HOW I CAME INTO RICH TREASURE
"Carette, ma mie," I asked, as we sat in the heather on Longue Pointe, the evening after I got home, "when shall we marry?"
"When you will, Phil. I am ready."
"As soon as may be then," and I drew her close into my arms, the richest treasure any man might have, and thanked God for his mercies.
It was a glorious evening, with a moon like a silver sickle floating over Guernsey. The sky was of a rare depth and purity, which changed from palest blue to faintest green, and away to the north-west, above the outer isles, the sun was sinking behind a bank of plum-coloured clouds which faded away in long thin bands along the water line. The clouds were rimmed with golden fire, and wherever an opening was, the golden glory streamed through and lit the darkening waters between, and set our bold Sercq headlands all aflame. And up above, the little wind-drawn clouds were rosy red, and right back into the east the sky was flushed with colour. It was a very low tide, too, and every rock was bared, so that from the white spit of Herm it seemed as though a long dark line of ships sped northwards towards the Casquets. Brecqhou lay dark before us, and the Gouliot Pass was black with its coiling tide. A flake of light glimmered through the cave behind, and now and again came the boom of a wave under some low ledge below. Up above us the sky was full of larks, and their sweet sharp notes came down to us like peals of little silver bells. And down in Havre Gosselin the gulls were wheeling noisily as they settled themselves for the night.
I have always thought that view one of the most beautiful in the world, but all its glories were as nothing to the greater glory in our two hearts. We had had our cloudy days and our times of storm and strife; and now they were past, our clouds were turned into golden glories and our hearts were glad. We had been parted. We had looked death in the face. And now we were together and we would part no more.
We sat there in the heather till all the glories faded save our own,—till Guernsey and Herm and Jethou sank into the night—till Brecqhou was only a shadow, and the Gouliot stream only a sound; and then we went down the scented lanes close-linked, as were our hearts.
Jean Le Marchant was sitting in the kitchen with Aunt Jeanne. He was recovered of his wound, and Martin also, but for the elder, at all events, active life was over, and he would have to be content with the land, and his memories.
We came in arm in arm.
"Do you see any objection to our marrying at once, M. Le Marchant?" I asked. "We are of one mind in the matter."
"B'en!" said Aunt Jeanne, with a face like a globe of light. "We will have it on Wednesday. You can go over to the Dean for a license, mon gars, and I'll be all ready—Wednesday—you understand."
And Jean Le Marchant smiled and said, "At Beaumanoir Mistress Falla rules the roost. Everyone does as she says."
"I should think so," said Aunt Jeanne, with an emphatic nod. "If they don't I know the reason why. So we'll say Wednesday. Have you had the news, Phil?"
"What news then, Aunt Jeanne?"
"Ah then, you've not heard. George Hamon was in from Guernsey. He says you are to get the reward offered by the London Merchants for the upsetting of Monsieur Torode."
"I?"
"And who better, mon gars? If it hadn't been for you, he'd be there yet gobbling their ships at his will. Now don't you be a fool, my dear. Take what the good God sends you with a good grace. You'll find a use for it when the babies begin coming, I warrant you. Little pigs don't fatten on water. Ma fé, non!"—at which bit of Aunt Jeanne, Carette only laughed, with a fine colour in her face.
And to make an end of that, in due time the five thousand pounds was indeed sent to me, and I put it in the bank in Guernsey for the use of Carette "and the children" as Aunt Jeanne said—and of the interest I reserved a portion for the provision of such small comforts as were possible to the lonely one on the Ecréhous.
And so, by no merit of my own, I became a man of substance and not dependent on Aunt Jeanne's bounty, which I think she would have preferred.
We were married in the little church alongside the Seigneurie at the head of the valley, by M. Pierre Paul Secretan, and Aunt Jeanne's enjoyment therein and in the feast that followed was, I am certain, greater than any she had felt when she was married herself.
We continued to live with her at Beaumanoir, and she gave me of her wisdom in all matters relating to the land and its treatment, as she did also to Carette in household matters and the proper bringing up of a family, about which latter subject she knew far more than any mother that ever was born.
In me she found an apt pupil, and so came to leave matters more and more in my hands, with sharp criticism of all mistakes and ample advice for setting things right.
Carette drank in all her wisdom—until the babies came, and then she took her own way with them, and, judging by results, it was an excellent way.
George Hamon still brought me word from time to time of the exile on the Ecréhous.
We were sitting over the fire, one cold night in the spring, Carette and I, Aunt Jeanne having gone to bed to get warm, when a knock came on the door, and when I opened it George Hamon came in and stood before the hearth. He looked pinched and cold, and yet aglow with some inner warmth, and his first word told why.
"He is dead, Phil. I found him lying in his bed as if asleep, but he was dead."
I nodded soberly. He was better dead, but I was glad he had not died by my hand.
"I have got him here—" said Uncle George.
"Here?" and I jumped up quickly.
"In my boat down in Port du Moulin."
"But why?"
"Because—" and he stood looking at us, and Carette nodded understandingly. And at that he went on quickly—"Because I have waited over twenty years, Phil, and I am going to wait no longer," and I understood.
