in
the sun. The lectern he had done his best
to burnish; but it was still a cripple from
the fire. Above, the rector’s hair shone like
silver, for the sun swept over it, but the lean
dark face was all in shadow. Gwynneth only
saw the fresh trim cut of the grizzled beard,
and the walnut colour of the gnarled hand
drooping over the book. That speaking
hand!
' Now it was the first hymn—actually! So
he dared to have hymns, and to sing them if
necessary by himself! But it was not neces-
sary, and not only Gwynneth joined in with
all the little voice she possessed, but presently
there were false notes from the other end of
the bench, and the saddler was not silent. But
342


A Very Few I/Vords
Robert Carlton’s voice rang sweet and clear
above the rest :—
“Jesu, Lover of my soul,
Let me to Thy Bosom fly,
While the gathering waters roll,
While the tempest still is high:
Hide me, O my Saviour, hide,
Till the storm of life is past:
Safe into the haven guide,
0 receive my soul at last . . .”
The hymn haunted Gwynneth upon her
knees, taking her mind from the remaining
prayers. It was a hymn that she had loved as a
little child, and now it seemed so simple and so
whole-hearted to one who longed always to be
both. But it was the passionate humility of it
that touched and filled the heart ; and yet there
had been neither tremor nor appeal in the voice
that led; and the humility was only in accord
with one of the simplest services ever held.
The second hymn was another of Gwynneth’s
favourites; she could not afterwards have said
which, for in the middle Mr. Carlton knelt, and
then came forward to the twisted lectern at the
head of the aisle.
It was not a sermon; it was only a very few
words. Yet in Long Stow nothing else was
talked of that day, nor for many a day to follow.
The few words were these :—
“The first verse of the nineteenth psalm :
“The heavens declare the glory qf God; and
the firmament sheweth his handyworh.
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Peccavi
“ Though I have given you a text, my
brethren, I do not intend this morning to preach
any sermon. If you care to hear me again—if
you choose to give me another trial—if you are
willing to help me to start afresh—then come
again next Sunday, only come in properly, and
make the best of the poor benches which are
all I have to offer you as yet. There will
only be one weekly service at present. I believe
that you could nearly all come to that—if you
would! But I am afraid that many would have
to stand.
“I cannot tell you how grieved I am that
your church is not ready for you; but I hope and
believe, as I stand before you here, that it will be
ready soon, much sooner than you suppose.
Then one great wrong will be righted, though
only one.
“Meanwhile, so long as we are blessed with
days like these—and I pray that many may be in
store for us—meanwhile, could there bea fitter or
a lovelier roof to the House of God than His own
sky as we see it above us to-day? Though at
present we can have no music worthy the name,
have you not noticed, during all this our service,
the constant song and twitter of those friends of
man, as I know them to be, of whom Jesus said,
‘ Not one of them is forgotten before God'?
And for incense, what fragrance have we not, in
our unfinished church, that is the House of God
all the more because it is also His open air.
“ My brethren, you need be no farther from
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A Very Few Words
heaven, here in this place, unfinished as it is,
than when the roof is up, and the windows are
in, and proper seats, and when a new organ peals
. and one whom you can respect stands where
I am standing now . . .
“My brethren—once my friends—will you
never, never be my friends again?
“ 0h spare me a little that I may recover my
strength : hefore [ go hence, and he no more
seen . . .
“Dear friends, I have said far more than I
ever meant to say. But it is your own fault ; you
have been so good to me; so many of you have
come in ; and you are listening to me—to me ! If
you never listen to me again, if you never come
near me any more, I Shall still thank you—thank
you—to my dying hour!
“But let no eye be dim for me. I do not
deserve it. I do not want it. If you ever cared
for me—any of you—be strong now and help
me . . .
“And remember--never, never forget—that a
just God sits in yonder blue heaven above us—
that He is not hard—that I told you . . . He is
merciful . . . merciful . . . merciful . . .
“O look above once more before we part,
and see again how ‘The heavens declare the
glory of God; and the firmanent sheweth his
handyworh.’
“ And now to God the Father, God the Son,
and God the Holy Ghost, be ascribed all honour,
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Peccavi
power, dominion, might, henceforth and for ever.
Amen.”
He had controlled himself by a superb effort.
The end was as calm as the beginning; but the
rather hard, almost defiant note, that might have
marred the latter in ears less eager than Gwyn-
neth’s and more sensitive than those of the people
in the porch, that note had passed out of Robert
Carlton’s voice for ever.
And there no longer were any people in the
porch ; one by one they had all crept in to listen,
some stealing to the rude seats, more standing
behind, none remaining outside. Thus had they
melted the heart they could not daunt, until all at
once it was speaking to their hearts out of its own
exceeding fulness, in a way undreamed of when
the preacher delivered his text.
And this was to be seen as he came down the
aisle, white head erect, pale face averted, and so
through the midst of his people—his once‘more—
without catching the eye of one.
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Peccavi
continued Fuller fiercely. “Not they—I know
’em. They’ll take the credit, the moment there’s
any credit to take—them that hasn’t given him
a word or a look in all these years. But the
reverend, he know—he know! ”
“I’m sure he does,” said Gwynneth, kindly;
and left the forerunner to his ignoble jealousy,
only hoping there was some foundation for it,
and that a real reaction was already in the air.
Even on her way home there were further
signs. Jones the schoolmaster, an implacable
enemy these five years, but an emotional man all
his life, was still dabbing his eyes as he held
unguarded converse with the phlegmatic owner of
the mill on the lock, who had been his fellow
churchwarden in the days before the fire.
“ I’ll be his churchwarden again,” declared the
schoolmaster, “and Sir Wilton can say what he
likes. We know who ruled the roast before, and
we know ”
Gwynneth caught no more as she hurried on,
her first desire a quiet hour without a whisper
from the world. She wished to recall every
word of the sermon, while every syllable remained
in her mind, and then to write it all down
and to possess it for ever. Such was her first
feverish resolve; nor, analytical as she was, did
she stop to analyse this. The stable gates
were open; it never occurred to Gwynneth to
wonder why. There was a good way through
the stable-yard to the garden, whose uttermost
end she might thus reach without being seen

348


An Escape
from the house. And Fraulein Hentig had
known where she was thinking of going, had
shaken Gwynneth not a little with her remon-
strances, but would be none the less certain to
ask questions when next they met.
Near the Italian garden was a certain walk,
with stark yew hedges on either hand, and fine
grass stretched like a drugget from end to end.
Across this strip the old English flowers, poppies
and peonies, hollyhocks and larkspur, faced each
other in serried lines as in a country dance ; and
the vista ended in a thatched summer-house
where it was always cool. The spot was a
favourite haunt of Gwynneth, who would catch
herself humming the old English songs there, and
thinking of patches and powder and the minuet.
It had not that effect this morning; she neither
saw nor smelt the flowers, nor heard the thrush
which was singing to her with persistent sweet-
ness from the stately trees upon the lawn beyond.
Gwynneth was in that other world which had
existed all these years within half-a-mile of this
one. What she heard was the virile cadence of
the voice which had always thrilled her; strong
and masterful in the beginning; softening all at
once, as the people pressed in to hear; then for
a little high-pitched and hoarse, spasmodic,
tremulous, too touching even to remember with
dry eyes; then that last pause, and the silver
clarion of his proper voice once more and to the
end. And what Gwynneth saw, through her
tears, was the sunlight resting on that stricken
34.9


Peccavi
head, as though God had stretched out His hand
in final mercy and forgiveness.
But what she was to see, before many minutes
were past, or the sermon over in her mind, was
a dapper figure approaching between the old
flowers and the spruce hedges, a figure in riding
breeches, swinging a cutaway coat in his walk.
It was Sidney, ridden over from Cambridge
on a hired horse. Gwynneth had time to come
out of the summer-house to meet him, but none
to think. SO he had given her a kiss before she
realised what that meant—and knew in her heart
that it must be the last. And the next moment
she saw that he’ was displeased.
“ So here you are ! ” was his verbal greeting :
“ I’ve been looking for you all over the Shop.”
“ I’m so sorry,” said poor Gwynneth. “If
you had only let us know ”
“Oh, that’s all right; I took my risk, of
course.”
He looked her up and down, as she stood in
the sunlight, tall and comely, her state of mind
instinctively and successfully concealed; and the
brown tinge came upon his handsome face as the
annoyance vanished. Endearments fell from his
lips, but now She made him keep his distance,
though SO tactfully that he obviously did not
realise his repulse. Gwynneth looked at him
for an instant with great compassion; then she
led the way into the summer-housc, her mind
made up.
“You haven’t been here all the morning, have,

