Chapter Eight.
New Quarters.
Ailwin presently made George’s supper, with milk, a little thickened with meal. They were all about the child, watching how he would take it, when a loud crack was heard.
“What is that?” cried Oliver.
“It is a crack,” said Ailwin, “in the wall or somewhere. I heard just such a one while Mildred was gone out to play, after dinner.”
“And there was another while you were away,” said Mildred. “Some plaster fell that time:—look here! In this corner.—What is the matter, Oliver? What makes you look so frightened? What does it mean?”
“It means, I am afraid, that more of the house is coming down. Look at this great zigzag crack in the wall!—and how loose the plaster hangs in that part of the ceiling! I really think,—I am quite sure, we ought not to stay here any longer.”
“But where can we go? What shall we do?”
“We must think about that, and lose no time. I think this room will fall very soon.”
Mildred could not help crying, and saying that they could not settle themselves, and rest at all. She never saw anything like it. They were all so tired they did not know what to do; and now they should have to work as hard as ever. She never saw anything like it.
“No, dear, never,” said her brother: “and thousands of people, far older than you, never saw anything like this flood. But you know, Mildred, we must not die, if we can help it.”
This reminded Mildred who it was that set them these heavy tasks,—that bade them thus labour to preserve the lives He gave. She was silent. Oliver went on—
“If ever we meet father and mother again, we shall not mind our having been ever so much tired now. We shall like telling them all our plans and doings, if it should please God that we should ever sit with them by the fire-side.”
“Or whenever we meet them in heaven, if they should not be alive now,” said Mildred.
“Yes, dear; but we will talk over all that when we get to the Red-hill:—we must not talk any more now, but set to work. However, I really think, Mildred, that father and mother are still alive somewhere. I feel as if they were.”
“But the Red-hill,” said Mildred, “what do you mean about the Red-hill? We are not going there, where Roger is,—are we?”
“We must, dear. There is no other place. Roger is very unkind: but floods and falling houses are unkinder still. Come, Ailwin, help me with the raft. We must carry away what we can before dark. There will be no house standing to-morrow morning, I am afraid.”
“Sleep on the ground!” exclaimed Ailwin. “Without a roof to cover us! My poor grandfather little thought I should ever come to that.”
“If you will move the beds, you need not sleep on the bare ground,” said Oliver. “Now, Ailwin, don’t you begin to cry. Pray don’t. You are a grown-up woman, and Mildred and I are only children. You ought to take care of us, instead of beginning to cry.”
“That is pretty true,” said Ailwin: “but I little thought ever to sleep without a roof over my head.”
“Come, come, there are the trees,” said Oliver. “They are something of a roof, while the leaves are on.”
“And there is all that cloth,” said Mildred; “that immensely long piece of cloth. Would not that make a tent, somehow?”
“Capital!” cried Oliver. “How well we shall be off with a cloth tent! It seems as if that cloth was sent on purpose. It is so spoiled already, that we can hardly do it any harm. And I am sure the person that wove it would be very glad that it should cover our heads to-night. I shall carry it and you across before anything else—this very minute. I will run down and bring the raft round to the door below. The water is low enough now for you to get out that way.—Oh dear! I wish I was not so tired! I can hardly move. But I must forget all that; for it will not do to stay here.”
While he was gone, Mildred asked Ailwin whether she was very tired.
“Pretty much; but not so bad as he,” replied Ailwin.
“Then do not you think you and I could fetch off a good many things, while he watches Geordie on the grass? If you thought you could row the raft, I am sure I could carry a great many things down-stairs, and land them on the hill.”
Ailwin had no doubt she could row, in such a narrow and gentle stream as now ran through the garden.
She made the trial first when Oliver was on board, and several other times with Mildred, succeeding always very well. Oliver was extremely glad of this; for the bridge-basket had been used so much, and sometimes for such heavy weights, that it was wearing out, and might break down at any moment. The bridge-rope, too, being the stoutest cord they had, was very useful for tying the raft to the trunk of the beech, so that it could not be carried away. When once this rope was well fastened, Oliver was content to rest himself on the grass beside Geordie, and let the strong Ailwin and little Mildred work as they wished. It surprised him, well as he knew Ailwin, to see the loads she could carry, bringing a good-sized mattress up the bank as easily as he could have carried a pillow. She wrung the wet out of the long piece of home-spun, and spread it out in the sun, to dry as much as it could before dark, and seemed to think no more of it than Mildred did of washing her doll’s petticoat.