"You are going to tell her?" I asked.
"Yes—now. I must. But not all, I think. We will see. But not all if we can help it. It will open the old wound, but, please God, I will heal it and she shall be happy yet."
"Yes," I said. "I think you can heal the wound, Uncle George. What do you want me to do?"
"Come with me, if you will;" and I kissed my wife and followed him out.
"You understand," he said, as we went across the fields to Belfontaine. "He was among Torode's men. I recognised him, and we smuggled him off so that he should not be hanged;" and on that understanding we knocked on the door and went in.
My grandfather was reading in one of his big books, my mother was at her knitting, and Krok was busy over a fishing-net.
"Ah, you two!" said my mother. "What mischief are you plotting now? It is like old times to see you with your heads together. But, ma fé, you seem to have changed places. What trouble have you been getting into, George?"
"Aw then, Rachel!—It is out of trouble I am getting. I bring you strange news;" and she sat looking up at him with deep wonder in her eyes.
Perhaps she saw behind his face into his thoughts—into his heart. For, as she gazed, a startled look came over her, and her face flushed and made her young again.
"What is it?"
"Paul Martel died yesterday."
"Paul?" and her hand went quickly to her heart, as though to still a sudden stab of pain, and for the moment her face whitened and then dyed red again.
Krok had eyed Uncle George keenly from the moment he entered. Now he did a strange thing. He got up quietly and took down a lantern and went to the fire to light it. Perhaps it had been an understood thing between them. I do not know.
My mother looked at Krok and then at Uncle George, and my grandfather stood up.
"Yes," said Uncle George with a grave nod. "I have got him here—in my boat in Port du Moulin, for I knew you could not credit it unless you saw him yourself."
"But how—?" she faltered.
"He was among Torode's crew—he was wounded. I recognised him, and we got him away lest—well, you understand? He has been living on the Ecréhous, and he died there yesterday. Will you see him?" and he looked at her very earnestly, and she knew all that his look meant.
Her silence seemed long, while Uncle George looked at her entreatingly, and she looked at the floor, and seemed lost in thought.
"Yes," she said at last, and Went towards the door.
"Put on a shawl. The night is cold," said Uncle George, and it seemed to me that there was something of a new and gentle right in his tone, something of proprietorship in his manner.
And so we went along the footpaths past La Moinerie and down the zigzag into Port du Moulin, the only bay along that coast into which my mother could possibly have gone by night, and that was why Uncle George had brought him there.
I do not think a word was spoken all the way. Krok held the lantern for my mother's feet. Uncle George walked close behind her, and at times before her, in the descent, and helped her down, and so we came at last to the shingle and crunched over it to the boat.
Krok put down his lantern on a rock, and he and Uncle George got in and pulled out to the lugger which was anchored about twenty yards out.
They came back presently, and lifted out the body and laid it gently on the stones, and Krok brought his lantern. My mother's face was very white and pinched as she knelt down beside it, and at first sight she started and looked quickly up at Uncle George as though in doubt or denial. And presently Uncle George bent down and with his hand lifted the moustache back from the dead man's mouth, and my mother gazed into the dark face and said quietly, "It is he," then she seized my grandfather's arm suddenly and turned away. They were stumbling over the rough stones when Krok ran after them with the lantern and came back in the dark.
We laid the body in the boat again, and Krok lifted in some great round stones, and we rowed out to the black loom of the lugger. Uncle George lit his own lantern, and by its dim light Krok set to work preparing my father's body for its last journey.
Whether he was simply anxious to get done with the business, or whether he felt a gloomy satisfaction in performing these last rites for a man whom he had always hated for his treatment of my mother, I do not know. But he certainly went about it with a grim earnestness which was not very far removed from enjoyment.
He stripped the mizzen-mast of its sail, and Uncle George said no word against it. If Krok had required the lugger itself as a coffin he would not have said him nay.
He wrapped the body carefully in the sail, with great smooth stones from the beach, and with some rope and his knife he sewed it all tightly together, and pulled each knot home with a jerk that was meant to be final, and his hairy old face was crumpled into a frown as he worked.
We ran swiftly up Great Russel under the strong west wind, until, by the longer swing of the seas, we knew we were free of the rocks and islands north of Herm.
Then Uncle George turned her nose to the wind, and under the slatting sail, with bared heads, we committed to the seas the body of him who had wrought such mischief upon them and in some of our lives.
"Dieu merci!" said Uncle George, as the long white figure slipped from our hands and plunged down through the black waters. Then he clapped on his cap and turned the helm, and the lugger went bounding back quicker than she had come, for she and we were lightened of our loads.
We ran back round Brecqhou into Havre Gosselin, and climbed the ladders and went to our homes.
Uncle George and my mother were married just a month after our little Phil was born, and I learned again, from the look on my mother's face, that a woman's age is counted not by years but by that which the years have brought her.
They have been very happy. There is only one happier household on the Island, and that is ours at Beaumanoir, for it is full of the sound of children's voices, and the patter of little feet.