359


An Escape
you?” he went on. “No, I see you haven’t;
there are your gloves.”
“Yes.”
“Been for a walk? ”
“Well, I did go for one.”
“What do you mean?” demanded Sidney,
struck at last by her manner.
“ I’ve been to church! ”
“ What ! Over to Linkworth and back P”
“ N0.”
Her tone trembled; he was not helping her
at all.
“Then what church did you go to, and what
on earth’s up with you, darling P”
“ I went to our own church.”
“ But I thought that Lakenhall chap only
came in the afternoon? ”
“ He doesn’t go to the church.”
Sidney stared an instant, and was on his
feet the next. “You don’t mean to say you’ve
been up to the church talking to—to Carlton?”
he cried.
“ No, not talking to him.”
“Then do you mind telling me what you do
mean P ” '
Gwynneth did her best to explain the occasion
and to describe the service, but found herself
unable to do the subject justice in a few words,
and drifted into a nervous enthusiasm as she went.
Sidney’s eyes seemed smaller than when she
began; she had never known he had so sharp a
thin. But he heard her out, standing in the
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Peccavi
doorway, and not always looking her way ; it was
when averted that his face looked so hard. When
she had finished he gave her his whole attention,
and was some time regarding her, his hands in
his pockets, without a word.
“ So you deliberately went to hear that black-
guard ! ”
“You needn’t call him that,” said Gwynneth,
hotly.
“ But I do.”
“I should be ashamed to abuse him after all
he has done ! ”
“That doesn’t alter what—what you ap-
parently and very properly know nothing about,
Gwynneth.”
“And I don’t want to know!” cried the girl,
indignant at his tone. “I only say, whatever he
has done, he has paid very bitterly for it, and
made such amends as were never made by any-
body I ever heard of. He may have been all you
say. He is more than all that I can say now ! ”
“And what do you say?” inquired Sidney,
with polite contempt.
“ That we shall honour ourselves in future by
honouring him, and dishonour ourselves by con-
tinuing to dishonour him. He has had his
punishment, and look how he has borne it!
Why, he has done what was never done in the
world before by one solitary man.”
Gwynneth stopped breathless. Sidney eyed
her coolly, his nostrils curling. “So that’s your
opinion,” he sneered.
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I got to enforce it while we’re still engaged? If
so I)

Gwynneth had raised her head slowly, and at
last she spoke.
“We are not engaged, Sidney,” she said
quietly.
“ N ot—engaged P ”
“ It has never been a proper engagement.”
“A proper engagement!” Sidney gasped.
“ Not a public one, if you like I What difference
does that make P ”
“ N 0 difference. It only makes it—easier——”
“What does it make easier P” he demanded
fiercely.
Gwynneth was choking with humiliation. It
was some moments before she could command
her voice. Her distress was pitiful; but the
young man was already busy pitying himself. A
sudden change had come over Sidney. It was
not in all respects a change for the worse. His
cynical aplomb had already disappeared, leaving a
tremulous, an angry, but a human being behind.
So Gwynneth felt a leaning to him even at the
last ; but this time she knew her mind.
And she spoke it with equal candour and
humility: it was all her fault: she could never
forgive herself; but he would forgive her, when
he saw for himself what the woman will always
see quicker than the man. She liked him better
than anybody she knew ; that week at Cambridge
had been the happiest week in her life; one day
they would, they must, be good friends again,
35/!


Peccavi
the want of it. I felt it first abroad, and you met
that want in your May-week in a way beyond my
dreams. You may sneer at me now, but you were
awfully nice to me then, and I shall never, never
forget it. You were so nice that I honestly did
think for a little that you met every other want as
well! Yet I tell you now, what I tried to tell
you once before, that when once you had spoken
nothing was the same. It was like touching a
bubble. The bubble had burst.”
“ You felt like that from the first P”
Gwynneth turned away, for now they were
both upon their feet, restlessly hovering between
the summerhouse and the sunlight.
“And yet it has taken you two months to tell
me,” pursued Sidney without remorse.
“ I know ; it was dreadful of me ; yet I could
not tell you till I was absolutely certain, and it is
not so easy to be certain of oneself in such things.
If you find no difficulty, Sidney, then you might
pity those who do. Nevertheless, I did write, on
my birthday, when you sent me those beautiful
pearls. Sidney, you must take them back—for
my sake. I meant to send them back at once,
but you know what I heard that very morning!
It may have been cowardly and weak, but how
could I tell you I did not love you the moment I
knew I was to have a little money of my own P
It’s hard enough as it is ; but I had not the pluck
for that. Yet it is hard enough now,” repeated
Gwynneth, with great feeling ; “ and you haven’t
made it easier, Sidney. No, I don’t mean any-
356


An Escape
thing you may have said; you have not said more
than I deserve. But you tempted me—you little
know how you have tempted me—to be dishonest
with you to the end. It would have been so easy
to make poor Mr. Carlton the whole cause, and
not to have told you the truth at all ! ”
“Then I wish to God you had done so!”
Sidney cried out, revealing the character of his
wound unawares, yet once more human, young, and
vain. Moreover there was passion enough in his
eyes and voice, as there had been in his wooing.
“ Besides,” he continued, “poor Mr. Carlton, as
you call him, is the cause, I don’t care what you
say. Curse him! Curse him, body and soul!”
Gwynneth was outside in the sun, doubly
adorable now that he had lost her, and for other
reasons too. Her sweet skin was flushed, and
even her tears inflamed the unhappy young man.
He looked at her long and passionately, then
muttered venom through his teeth.
“ What did you say?”
“ I said it was like him, too, the blackguard ! ”
“I don’t know what you mean, and I don’t
want to.”
“It’s as well,” jeered Sidney, with exceeding
malice ; but already she was turning away. She
was turning away without one word. In an
instant he had her by both wrists, as the devil
possessed himself.
“ Let me go,” cried Gwynneth. “ You're
hurting me! ”
“ I’m not. I’m not. I’m only going to let
357


XXVI I I.
THE TURNING TIDE.
NEXT Sunday there was a real congregation.
Yet the benches were almost as empty as before,
the people herding near the porch until entreated
either to occupy such seats as there were, or to
leave the church. “ Curiosity may have brought
some of you here,” said Mr. Carlton; “but I
earnestly hope that none will remain in that spirit.”
The benches were full in a minute, and many had
still to stand. All the next week Robert Carlton
spent in sawing more planks to one length, and
more props to one height for their support.
And on the third Sunday his church was packed. ’
The summer of 1887 was, however, a remark-
able one. And the month of August was an
ideal month for the inauguration of open-air
services, where there were trees.
In those hot still days came visitors of every
type, and in greater numbers than Robert Carlton
desired. The tide had turned; he was early
aware of his danger now. Again and again it
became his own sore duty to remind this one or
the other, distantly perhaps, yet none the less
unmistakably, of that which they might forget,
but he never. Their open admiration tried him
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Peccavi
acutely. He did like it a little for its own sake,
after five years’ ostracism; more for the fresh
purchase it gave him over simple hearts; but he
was very hard on himself for liking it at all. On
the other hand, he knew that it must put many a
mind, the subtler minds, more than ever against
him. It also renewed his own shame. SO it was
not admiration that he wanted at all ; it was con-
fidence, forgiveness, love ; and these if possible by
degrees. It was not possible, and Robert Carlton
had to suffer in turn from the saddler, the school—
master, and the rest. The first would come to
hedge and hedge with a view to Sir Wilton’s
imminent return ; the next would intercept him as
he came away, learn what he had been saying, and
forthwith step across to the church to let the
reverend know how the schoolmaster’s character
impressed itself upon a man of his experience. It
was an unattractive trait in Fuller that he ques-
tioned everybody’s sincerity but his own, albeit his
strictures were not seldom justifiable. He talked,
however, as though for years he had been the one
and only philanthropist to hold any dealings with
the rector; at last it became necessary to set
him right on the point, which Mr. Carlton did
with a mild account of his illness and the sexton’s
aid.
“ I do wish I’d ha’ known,” said Fuller, with
perfect truth; “ I do wish I’d ha’ known an’ had
the nursun of yer, reverend, instead 0’ him. And
he never come near you no more; so I should
expect.”
36o


