God's Good Man, Marie Corelli [me reader .txt] 📗

in ‘im wot the sperrit o’ God keeps down,—but it’s there, lurkin’ low in ‘is mind, an’ when ‘is eyes flashes blue like lightnin’ afore a storm, the devil looks straight out of ‘im, it do reely now!”

“Well, well!” said Buggins, tolerantly, with the dignified air of one closing the discussion; “Devil or no devil, you tell ‘im as ‘ow the Five Sisters be chalked for layin’ low on Wednesday marnin’. Good day t’ye!”

“Good day!” responded Bainton, and the two worthies panted, each to go on their several ways, Buggins to the ‘Mother Huff’ from whose opened latticed windows the smell of roast beef and onions, which generally composed the Buggins’ Sunday meal, came in odorous whiffs down the little lane, almost smothering the delicate perfume of the sprouting sweet-briar hedges on either side, and the nodding cowslips in the grass below; Bainton to his own cottage on the border of his master’s grounds, a pretty little dwelling with a thatched roof almost overgrown with wistaria just breaking into flower.

Far away from St. Rest, the greater world swung on its way; the whirl of society, politics, fashion and frivolity revolved like the wheel in a squirrel’s cage, round which the poor little imprisoned animal leaps and turns incessantly in a miserable make-believe of forest freedom,—but to the old gardener who lifted the latch of his gate and went in to the Sunday dinner prepared for him by his stout and energetic helpmate, who was one of the best dairy-women in the whole countryside, there was only one grave piece of news in the universe worth considering or discussing, and that was the ‘layin’ low of the Five Sisters.’

“Never!” said Mrs. Bainton, as she set a steaming beef-steak pudding in its basin on the table and briskly untied the ends of the cloth in which it had been boiling. “Never, Tom! You don’t tell me! The Five Sisters comin’ down! Why, what is Oliver Leach thinking about?”

“Himself, I reckon!” responded her husband, “and his own partikler an’ malicious art o’ forestry. Which consists in barin’ the land as if it was a judge’s chin, to be clean-shaved every marnin’. My wurrd! Won’t Passon Walden be just wild! M’appen he’s heard of it already, for he seems main worrited about somethin’ or other. I’ve allus thought ‘im wise-like an’ sensible for a man in the Church wot ain’t got much chance of knowin’ the wurrld, but he was jes’ meanderin’ along to-day—meanderin’ an’ jabberin’ about a meek an’ quiet sperrit, as if any of us wanted that kind o’ thing ‘ere! Why it’s fightin’ all the time! If ‘tain’t Sir Morton Pippitt, it’s Leach, an’ if ‘tain’t Leach it’s Putty Leveson—an’ if ‘tain’t Leveson, why it’s Adam Frost an’ his wife, an’ if ‘tain’t Frost an’ his wife, why it’s you an’ me, old gel! We can get up a breeze as well as any couple wot was ever jined in the bonds of ‘oly matterimony! Hor-hor-hor! ‘Meek an’ quiet sperrit,’ sez he—‘have all of ye meek an’ quiet sperrits’! Why he ain’t got one of ‘is own! Wait till he ‘ears of the Five Sisters comin’ down! See ‘im then! Or wait till Miss Vancourt arrives an’ begins to muddle round with the church!”

“Nonsense! She won’t muddle round with the church,” said Mrs. Bainton cheerfully, sitting down to dinner opposite her husband, ‘What nesh fools men are, to be sure! Every-one says she’s a fine lady ‘customed to all sorts of show and gaiety and the like—what will she want to do with the church? Ten to one she never goes inside it!”

“You shouldn’t bet, old woman, ‘tain’t moral,” said Bainton, with a chuckle; “You ain’t got ten to bet agin one—we couldn’t spare so much. If she doos nothing else, she’ll dekrate the church at ‘Arvest ‘Ome an’ Christmas—that’s wot leddies allus fusses about— dekratin’. Lord, Lord! The mess they makes when they starts on it, an’ the mischief they works! Tearin’ down the ivy, scrattin’ up the moss, pullin’ an’ grabbin’ at the flowers wot’s taken months to grow,—for all the wurrld as if they was cats out for a ‘oliday. I tell ye it’s been a speshel providence for us ‘ere, that Passon Walden ain’t got no wife,—if he ‘ad, she’d a been at the dekratin’ game long afore now. Our church would be jes’ spoilt with a lot o’ trails o’ weed round it—but you mark my wurrd!—Miss Vancourt will be dekratin’ the Saint in the coffin at ‘Arvest ‘Ome wi’ corn and pertaters an’ vegetable marrers, all a-growin’ and a-blowin’ afore we knows it. There ain’t no sense o’ fitness in the feminine natur!”

Mrs. Bainton laughed good-naturedly.

“That’s quite true!” she agreed; “If there were, I shouldn’t have made Sunday pudding for a man who talks too much to eat it while it’s hot. Keep your tongue in your mouth, Tom!—use it for tastin’ jes’ now an’ agin!”

Bainton took the hint and subsided into silent enjoyment of his food. Only once again he spoke in the course of the meal, and that was during the impressive pause between pudding and cheese.

“When he knows as ‘ow the Five Sisters be chalked, Passon Walden’s sure to do somethin’,” he said.