Mildred took charge of the lighter articles that required care—her mother’s china, for one thing; for it was found that nothing made of earthenware remained unbroken in the lower rooms. There were some pewter plates, which were now lodged under the beech, together with pots and pans, knives and forks, and horn spoons. There was no table light enough to be moved, but a small one of deal, which Ailwin dragged out from under water, with all its legs broken: but enough of it remained entire to make it preferable to the bare ground for preparing their food on, when once it should be dry. There was a stool a-piece—not forgetting one for Roger; and Mildred took care that Geordie should have his own little chair. Not even Ailwin could carry a chest of drawers: but she carried down the separate drawers, with the clothes of the family in them. No one of the household had ever seen a carpet; but there was matting on some of the floors. Ailwin pulled up pieces of this, to be some protection against the damp and insects of the ground.
“It is as wet as water now,” said she; “but we must not quarrel with anything to-day on that account; and matting will dry on the hill better than at home. If it turns out rotten, we must try and spare a piece of the cloth from overhead, to lay underfoot: but George will feel it more like home, if he has a bit of matting to trip his little foot against.”
So down-stairs went a great bundle of wet matting.
“Will not that do for to-night?” asked Oliver, languidly, as he saw Ailwin preparing to put off again, when the sun was just touching the western hills. “You know we have to put up the tent, and get something to eat before we can go to sleep; and it has been such a long, long day!”
“As you please,” said Ailwin; “but you said the house would be down in the night; and there are many things yet that we should be sorry to have to do without.”
“Never mind them:—let them go, I am sure we all want to be asleep more than anything else.”
“Sleep, indeed! Do you suppose I shall sleep with that boy hid among the trees? Not I, you may rely upon it. Those may that can: and I will watch.”
No one had yet mentioned Roger, though all felt that his presence was a terrible drawback to the comfort of their establishment on the hill, which might otherwise be, in fine weather, a tolerably pleasant one. It made Oliver indignant to think that a stout lad, whom they had wished to make welcome to all they had, in their common adversity, should be skulking in the wood as an enemy, instead of helping them in their labours, under circumstances in which all should be friends. This thought made Oliver so angry that he did not choose to speak of Roger. When Ailwin offered to seek him out, and do her best to tie his limbs again, and carry him away to any place the children chose, Oliver begged her to say no more about it; and observed that they had better forget Roger altogether, if they could, unless he should come to make peace.
There was one, however, who could not for a moment forget who was the cause of the late quarrel. Mildred was very unhappy at the thought of the mischief she had done by her shriek. Not all her hard toil of this evening could console her. When the cloth had been spread over the lower branches of a great ash, so as to shelter the party, in a careless way, for this one night (when there was no time to make a proper tent), and while Ailwin was heating something for supper, and Oliver dozing with George on one of the beds, Mildred stole away, to consider whether there was anything that she could do to cure Roger’s anger. It did her good, at least, to sit down and think about it. She sat down under a tree, above where the bee-shed had stood. The moon had just risen, and was very bright, being near the full. The clouds seemed to have come down out of the sky, to rest upon the earth; for white vapours, looking as soft as wreaths of snow, were hovering over the wide waste of waters. Some of these were gently floating or curling, while others brooded still, like large white birds over their hidden nests. It seemed to Mildred’s eye, however, as if a clear path had been cut through these mists, from the Red-hill to the moon on the horizon, and as if this path had been strewed with quivering moonbeams. She forgot, while gazing, that she was looking out upon the carr,—upon muddy waters which covered the ruins of many houses, and in which were hidden the bodies of drowned animals, and perhaps of some people. She looked upon the train of trembling light, and felt not only how beautiful it was, but that He whose hand kindled that mild heavenly lamp, and poured out its rays before his children’s eyes, would never forget and forsake them. While everything was made so beautiful as to seem ordered for the pleasure of men, their lives and common comforts could not be overlooked. So plain did this now appear to Mildred, that she felt less and less anxious and fearful; and, after a time, as if she was afraid of nothing at all, and could never be afraid again.
She determined to go and seek Roger,—not with any wish like Ailwin’s, that he could be bound by force, and carried away, to be alone and miserable,—but with a much happier hope and purpose. She did not think he would hurt her; but, if he did, she had rather that he should strike her than that Oliver and he should fight, day after day, as Ailwin had whispered to her they meant to do. She did not believe he could come to blows with Oliver again, after she had taken all the blame upon herself. So she set forth to do so.
She went on quickly enough while she was upon the slope, in the full moonlight, and with the blaze of Ailwin’s fire not far off on her right hand. But she felt the difference when she entered the shade of the trees. It was rather chilly there, and very silent. There was only a rustle in the grass and brambles about her feet, as if she disturbed some small animals hidden there. When she thought she was far enough away from her party not to be heard by them, she began to call softly, hoping that Roger might presently answer, so that she should not have to go much further into the darkness. But she heard nothing but her own voice, as she called, “Roger! Where are you, Roger? I want to speak to you.”