The Turning Tide
“ But you tell me he’s very ailing, Fuller.”
“ He haven’t been ailun all these years.”
“ We—we had a little tiff in the end. It was
my fault. I wonder if he’d see me now P ”
“I’ll make him, reverend, I’ll tell him he’s
got to.”
“ No, Fuller, I can’t allow that. Besides, he
has not got to do anything of the sort; he has
turned dissenter, and may prefer me to stop
away. Nevertheless I shall call, if only to ask
how he is.”
There was no need to ask, in the event. The
old sexton was failing fast, and “ not long for this
world,” as his daughter announced in front of
him. The poor man was in bed, and very dirty,
but as sensible as he ever had been; and he
welcomed the rector with cadaverous grins.
“They tell me,” he whispered, “you fare to
finish the church with your own two hands.
You’re a wonderful man, sir—and I’m another.”
“You are, indeed. Why, you must be nearly
ninety, Busby P ”
“Eighty-eight, sir, come next September.
But I wasn’t thinkun 0’ my age, sir. Do you
remember that little varmin I swallered out ’f a
pond P ”
“ I remember.”
“ I’ve killed that, sir ! ”
And the sunken eyes shone like lamps.
“I congratulate you, Busby.” ’
“I killed that two year ago; and you’ll
never guess how ! ” The ex-sexton proceeded to
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Peccavi
on the trees. Any Sunday now the open-air
service might prove a discomfort and a peril to
all; in a few weeks at most it would become
impossible. But the people must have their
church. They had waited long enough. There-
fore any further reluctance in him was little and
unworthy, as Carlton saw at once for himself.
Yet there was now so much else to do, so many
poor folks to see, so many old threads to take up,
that for once he temporised. And even as he
temporised, his mind made up, and a competition
pending between the masons of the neighbour-
hood, Sir Wilton Gleed arrived in Long Stow for
the shooting.
Sir Wilton arrived with a frown. It deepened
but little at what he heard. He was prepared for
everything; and about Gwynneth he knew. She
had left his house, she had gone her own way, he
washed his hands of her, and only congratulated
Sidney on his escape. That chapter was closed.
It_was the older matter that harassed Sir Wilton
Gleed.
So that devil had reinstated himself after all !
The fact might not be finally accomplished; it
was none the less inevitable, imminent. And Sir
Wilton had long been prepared for it; for the
last two years he had been unable to move with-
out hearing the name he abhorred; it dogged him
in town, it followed him to Scotland, it awaited
him in every hole and corner of the Continent.
Once he had been fond of speaking of his pro-
perty; but in two senses it was hard to do this
364


Peccavi
destroy his influence in the neighbourhood ; even
if he succeeded it would damage his popularity
elsewhere. And a chat with the schoolmaster,
a call upon one or two of the neighbouring clergy,
a word with old Marigold in his gig, all served
but to convince him finally of these facts.
Sir Wilton’s mind was made up. He had
come back primed with a desperate measure for
the last of all. Once it was resolved upon, his
spirits rose.
He told his wife and took her breath away;
but a very little reasoning brought the lady
round the compass to his view. This was after
breakfast on the second day. The same forenoon
Sir Wilton went up the village, brisk and rosy,
a flower in his coat, and a word for all. Past
the Flint House he began to walk slowly, took
no notice of a courtesy, swung round suddenly
himself, and was knocking at Jasper Musk’s door
that minute, still a thought less confident than he
had been. '
Musk was in his garden, fast as usual to his
chair. Mrs. Musk brought out another chair for
Sir Wilton, and drove Georgie indoors on her
way back. Sir Wilton watched the child out of
sight, and then favoured Jasper with his peculiarly
fixed stare. There was unusual meaning in it
this morning.
“So the world has forgiven him,” said Sir
Wilton Gleed.
Musk stared in his turn, his great face glowing
with contempt. “ Have you P ” said he at last,
366


The Turning Tide
“ Not yet," replied Sir Wilton, a shade more
pink in the face. He had meant to lead up to
his intention. He was taken aback.
“But you mean to, do you P” pursued Musk,
pressing his point in no respectful tone: in all
their relations this one had never pandered to the
other.
“ I don’t say that, either,” replied Sir Wilton,
in studied tones.
“Then what do you say?”
“ Less than anybody else, a good deal less,”
declared the squire. “ I—I don’t quite under-
stand your tone, Musk, I must say; but I can
well understand your position in this matter. It
is unique, of course. So is mine, in a sense.
But I must beg of you not to jump to conclusions.
I am the last person to make a hero of the man I
did my best to kick out of the parish five years
ago; next to yourself, no one has reason to love
the fellow less. I thought it a public scandal
that he should be empowered to stay here against
all our wills. My opinion of that whole black
matter is absolutely and totally unchanged. But
I do confess to you, Musk, that this last year or
two has somewhat modified my opinion of the
man himself.”
Musk’s eyes had never dropped or lifted from
his visitor’s face. Their expression was inscrut-
able. The iron cast of that massive countenance
was the only key to the workings of the mind
within : the lines seemed subtly emphasised, as in
the faces of the dead. And his gigantic body was
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Peccavi
the same; only the eyes seemed alive; and they
were as still as the rest of him.
“ What if I’ve modified mine ? ”
Sir Wilton looked up quickly ; for the habitual
starer had been for once outstared. “ Do you
mean that you have ?” cried he.
“ I don’t say as I have or I haven’t. But
that’s a man, Sir Wilton, and I won’t deny it.”
“ Exactly what everybody is saying. I say
no more myself.”
“And I won’t say no less . . . Suppose you
was to patch it up with him, Sir Wilton ? ”
“ I should help him finish his church.”
Musk sat silent for some time. His eyes
seemed smaller. But they had not moved.
“That would be a wonderful good action on
your part, Sir Wilton,” he said at last.
“Not at all, Musk. I should be doing it for
the people, not for Mr. Carlton.”
Another pause.
“ And yet, Sir Wilton, in a manner 0’ speaking,
you might say as he deserved it, too ? ”
Sir Wilton was quite himself again—a gentle-
man in keeping with the flower in his coat.
“I certainly never expected to hear you say
so, Musk,” said he frankly; “though it’s what
I’ve sometimes thought myself.”
“I haven’t said as [ forgave him, have I ? ”
“ No, no, Musk, you haven’t ; it is not in
human nature that you could.” I
It was a strange tongue that had spoken in the
massive head; there was no forgiveness in that
368


Peccavi
“And now I shall be going on,” announced
Sir Wilton, who did not like this look, and was
now less inclined to suffer disrespect.
“Hold on a bit, Sir Wilton. I’m glued tight
to this here chair by my old enemy; that seem to
get worse and worse, and I’m jealous I Shall soon
set foot to the ground for the last time. That
take me ten minutes to mount upstairs to bed. I
haven’t been further’n this here lawn these twelve
months. SO I can’t come and see you, Sir
Wilton; and I should like another word or two
now we’re on the subject. You see, he was here
a good bit when the boy was bad, and even I don’t
feel all I did about him, though forgive him I
never shall on earth. At the same time I’d like
to see him have his church. That’d want
consecrating again, sir, I suppose ?”
“ I suppose it would.”
“ Would the bishop do it, think you ? ”
“Like a shot,” said Sir Wilton, a touch of
pique in his tone. “ I had some correspondence
with him years ago about this matter, and I was
surprised at the view the bishop took. He will
come, if he is alive.”
jasper had taken his eyes from Sir Wilton’s
face at last ; they were resting on the level sunlit
land beyond the river. “ That’ll be a great day
for Long Stow,” he murmured almost to himself;
and suddenly his lips came tight together at the
corners.
“It should be a very interesting ceremony,"
said Sir Wilton, foreseeing his part in it. He
37°


The Turning Tide
had forgiven his enemy, the scandalous clergyman
who had lived down a scandal and a tragedy; it
was Sir Wilton who had helped him to live them
down. Not at first ; then he had been adamant ;
but his justice in the beginning was only equalled
by his generosity in the end, when the man had
proved his manhood, and the sinner had atoned
for his sin, so far as atonement was possible in
this world. That poor pertinacious devil had
been five years running up the walls. Sir Wilton
Gleed had thrown his money and his influence
into the scale, and finished the whole thing in
less than five months. They were saying all this
at the opening ceremony; everybody was there.
His magnanimity was being talked of in the same
breath with the parson’s pluck. The bishop was
his guest.
“A very interesting ceremony, repeated Sir
Wilton. “We could have it at Christmas, if not
before.”
“ That won’t see me,” said Jasper Musk. “ I
couldn’t get, even if I wanted to. But sciatica
that don’t kill, and I hope to live to see the day.”
And again the corners of his mouth were much
compressed.
“ Yet you think you can never forgive him P”
Sir Wilton felt that he could not be the bearer
of too much good-will, now that he was about it;
but Musk turned his eyes full upon him, and
there was a queer hard light in them.
“ I don’t think,” said he. “ I know.”
And so it fell out that in an hour of unusual
371 2 B 2