“Ay!” responded his wife thoughtfully; “he’s sure to do something.”

“What d’ye think he’ll do?” queried Bainton, somewhat anxiously.

“Oh, you know best, Tom,” replied his buxom partner, setting a flat Dutch cheese before him and a jug of foaming beer; “There ain’t no sense o’ fitness in ME, bein’ a woman! You know best!”

Bainton lowered his eyes sheepishly. As usual his better half had closed the argument unanswerably.

VII

Seldom in the placid course of years had St. Rest ever belied its name, or permitted itself to suffer loss of dignity by any undue display of excitement. The arrival of John Walden as minister of the parish,—the re-building of the church, and the discovery of the medieval sarcophagus, which old Josey Letherbarrow always called the Sarky Fagus, together with the consecration ceremony by Bishop Brent,—were the only episodes in ten years that had moved it slightly from its normal calm. For though rumours of wars and various other mishaps and tribulations, reached it through the medium of the newspapers in the ordinary course, it concerned itself not at all with these, such matters being removed and apart from its own way of life and conduct. It was a little world in itself, and had only the vaguest interest in any other world, save perhaps the world to come, which was indeed a very real prospect to most of the villagers, their inherited tendency being towards a quaint and simple piety that was as childlike as it was sincere. The small congregation to which John Walden preached twice every Sunday was composed of as honest men and clean-minded women as could be found in all England,—men and women with straight notions of honour and duty, and warm, if plain, conceptions of love, truth and family tenderness. They had their little human failings and weaknesses, thanks to Mother Nature, whose children we all are, and who sets her various limitations for the best of us,—but, taken on the whole, they were peculiarly unspoilt by the iconoclastic march of progress; and ‘advanced’ notions of doubt as to a God, and scepticism as to a future state, had never clouded their quiet minds. Walden had taken them well in hand from the beginning of his ministry,—and being much of a poet and dreamer at heart, he had fostered noble ideals among them, which he taught in simple yet attractive language, with the happiest results. The moral and mental attitude of the villagers generally was a philosophic cheerfulness and obedience to the will of God,—but this did not include a tame submission to tyranny, or a passive acceptance of injury inflicted upon them by merely human oppressors.

Hence,—though any disturbance of the daily equanimity of their agricultural life and pursuits was quite an exceptional circumstance, the news of the ‘layin’ low of the Five Sisters’ was sufficient cause, when once it became generally known, for visible signs of trouble. In its gravity and importance it almost overtopped the advent of the new mistress of the Manor; and when on Tuesday it was whispered that ‘Passon Walden’ had himself been to expostulate with Oliver Leach concerning the meditated murder of the famous trees, and that his expostulations had been all in vain, clouded brows and ominous looks were to be seen at every corner where the men halted on their way to the fields, or where the women gathered to gossip in the pauses of their domestic labour. Walden himself, pacing impatiently to and fro in his garden, was for once more disturbed in his mind than he cared to admit. When he had been told early on Monday morning of the imminent destruction awaiting the five noble beeches which, in their venerable and broadly-branching beauty, were one of the many glories of the woods surrounding Abbot’s Manor, he was inclined to set it down to some capricious command issued by the home-coming mistress of the estate; and, in order to satisfy himself whether this was, or was not the case, he had done what was sorely against his own sense of dignity to do,—he had gone at once to interview Oliver Leach personally on the subject. But he had found that individual in the worst of all possible moods for argument, having been, as he stated, passed over’ by Miss Vancourt. That lady had not, he said, written to inform him of her intended return, therefore,—so he argued,—it was not his business to be aware of it.

“Miss Vancourt hasn’t told me anything, and of course I don’t know anything,” he said carelessly, standing in his doorway and keeping his hat on in the minister’s presence; “My work is on the land, and when timber has to be felled it’s my affair and nobody else’s. I’ve been agent on these estates since the Squire’s death, and I don’t want to be taught my duty by any man.”

“But surely your duty does not compel you to cut down five of the finest old trees in England,” said Walden, hotly,—“They have been famous for centuries in this neighbourhood. Have you any right to fell them without special orders?”

“Special orders?” echoed Leach with a sneer; “I’ve had no ‘special order’ for ten years at least! My employers trust me to do what I think best, and I’ve every right to act accordingly. The trees will begin to rot in another eighteen months or so,—just now they’re in good condition and will fetch a fair price. You stick to your church, Parson Walden,—you know all about that, no doubt!—but don’t come preaching to me about the felling of timber. That’s my business,—not yours!”

Walden flushed, and bit his lip. His blood grew warm with indignation, and he involuntarily clenched his fist. But he suppressed his rising wrath with an effort.

“You may as well keep a civil tongue in your head, Mr. Leach—it will do you no harm!” he said quietly; “I have no wish to interfere with what you conceive to be your particular mode of duty, but I think that before you destroy what can never be replaced, you should consult the owner of the trees, Miss Vancourt, especially as her return is fixed for to-morrow.”

“As I told you before, I know nothing about her return,” replied Leach, obstinately; “I am not supposed to know. And whether she’s here or away, makes no difference to me. I know what’s to be done, and I shall do it.”

Walden’s eyes flashed. Strive as he would, he could not disguise his inward contempt for this petty jack-in-office,—and his keen glance was, to the perverse nature of the ill-conditioned