Further and further on she went; and still there was no reply. Though she knew every inch of her way, she tripped several times over the roots of the trees; and once she fell. She saw the stars in the spaces of the wood, as she looked up, and knew that she should soon come out upon the grass again. But when she did so, she found it almost as dark as in the wood, though the moon shone on the waters afar. She still went on calling Roger—now a little louder, till she stumbled over something which was not the root of a tree, for it was warm, and it growled.
“Bishop!” she exclaimed, in alarm; for next to Roger, she had always been afraid of Roger’s dog.
“Why don’t you call him Spy?” said Roger’s voice, from the ground just before her. “What business have you to call him by his wrong name?—how is he ever to learn his name if people come calling him by the wrong one? Get away—will you? I know what I’ll do if you come here, spoiling my dog.”
“I will go back directly when I have said one thing. It was all my fault that you and Oliver quarrelled this morning. I was frightened, and screamed when I ought not; and it is my fault that you are not now by our fire, getting your supper with us, in our tent. I am sure, I wish you were there.”
“Very fine,” said Roger. “He knows I thrashed him; and he does not want any more of it. But I’ll thrash him as long as I live; I tell you that.”
“Oliver does not know about my coming—he is asleep in the tent,” protested Mildred. “Nobody knows of my coming. I don’t believe Oliver would have let me come, if he had known it. Only go and look yourself; and you will see how he lies asleep on the grass. We know you can beat him in fighting, because you are so much bigger; and that is why I cannot bear that he should fight. It was all about me this time; and I know he will never give up; and I don’t know how long it will be before he is big enough to thrash you.”
“Long enough, I can tell you: so get away, and let me go to sleep; or I’ll thrash you too.”
“How can you talk so, Roger, and keep your anger so, when we are all so unhappy? I did not wonder much before, when Ailwin had to help Oliver... That was enough to make you or anybody be angry. But now, when I come to tell you how sorry I am, and that I know, if I ask Oliver, that he will be glad to forget everything, and that you should come to supper with us, instead of lying here in the dark, with nothing to eat, I do think you ought to forgive and forget; to forgive me, and forget all about thrashing Oliver.”
Roger made no answer.
“Good-bye, Roger,” said Mildred. “I am sorry that you choose to lie here, hungry and cold, instead of...”
“What business have you in my island?” interrupted Roger, fiercely. “How dared you settle upon my ground, to mock me with your fire and your supper? I’ll have my fire and my supper too.”
“I hope you will, if you will not come to ours. We were obliged to settle here—the house is all cracking, and falling to pieces. We were very sorry to come,—we were all so tired;—but we dared not stay in the house.”
Roger uttered an exclamation which showed that a new light had broken upon him, as to the causes of their removal.
“Poor Geordie is so ill, we were most sorry to have to move him. The time will come, Roger, though you don’t think so now, when you will be vexed that while we cannot tell whether father and mother are alive or dead, and whether George will live or die, you put the pain of quarrels upon us too.”
“Well, get you gone now!” said Roger, not immediately discovering that she was some paces on her way home again before he said that much.
Mildred heard Ailwin calling her to supper, as she drew near the tent. She did not say where she had been; but perhaps she was more on the watch, in consequence of what had passed. She soon saw that Roger was sauntering under the trees; and indeed what she had said, and what he now saw together, had altered Roger’s mind. He was hungry, and once more tired of being alone and sulky. He was thinking how comfortable the fire and the steaming kettle looked, and considering how he should make his approach, when Mildred jumped up, and came running to him.
“They don’t know that I came to find you,” said she. “Oliver will think it so kind of you to come and be friends! He will be so pleased! And there is plenty of supper for everybody.”
She ventured to put her hand in his, and lead him forwards into the light. She told Oliver that Roger was willing to forgive and forget; and Oliver said that he was quite willing too. Oliver set a stool for Roger, and offered him his own basin of broth. Ailwin held her tongue;—which was the most that could be expected of her.
Roger did not quite know what to say and do, when he had finished his supper, and fed Spy. He swung his legs, as he sat upon his stool, stared into the fire, and began to whistle. Roger’s shrillest whistle, as it had been sometimes heard in the carr, was anything but agreeable: but his low whistle, when he was not thinking about it, was soft and sweet. A gentle chuckle was soon heard from George, as he lay across Mildred’s knees.
“He likes it! He likes such a whistle as that!” exclaimed Mildred. Her eyes said to Roger, “Do go on!”
Roger went on whistling, better and better,—more and more softly, he drawing nearer, till he quite bent over the poor sick child, who, after many signs of pleasure, dropped off into a sleep,—a quiet, sound sleep.
“Thank you!” said Oliver, heartily. “Thank you, Roger!”
“You will do it again to-morrow, will not you, if he should be fretful?” said Mildred.
Roger nodded. Then he made the cloth drapery hang better over the pillows on which the child was laid,—so as to keep off the dew completely, he said. Then he nodded again, when Oliver gave him a blanket: and once more he nodded good night, before he rolled himself up in it under a neighbouring tree.