Peccavi
depression, and of natural hesitation which was
yet not natural in Robert Carlton, he looked up
suddenly and once more saw his enemy in the
sanctuary which would soon be his very own leafy
sanctuary no longer. Carlton had come there to
meditate and to pray, but not to work. That sort
of work was not for him any more. Others must
take it up ; the time was ripe ; only the beginning
was hard. And here was Sir Wilton Gleed
advancing towards him.
And Sir Wilton was holding out his hand.
372


XXIX.
A HAVEN or HEARTS.
SLOWER to decide than most young persons of her
independent character, Gwynneth was one of
those who are none the less capable of decisive
conduct in a definite emergency. She behaved
with spirit in the predicament in which her weak-
ness and her strength had combined to place her.
She had jilted Sidney; outsiders might not know
it; but she had treated him in a way which he
and his were never likely to forgive. After that,
and that alone, his home could not have been her
home any more; but Gwynneth had other and
even stronger reasons for determining to leave
Long Stow; and there were none why she should
not. She had her money. She was of age. She
would be a good riddance now. It was her first
thought in the garden. The thought hardened
to resolve while Sidney, full of bitterness and
champagne, was still galling his hired horse back
to Cambridge. Gwynneth also was gone within
the week.
It was a chance acquaintance to whom the
girl had written in her need. She had met in
Leipzig a strangely interesting woman: com—
manding, mysterious, self-contained. This lady,
a Mrs. Molyneux by name, had taken notice of
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Peccavi
Gwynneth, and, at the close of their short acquaint-
ance, had given her a card inscribed in pencil with
the name of St. Hilda’s Hospital, Campden Hill.
“ You have never heard of it,” Mrs. Molyneux
had said with a smile ; “ but I shall be very glad
if you will come and see me and my hospital some
day when you are in town.”
Gwynneth had felt honoured, she could
scarcely have said why, for she knew no more of
this lady than she had seen for herself, which was
really very little. But there is a kind of distinc-
tion which appeals to the instinct rather than to
the conscious perceptions, and Gwynneth had felt
both awed and flattered by an invitation which
was obviously sincere. She had said that she
should love to see the hospital—and had never
been near it yet.
“ I don’t know whether you have ever thought
of being a nurse,” Mrs. Molyneux had added with
Gwynneth’s hand in hers ; “ but if you ever should
—or if ever you want to do something, and don’t
know what else to do—I wish you would write to
me, and let me be your friend.”
The second invitation had been given with a
wonderfully understanding look—a look which
seemed to sift the secrets of Gwynneth’s heart—a
look she would not have cared to meet during the
late season. She had promised again, however,
very gratefully indeed ; and it was her second
promise that Gwynneth eventually kept.
“ I had such a strong feeling about you,” Mrs.
Molyneux wrote by return. “ I knew that I
374


A Haven of Hearts
Should hear from you sooner or later . . . I like
your frankness in saying that it is no fine impulse,
or love of nursing for its own sake, that makes
you wish to come. I do not seek to know what
it is. Even if you are no nurse you can play
the organ in our little chapel as it has not been
played yet ; and that would be very much to me.
SO come any day and make your home with us
at least for a time.” The writer contrived to
refer to herself as “Reverend Mother,” in emphatic
capitals, and her letter was signed “Constance
Molyneux, Mother in God.”
It happened that Gwynneth had spoken of
Mrs. Molyneux to her aunt, who knew a good
name when she heard it, and had often asked
Gwynneth if she was not going to pay that call
on Campden Hill; thus her recklessness in cast-
ing herself among strangers was more apparent
than real, and little likely to aggravate her prime
offence against kith and kin. Nor did it; never-
theless it was a plunge into all but unknown
waters. The hospital was a private one, and Mrs.
Molyneux both spoke and wrote of it as her own.
It was a cancer hospital for women, evidently run
upon religious lines, and those not easy to define,
since Gwynneth happened to know that the
Reverend Mother was not a Roman Catholic.
And these things were all she did know when
her hansom drew up before a red-brick building
with ecclesiastical windows, and a cross over
the door, in a leafy road n'ot five minutes' climb
from Kensington High Street.
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Peccavi
Gwynneth pulled the wrought-iron bell-handle,
and next moment caught her breath. The door
had been opened by a portress in austere but
becoming garb, a young girl like herself, and the
pretty face between the quaint cap and collar was
smiling a sweet greeting to the newcomer. A
few worn steps of snowy stone, and a Gothic
doorway, with the oak door standing open, showed
more girls within against the wainscot; all were
pretty; and all wore blue serge, with white
aprons and long cambric cuffs, square bib-collars
trimmed with lace, and Normandy caps with
streamers of fine lawn. Gwynneth blushed for
her own conventional attire, as she was ushered
through this hall, past a dispensary where another
of the uniformed girls was busy among the bottles,
and so into the presence of the Reverend Mother.
Mrs. Molyneux, the well-dressed woman of
the world whom Gwynneth had known in
Leipzig, was a lost identity in a habit which
marked her sway only by its supreme seve-
rity; an order of St. John iof Jerusalem hung
upon her bosom, and a crucifix dangled at her
side. Her hands were hidden beneath some short
and shapeless garment reaching to the waist, but
one emerged for a moment to greet Gwynneth
warmly. “ Do you feel as if you had come into a
convent P” the Reverend Mother asked, a gentle
humour in her lowered voice. It was exactly
what Gwynneth did feel, and the sensation was
by no means displeasing to her. The Mother
herself then showed Gwynneth over the establish-
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A Haven of Hearts
ment, which was indeed a singular amalgam of
the hospital and the nunnery. The dining-room
was termed the “refectory;” a cross hung over
every bed in the wards upstairs, and in the nurses’
cubicles below the wards. Cap and apron, bib-
collar and cuffs, were laid out on Gwynneth’s bed,
and these she found herself expected to don then
and there. The Mother returned when she was
ready, and showed her the chapel last of all. It
was a tiny chapel, but as beautiful as antique
carving, rich embroidery, much stained glass, and
hanging lights could make it. In her innocence
Gwynneth wondered why these lights were burn-
ing while the summer sun, shining through the
stained glass, filled the chapel with vivid beams of
purple and red. She was even puzzled by the
unmistakable odour of recent incense; but she
said, with truth, that the chapel delighted her.
“I knew it would,” the Mother whispered
with her penetrating smile.
“How could you know?" Gwynneth asked,
smiling also, because she had never touched on
religion with Mrs. Molyneux.
“ I saw you once in the English church,” the
Mother said. “It was before I knew you; and
yet, you see, I did know you, even then! ”
In this chapel there were daily matins, vespers,
nones ; and at each of the three services attend-
ance was compulsory on the part of all nurses not
required at an actual deathbed, and of all patients
who were still up and about. French-capped,
pink-frocked maid-servants and ward-maids filled
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the front rows of chairs ; the patients sat behind ;
and on either hand, in the carved oak stalls, were
the pretty nurses, the Reverend Mother near the
entrance in their midst. The services, conducted
by an attendant Anglican of small account, were
punctuated by genuflexions and the sacred sign ;
and it was impossible to follow them in the Book
of Common Prayer.
Gwynneth tried hard to lift up her heart in
this strange sanctuary. She longed for real
religion as she had longed for little in her life
before. At the first blush, it seemed as though
Providence alone could have led her into so
unique a haven of equal sanctity and usefulness ;
and yet, also from the first, the girl was repelled a
little if attracted more. She liked her work; she
was a natural nurse, and soon grew used, but
never hardened, to hopeless suffering and slow
death. There were patients who loved Gwynneth,
and not a nurse who was not fond of her, before
she had been at St. Hilda’s a month. Already
she was playing the organ at all three services,
and her own music, and the voices floating up to
her, at these set times, filled her heart with peace ;
but she wondered if it was the right kind of
peace; she wondered whether this was religion at
all. Sometimes the sweet little chapel—for it was
all that to Gwynneth’s mind—struck her also as
a stage of studied effects. The nurses were so
pretty, their garb so becoming, and the blue of it
had such a perfect foil in the maid-servants’ pink.
But then the Reverend Mother, in her sombre
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mediaeval glow over the polished floor and the
dark wainscotting—long after the others were in
their cubicles. Nurse Ella had the greatest
scorn for the conventual Side of St. Hilda’s, which
Gwynneth would defend warmly, while her heart
admitted more than her lips ; the discussion would
ramify, and become animated on both sides ; then
all at once Nurse Ella would look at her watch,
and no persuasion would induce her to Stay
another minute. Gwynneth could have sat up
half the night, and would plead in vain for ten
minutes more; it seldom took Nurse Ella as
many seconds to suit her action to her word. She
said she would do a thing, and did it; that was
Nurse Ella’s principle in life.
SO there was no exchange of confidences
between these two, both reticent natures, and
neither unduly inquisitive about the other’s affairs.
Gwynneth only knew that her friend’s married
life had been a very Short one; for her own
part, she had said nothing to let Nurse Ella
suppose that she had herself been even asked in
marriage. But one night they were speaking of
another nurse, who had left St. Hilda’s that day,
in floods of tears, to be married the following week.
“If I felt like that,” Gwynneth had declared,
“ I wouldn’t be married at all.”
Nurse Ella looked up quickly, her glasses
flaming in the firelight. “What, not after you
had given your word ? ” said she.
“ Certainly not, if I felt I had made a mistake.”
Gwynneth was Staring into the fire.
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A Haven of Hearts
all self-conscious and acquired? Was her in-
tolerance of the slightest hesitation, in matters of
no account, a life’s reaction from a fatal irresolu-
tion in some crisis of her own career ?
Gwynneth never knew; for a fine mutual
reserve distinguished the intimacy of this pair,
and even drew them together, opposite as they
were in so many other respects, more than impul-
sive confidences on either side. One had suffered ;
the other was suffering now; each was a little
mystery to her friend. And there was one more
reason for this: neither was sure of the other’s
sympathy: at every point of contact they
diverged.
So Gwynneth used to wonder whether Nurse
Ella was in reality a widow at all, and Nurse Ella
was quite sure that Gwynneth was still in love,
probably with the man she had jilted, according
to the wise way of women; she was so ready to
speak of love in the abstract ; and once she spoke
so passionately. This was in Kensington Gardens,
one foggy Sunday, when the two nurses were on
their way to church; for they were allowed to
worship where they listed after matins at St.
Hilda’s. Nurse Ella rented a sitting under a
fashionable preacher who discoursed with much
wisdom and some acidity on topics of the hour;
but 'Gwynneth was still seeking her spiritual ideal.
They would walk togetheras far as the Bayswater
Road, where their ways diverged, unless Nurse
Ella could induce Gwynneth to go with her; on
this particular morning they were arguing about a
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Peccavi
Gwynneth walked on in silence. She was
reconsidering her own last words.
“ Atonement or no atonement,” she exclaimed
at length, “it would make no difference—if I loved
the man. Atonement or no atonement ! ” repeated
Gwynneth defiantly.
Nurse Ella had a passion for the last word,
but they were come to her corner, and there was
Gwynneth glowing through the fog, her eyes
alight, her cheeks flaming, a new being in the
puzzled eyes of her friend.
“Come with me, Gwynneth,” begged Nurse
Ella, at length; “don’t go off by yourself. Come,
dear, and hear a shrewd, hard-headed sermon,
without sentiment or superstition ! ”
Gwynneth smiled. That was the last thing to
meet her mood.
“ Then where shall you go P ”
“Either St. Simeon’s or All Souls’,” said
Gwynneth. “ I haven’t made up my mind.”
Nurse Ella shook her head over an admission
as characteristic as her disapproval. This was
the Gwynneth that she knew.
“ When do you make it up ! ” exclaimed Nurse
Ella without inquiry.
“When it’s a matter of the least importance,”
said Gwynneth, choosing to reply. “ What can it
signify which church I go to, what difference can
it possibly make? As a matter of fact I rather
think of going to All Souls".” ’
“I thought you didn’t care about music and
nothing else P ”
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A Haven of Hearts
“I don’t know that there is nothing else. I
think of going to see. I have often thought of it
before, but St. Simeon’s is rather nearer, and I
generally end by going there. I shall decide on
the way.”
“What a girl you are, Gwynneth ! ” exclaimed
Nurse Ella, with frank impatience. “You never
seem to know your own mind—never ! ”
Gwynneth made no reply; but she kindled
afresh, and this time very tenderly, as she went
her own way through the fog.
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Peccavi
which he himself had already remarked in the
eyes of others. He was a tall thin man, very
weather-beaten and rather bent, wearing a new
overcoat and a soft muffler; there was nothing in
his appearance to declare him of the cloth himself.
His grey beard was closely trimmed. He wore
gloves and carried a tall hat shoulder high in the
press going out. He was no more readily recog-
nisable as the lonely builder of Long Stow church,
than ‘Gwynneth in her nurse’s garb as the niece
of Sir Wilton Gleed. But their separate fates
brought them face to face in the porch, and
recognition was immediate on both sides.
“Miss Gleedf?” said Robert Carlton, raising
his hat before it covered his grey hairs.
“Mr. Carlton !” she exclaimed in turn. There
had been no time to think, and her voice told only
of her surprise; her own ear noticed it, and She
had time to marvel at herself.
“ I thought I could not be mistaken,” Carlton
was saying. And they were shaking hands.
“I never expected to see you here,” said
Gwynneth, with a strange emphasis, as though
the declaration were due to herself.
“I never thought of coming until an hour or .
two ago.”
No more had Gwynneth : then the miracle was
twofold. Her heart gave thanks. It was not afraid.
Meanwhile the crowd was carrying them
gently, insensibly, but side by Side, across the
flagged yard to the gate.
“ It’s the first Sunday I’ve spent in town for
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The Woman’s Hour
years,” observed Carlton ; “you are here al-
together, I believe?"
“ Well, for some years, at least. I am learning
to be a nurse.”
And Gwynneth blushed for her conspicuous
attire, just as Carlton gave a downward glance
at the quaint cap on a level with his shoulder.
“ So I heard,” he said. “May I ask which
hospital you are at P ” He could recall none
where the uniform was so picturesque.
“ You would not know it, Mr. Carlton ; it is a
private hospital on Campden Hill.”
They had passed through the gate, and they
paused with one consent.
“ Are you returning there now, Miss Gleed P”
“ Yes—through the gardens.”
“Then so far our way is the same.” He did
not ask whether he might accompany her, but
took the outer edge of. the pavement as a matter
of course. “ I am staying at Charing Cross,” he
explained as they walked ; “ early this morning I
went to the abbey. I did mean to go back there ;
then I suddenly thought I should like to come
here instead. I was once one of the assistant
clergy at this church.”
“I know,” said Gwynneth. She would not
deny it. That was why she had so often thought
' of coming to All Souls’—only to resist the tempta-
tion time and time again. Why, to-day of all
days, had she been unable to resist? Why had
she thought of him this morning, and why had the
thought been so strong? These were questions
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Peccavi
for a lifetime’s consideration. Now she was
walking at his side.
“It was strange to go back there after so
many years,” pursued Carlton, with the fine un-
guarded candour which he had brought back with
him into the world; “that service, in particular,
was very strange to me. I did not care for it at
first. It seemed so artificial after our simple
service in the country. Then I looked at the
faces of the men near me, and I saw how narrow
one can get. It was not artificial to them ; it was
only beautiful; and there :lies the root of the
whole matter. Simple services for simple folk—
that is my watchword now—but beauty, bright-
ness, elaboration by all means for those who need
it and can appreciate it. It is the right thing for
these rich congregations of hard-worked pro-
fessional men and busy society women; the
trappings of their religious life must not compare
meanly with those of their daily lives; let us
order God’s house as we would our own. But
the opposite is the case—though the principle is
the same—with a primitive country parish like
ours at Long Stow. . . And yetI had not the
wit to see that when I went there first.”
He was musing aloud as men seldom do
unless very sure of their audience. How came
he to be so sure of Gwynneth? They had seen
nothing of each other; this was the first time
they had been alone together long enough to
exchange ideas; yet in a moment he was
revealing his as few men do to more than one
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The Woman’s Hour
the spire of St. Mary Abbot’s was already dimly
discernible through the yellow haze.
“There is nothing we have not to buy, for
the interior,” he said at length. “The lectern is
the one exception, and I have had it straightened
and lacquered into a new thing. Sir Wilton
wanted me to keep it as it was; but that would
never have done. However, he would have an
inscription to the effect that it is the same lectern
which was in the fire, which is quite a sufficient
advertisement of the fact. I was in favour of
restoring the communion plate also, but Sir
Wilton insisted on presenting us with a new set,
which I have been choosing among other things
this week. The other things are too numerous
to mention—carpets, curtains, collecting-boxes,
alms-bags, a Litany desk, and the hundred and
one things you take for granted as part of the
church itself. But each has to be chosen and
bought, and I only wish that I had had your
help. I have found the best things most difficult
to choose—the plate and a very handsome cross
and candlesticks of polished brass—all of which
are my choice, but Sir Wilton’s gift. So is the
organ which is being built for us. Can you
wonder, then, that his generosity has moved me
more than I can possibly tell you P ”
“Indeed, no!” cried Gwynneth, in her own
kind voice; but her honour was all for the man
who claimed it for another; and, until she opened
them now, her lips had been pursed in mute
rebellion. She could fancy so much that the true
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Peccavi
foolish of me—for no one man could have finished
such a work—no other man living would have got
as far as you did without a soul to help you! Yet
somehow I don’t so much want to see the church
that they came in and finished ; it would spoil the
picture that I can see so plainly now, and always
shall—Of the stones you cut and the walls you
built with your own two hands—and every other '
hand against you !”
She was holding out her own. Carlton looked
from it to her face, a strange surprise in his eyes.
He had wriggled out of one of his gloves, and was
twisting it round the iron paling at the corner
where they stood.
“ May I come no further?” he said.
“ No, I could not think of taking you another
yard out of your way. And it is really not so
very many yards from where we stand ! ”
Gwynneth smiled brightly; but her voice was
the very firm one of this half-hour of her exist-
ence. And ever afterwards she was to marvel
why neither smile nor words were an effort to her
at the time: so his presence supported her to the
end, when the clasp of that indomitable hand, now
bare, and horny even through her glove, left
Gwynneth outwardly unmoved. She returned
his pressure with honest warmth; her smile was
kind and bright; then the cold mist fell between
them in a widening yellow gulf, with a diminishing
patter of firm footsteps, that Carlton could hear
when the nurse’s streamers had quite disappeared
in the fog.
4oo


The Woman’s Hour
And he stood where he was to hear the last of
her; and still he stood, wishing he had disregarded
tact, and persisted in his escort, whether it embar-
rassed her or not, if only to find out where her
hospital was. He felt inclined to call before
leaving town; already there was something that
he wished he had said; he kept saying it to
himself as he wandered back through dark
gardens and a desert park.
“ So you prefer to think of it before the roof
was on, as I managed to make it by myself! You
are the first to say that or to feel it—except me!
And I have put the feeling down; thank God, I
have got it under; yet it is a help to know that
one other felt the same. Perhaps it was a human
feeling ; but in me at least it was unworthy. God
help me ! But in you it is sweet, and to me very
wonderful . . . that you should understand and
sympathise . . . a young girl like you!”
This whole fatality left the man sadly unsettled ;
tired and yet restless in body and soul; humbly
thankful for a woman’s sympathy after so long,
and so much, yet the prey of a new depression.
A woman’s sympathy! Or was it only a woman’s
pity P No, she understood; but it mattered little
to Robert Carlton ; there could be no second
woman in his life. That he had always felt; but
he was not sure that he had ever before defined
the feeling. It was a part of his eternal punish-
ment; but he was quite sure that he had not
previously regarded it in that light.
A coxcomb Carlton had never been; he had
401 2 D


XXXI.
ADVENT EVE.
THE bishop arrived on the Saturday afternoon.
He was still the same little old man, with the
side-whiskers and the long mouth, the queer voice
and the ungainly limp; and Robert Carlton found
him neither more nor less cordial than at their last
dread interview; but he asked to see the church
before it was too dark.
All was in readiness at last. But the cocoa-
nut matting in the aisle and transepts, and the
maroon axminster in the chancel, had only been
laid that day. As yet there was no stained glass,
and only the east window and the west were
mullioned as of old; but through the latter a
wintry sun poured thick red beams, already too
much aslant to touch the floor, but just falling
upon the altar with its glimmering candlesticks,
its rich green cover, its violet frontal, all three
gifts from the hall. The bishop heard this with-
out remark, his mouth a mere seam. But he
approved of the rows of rush-seated chairs in
place of pews, and he admired the simple pulpit
of pitch pine. There was a pleasant smell of
pitch pine in the church. All the woodwork was
405


Advent Eve
his first tobacco for five years and a half. And
still they were strangely silent, until the occurrence
of an incident, little in itself, but great with
suggestion. _
There was a tiny patter on the worn carpet,
and all at once the bishop beheld a big brown
mouse seated upright within a few inches of his
companion’s boot. The bishop exclaimed, and
the mouse fled with a scuttle and a squeak.
“I tamed him,” Carlton explained with a
slight access of colour. “The house is overrun
with them, but this fellow lets none of the others
in here.”
The bishop was slow to follow up his
exclamation. He certainly was a man of
fewer words than formerly.
“ You ought not to have made yourself such
an anchorite,” he said at last. “ You might have
smoked your pipe—you say that’s your first—and
written to me sooner!”
So that still rankled. Carlton was not
altogether surprised.
“ My lord,” said he, “ how could I P You had
advised me to live anywhere else, and yet here I
was! ”
“ The circumstances justified you, Mr. Carlton.
I could not foresee such circumstances, I assure
you. I heard of them, however, at the time.”
Carlton had never written till the five years
were nearly up, when it became a necessary pre-
liminary to the resumption of those offices from
which he had been debarred; but, when he did
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Peccavi
write, he had done so to such effect that certain
other preliminaries had been foregone.
“Though you did not write,” continued the
bishop, “ Sir Wilton Gleed did. We had some
correspondence about you, and we disagreed;
that is one reason whyI declined his invitation
and accepted yours. I would not mention it,
only you are now such excellent friends. And I
understand that he himself makes no secret of his
former attitude towards you.”
“ On the contrary, he has expressed the most
generous regret for the line he took.”
“ He may well regret it,” said the bishop.
But Carlton had accepted his old enemy’s
aid, and would not hear ill of him, whatever
he might think. “It was natural enough,” he
murmured.
“What! To prevent you from making the
one reparation in your power? To have you
boycotted right and left? To trump up acriminal
charge? To force you, a clergyman, to remain
in your own parish, labouringlike a convict by
the year together ? To trample the cloth under-
foot in the eyes of all the world?”
“Oh,” groaned Carlton, “it was I who did
that! I alone am to blame for that—I alone!”
He leant his elbows on the chimney-piece, his
face in his hands; for stand he must if he was
only to hear harsh words—that night of all
nights! Carlton was unprepared for such severity
at this stage; and infinitely hurt ; for at his worst,
when he deserved no sympathy at all, the bishop
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Advent Eve
had shown much more. But behind his back the
blazing eyes were quenched, and the long mouth
relaxed.
“ No, no,” a softer voice said; “you have
done just the opposite—just the opposite. You
have been hard enough upon yourself; but the
world was harder on you—once.”
There was kindness in the rasping voice, but
no enthusiasm. None other had made so little
of the mere physical feat of this man ; and to him
the tone was unmistakable.
“I know what you mean,” said Carlton, turn-
ing round, his own eye alight. “You think the
world is going to the other extreme!”
“It generally does,” replied the bishop. “I
do not mean to be unkind.”
“You are not, my lord—unless you think I
haven’t seen this for myself! ”
The bishop nodded gravely to himself.
“You would see the danger. I am sure of
that. You must want to hear the last of what
you have done; superhuman and heroic in itself—
I am the first to admit it—it is nevertheless the
last chapter of a book which you must want to
close once and for all. The last chapter recalls
the first. Close the book; put it behind you;
start afresh.”
Robert Carlton stood looking down with a
curious smile upon his haggard face.
“That is exactly what I am going to do,”
said he.
“But the parish must do the same; they
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Peccavi
must help you. Let them also think no more of
the past, either remote or immediate.”
“They must think of what they will,” rejoined
Carlton, queerly. “They cannot help me much
longer, nor 1 them. I am resigning the living,
my lord.”
“ Resigning it?” cried the bishop.
“I intend to do so to-morrow night. It
always has been my intention. But you are
the first whom I have told.”
“ I’m glad to hear that ! ” the bishop exclaimed,
as he scrambled to his feet another being. “ You
have taken my breath away! My dear fellow, let
me dissuade you from any such course.”
Carlton shook his head.
“ My work here is done.”
“ It is just beginning ! ”
“ N o, it is done. I have given my parishioners
the church I owed them, since they lost their last
church through me. I set them once an example
for which I shall pray to be forgiven till my life’s
end ; but now, please God, I have at least shown
them that because a man falls it need not be
utterly and for ever. He can rise; or, at any
rate, he can try. God knows I have tried; and
they know it; and it may help them in their
own day of bitter trouble. But it was you, my
lord, who first helped me, by bidding me never
despair. I have tried to teach your lesson; that
is all.”
“But you have not finished,” the bishop
urged, gently. “ Go on teaching it—go on.”
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Peccavi
Ah! do you think I ever have forgotten—for an
hour—for a moment—since I left off working
with my hands P”
One of these was stretched in the direction of
the churchyard; and the bishop read its touching
testimony for the first time.
“There,” whispered Carlton, in strange excite-
ment, “there lies one . . . whose ruin and whose
death are at my door. I don’t forget—I never
have forgotten. I have paid, and I will pay till
the end. And there shall be no other woman . . .”
His tongue failed him; his face was grief-
stricken; the whole man was changed. 50 then
the human being, his bishop, knew that there was
another woman in his heart already; recalled the
most terrible part of this man’s confession to him,
years before; and presently plucked him by the
sleeve. And the voice that Robert Carlton
heard, as he leaned once more with his elbow on
the chimney-piece, and his face between his
hands, was the voice of their last interview, at the
bishop’s palace, in the blank forenoon of a wet
summer’s day.
“ Forgive me,” it said, “for I also have mis-
judged you in my turn. But now I see—~but
now I see, and am ashamed . . . Your life has
been hard, my brother, but it has been brave!
You have been through the depths, but you have
also touched the heights, and I think that God
must be very near you to-night. I see now that
you are right to go; you are both nobler and
wiser than I thought; may happiness, and peace,
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Advent Eve

up to shake hands. Yes, he would come in gladly
after church tO-morrow. No, he had seen no one
else to speak to as yet, except Mrs. Musk; and
the grenadier stood confused.
“ Where did you see her?”
“ Driving away from the Flint House.”
“ That Old woman at this time of night?”
“Musk is bad, and She was going for the
doctor herself. I offered to go instead, but She had
the girl with her, and there was no Stopping them.”
“ Bad! ” echoed Carlton. “ He has been bad
for weeks; he may be dying—and all alone!”
He dashed from the room, but was back next
moment in his wideawake. “I must go to him,
George! He will hate it, but I must go. Open
the door, and I’ll put out the light ; if he’s dying
I shall stay.”
It was a clear keen night with a worn moon
curling in the west; and the hard road rang like
a drum as red-coat and black ran elbow to elbow
down the village, jerking a word here and there
as they went.
“ Been bad long, sir?”
“Sciatica for years; only just taken to his
bed.” '
“ Sciatica Shouldn’t kill.”
“This must be something else. The man is
old—and the one enemy I have left ! ”
They ran on. Before the Flint House came
first its meadow and then its garden wall, with
the gate left open, and a rude drive twisting
through trees to the side of the house. “This
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The Second Time
The grenadier had a wet skin, a quivering
lip, a starting eye.
“ Oh, I can’t tell you, sir! I may be wrong.
God grant it! But give me the lamp, and go
outside and look for yourself ! ”
In sheer perplexity Carlton complied; and
for an instant imagined some outrageous freak of
nature; for the trees of the Flint House drive,
black as night a few minutes before, now stood
etched against the reddest dawn that he had ever
seen—at midnight in December! Then a flame
shot upwards, and another, and another; and
Mellis was left standing, lamp in hand, a brilliant
patch of light and colour, yet less brilliant every
instant in the face of that unearthly glare in the
east. Swift feet were pattering down the drive;
and had such a start, before the soldier found
his senses, that it was only in the churchyard
he caught them up.
Long Stow church was on fire for the second
time, and burning faster than it had burnt
between five and six years before. The crackle of
the pitch pine was loud as musketry already.
The roof was already burning; its destruction
had been the climax of the former fire.
Robert Carlton stood with folded arms heaving
on his chest. The bishop was there already, in
his overcoat and rug, with the whiter and the
sterner face. The servants had called him : they
also were there, in pitiful case, but no more had
arrived as yet.
“ It is no use their coming. The roof ’s on fire
419 2 E 2


Peccavi
in three or four different places. He has done
his work better this time ; more oil for him, with
those stoves !”
The voice was Carlton’s, because his lips
moved, and those of the bishop were compressed
out of sight. Otherwise Mellis, for one, would
never have recognised so sad a discord of heart-
break and devil-may-care.
“Some things might be saved,” said the
bishop.
“They might and shall! George, run to
my study for the key; it’s on a nail beside the
fireplace. And to think I locked up myself lest
something might happen at the last!” cried
Carlton, with a single note of high hollow
laughter, as the soldier vanished. “But I never
thought of you! N 0, you have cheated me very
cleverly this time. You almost deserve your
triumph—over me ! ” .
“Do you mean to say you know who has
done it?” cried the bishop.
“ Yes—the man who did it before.”
“ But was that ever known ?”
“No; but I knew. I found his hat in the
church.”
“And you never told?”
“Nor shall I now. But I do wonder where
he got in! And he was well enough to climb a
ladder—my dying man ! "
Carlton said no more; he was sorry he had
said so much. Yet this time it was sure to come
out. There was the empty bed. Mellis would
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Peccavi
and calling to Mr. Carlton to do the same. In
three places the ceiling was on fire, and burning
planks beginning to drop ; in anothera spreading
patch of brown burnt through even as they
watched. Almost simultaneously came a shriek
from the women and a roar from the men now
gathering outside; it was Tom Ivey who came
rushing in.
“ There’s some one overhead ! He’s smashing
the skylight over the north transept! That’s the
man that done it—that’s the man that done it—
fairly caught ! ”
The saddler came on Tom’s heels.
“ Gord love us all, that’s Jasper Musk!”
Carlton darted into the south transept without
waste of words, and in an instant had disappeared
in the part that was boarded off until the new
organ should be established in its place there;
meanwhile the very ceiling had not been carried
to the end of the transept, and a ladder led to
the natural loft that it formed. Up this ladder
the incendiary must have climbed, and up this
ladder the rector was running when Mellis and
Ivey, with the rest at their heels, reached its foot.
“ Come down, sir, come down, for God’s sake ! ”
“ I am not coming down alone.”
“Then I’ll fetch you,” roared Ivey; “you are
not going to risk your life for him ! ”
But the red-coat was first upon the ladder,
and in a few seconds both young men were in the
triangular tunnel between the ceiling and the
roof; a space so confined that under the apex
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alone was it possible to walk upright; and that
only for the few feet dividing them from the
nearest flames.
“ Look out!” cried Tom Ivey from the top
rung. “ It 'wasn’t made for a floor; get on
your hands and knees, and the weight won’t be all
in one place.” So they crept into the centre Of
the cross; and there they knelt upright to see
over a fringe of fire that burnt their eyelids bare
as they gazed.
Roof and ceiling of chancel and of nave, both
were in roaring flames to right and to left of
them; through the flaming barrier in their faces,
and the hole already burnt, they could see the
pulpit and the chairs in the north transept thirty
feet below ; and across the gulf, Jasper Musk and
Robert Carlton face to face. Carlton had made
the leap ; they could not; already the flames were
driving them back and back.
In the steady roar and crackle they could hear
no words. Musk was crouching under a skylight
all too narrow for his gigantic shoulders, a tell-
tale oil-tin overturned at his feet. His face was
livid, but fearless, and his light eyes gleamed with
hate. Carlton’s back was turned to the watchers,
and for a second motionless ; then he looked
round, saw them through smoke and flame, and
clapped a hand to his mouth.
“ Down, both of you,” he shouted, “and round
with the ladder to the outside here, and one of
you fetch up an axe. The skylight’s too small-—
we must make it bigger ! ”
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Peccavi
Musk’s lips moved, and his eyes flashed their
own fire ; the others could almost see the words.
“ Well P” said Mellis.
“ Come on ; it’s our only chance.”
In an instant they were down the ladder, and
had it horizontal in a minute. Then Ivey began
to fume.
“ It’ll take some getting through the porch ! ”
“Shove it through the broken window.”
“Good man! Stand by, out there, to haul
out this ladder ! ”
The red-coat ran round, his medal twinkling
in the glare, while Ivey rushed for the axe.
“ Up with her, comrades ! That’s it -—
altogether—now ./ ”
The ladder was up outside. Ivey, axe in
hand, had leapt upon the fourth rung at a bound,
and was taking the rest two at a time. Below it
was light as day; the naked trees stood brown
and brittle in the glare ; the upturned faces white
as the curled moon. A whiter face peered through
the skylight.
“Look alive with that axe, Tom; he can’t
breathe, and he’s being roasted!”
“ He deserve ut ! Do you come through
first, sir. There’s room for you as ’tis. He can
bide his turn.”
The white face flushed indignant dominion.
“Unless you obey me, you are my murderer
too ! ”
A stifled curse came from under the tiles.
“ There, then! Would you save him after
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Sanctuary
From his own observatory the saddler had
seen who was in the covered fly, when Gwynneth
got out. He was at his usual work upon the
latest newspaper, and he took it up again for a
minute. But Gwynneth was more than a minute,
and more than five; the saddler lost patience,
and wandered across the road.
“Where did you bring that young lady from P
Lakenhall P ”
“Yes.”
“And are you going to take her back again?”
“Yes, in time for the 5.40 train; and she
only got down by the 2 . 10."
Gwynneth, who had not stirred a feature or a
limb, started indignantly at the sound of a
profaning step ; but had forgiven Fuller before he
reached her hand with his own outstretched.
There had seemed so much that she might never
know, could never ask ; it would not be necessary
with the saddler.
“ Why, Miss Gwynneth, is that you P” he
cried, when he had crushed her hand; and his
eyes widened with concern.
“ Am I so much changed?” asked Gwynneth,
smiling gallantly.
“ Changed! Gord love yer, miss, you’re the
shadder of what you was.”
“ There is plenty of substance still, Mr.
Fuller.”
“ And where’s your colour, miss P ”
“ In London, I suppose.”
“That’s it,” cried Fuller; “that London! I
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Peccavi
wouldn’t live there, not jf you paid me: nasty,
beastly, smoky, overcrowded sink of iniquity and
disease! If I was the Government I’d pull that
down and build it up again on twice the space.
That isn’t good manners to run down the place
where you live, miss, I know; but I never could
abide that London, and now I shall hate it more
than ever.”
“But I thought you were never there, Mr.
Fuller ? ”
“And never mean to be, miss, and never
mean to be ! I’ve too much sense. Look at me :
sixty-eight I am, and a bit over, and not an ache
or a pain from top to toe. That’s because I live
in the pure air and know what I eat; now in
London, if you’ll excuse my saying so, you never
do. Where should I be if I’d been swallerun
London fogs and adulterated milk and butter all
my life? In my grave these thirty years! Do
you take the advice of a man of my experience,
miss : shake the soot of London off your feet, and
come you back to good living and good air, and
you won’t know yourself in a week.”
Gwynneth let the saddler run on; a more
sensitive man would have seen that she was not
hearkening to a word. Her eyes were very hard
and bright; they rested once more upon the faded
flowers and the fluttering cards.
“ So this is Mr. Carlton’s grave!”
The belated words told nothing at all. Fuller
removed his cap.
“Yes, miss, there lie the biggest and the
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Sanctuary
bravest heart that ever beat in this here parish or
anywhere near it. And I have a right to say so.
Many has come back to him this last twelvemonth
or so. But I was the first.”
“Were you at the fire, Mr. Fuller?”
“Was I at the fire! \Vhy, it was me that
saw that first, Miss Gwynneth. Young George
Mellis, with his red-coat and his bamboo cane, he
would have it that was him; but there are some
folks that fare to be first in everything, and
General George ’11 be getting too big for his
uniform if he don’t take care. You see, I hadn’t
closed an eye when I saw the first flicker on the
ceiling; but an old man like me have to get
on some clothes before he can run outside in the
depths 0’ winter. Meanwhile, Master George,
who haven’t been near his old friend all these years,
he can come down fast enough when the reverend’s
got the ball at his feet again ; and there were the
two of them at the Flint House, inquiring after
Jasper Musk, said to be at death’s door at the
very moment he was setting fire to the church.”
“Fiend!”
“ You may well say that, miss, for it was the
second time he’d done it ; and the reverend had
known, all these years, and that must’ve been
Jasper’s hat he flung into the first fire when
Tom Ivey come, puttun two an’ two together.
What make that worse, it seem old Jasper used
to say he hoped to live to see the new church
consecrated; and some say he’d smile as he said
it; but now we know what he meant. And he
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Peccavi
used to limp up and down his room, for practice,
when even the doctor thought he couldn’t set
foot to the ground; for the servant girl heard
him at it. Yes, Miss Gwynneth, he was deep
and strong and cruel, like the sea, was Jasper;
that’s what the bishop said himself, for I heard
him; but I will say this for him, he asked no
more quarter than he gave. Tom Ivey heard his
last words through the skylight, and they aren’t
fit for a young lady like you to hear, but they
were a man’s words whatever else they were.
The worst is that the dear old reverend could’ve
squeezed through himself if only he’d have let
Jasper slip; but that he wouldn’t; so they both
went through with the ceiling and were killed.”
“ For his enemy! ” whispered Gwynneth, an
unearthly radiance in her poor hard eyes.
“ Yes, for the man that burnt the church down
twice, and deserved to burn himself ; that was the
worst of it.”
The listener's lips were consistently com-
pressed, but at this they parted again.
“Oh, no, it was the best. Itwas the best.
A great death, a glorious death! ” And the pale
thin face was white-hot with a pride which con-
sumed all else.
“The bishop said his life was greater still.
You should ha’ heard his sermon, out here, at the
open grave, when it was all over. There never
was such a funeral in the countryside before, and
there never will be another like it. The place
was packed. I stood where you are standing
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Sanctuary
now, miss. I was one o’ the bearers ; and Ivey,
Mellis, and Jones the schoolmaster, they were the
other three. Then you should have seen the
clergy; there was a rare procession of the clergy
from all round; the Reverend Scrope from Burton
Mills, the Reverend Preston from Linkworth,
and Canon Wilders, and a lot more. But the
bishop was in all his toggery, and I never see a
man look so fine; he’s little and he’s lame, but
the face he preached with, across this here open
grave, you’d have said that belonged to some old
giant. And what a sermon! That didn’t make
us cry ; that dried our tears, an’ made us want to
build churches and be killed ourselves. You
might guess the text : ‘ Greater love hath no man
than this, that a man lay down his life for his
friend.’ I kept waitun for him to point out that
Musk was not the reverend’s friend, but his worst
enemy; but he never did. I would have done;
otherwise, he said just what I would like to have
said myself, let alone the one thing that took the
whole lot of us by surprise. And I tell you, Miss
Gwynneth, the place was right black with people;
not only in the churchyard, but across the fence
in the medder as well ; there was hardly a blade
0’ grass to be seen.”
“ What was the surprise, Mr. Fuller P ”
“ He’d made up his mind to resign the living!
He had told his lordship. He meant to resign
next night—I can’t for the life of me think
why!”
But Gwynneth could; and, with the second
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Sanctuary
were in a hospital together, but now we have
taken a flat—for I am going to live with her too.
And it is for Georgie I am come to-day.”
Her companion had served her purpose; but
would not go ; and a hint might betray that which
had obviously never entered the saddler’s head.
So Gwynneth looked her last upon her own
heart’s grave with the same pale face and the same
unbending carriage; but the bright eyes were
softer now, though radiant still with a heavenly
pride. So his ashes exalted her as his living
presence; so his undying soul still strengthened
hers. '
It was a pale February day, the grass very
green, a subtle gloss of life upon the bough;
but it was man’s handiwork that appealed to
Gwynneth; and all at once an astounding fact
forced itself upon her vision and understand-
ing. The church was almost exactly as she had
seen it last. The east end was the worst; the
roof was not begun. It was just as it had been
six months before; and only the work of the
hireling had perished after all; that of the self-
taught mason, the pariah, the penitent, still
endured as an oblation and a sacrifice for his sins,
and as a monument to the man for all time.
Gwynneth could have gone down on her knees
in thanksgiving for this miracle; as it was she
saw his resting-place but dimly for the last time.
At that moment the starling which had enter-
tained him in life began a gossip in the elder-
bush at his head; a jealous sparrow poured abuse
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