Wastralls: A Novel

by C. A. Dawson Scott

"Funeral being to-morrow," said Mrs. Tom, and her glance gave him a momentary, quickly banished qualm, "of course there's things to be arranged out-of-doors as well as in. You'll 'av to clear the yard to make room for all the carts; and 'tis a pity there hain't time to give front door a coat of paint. 'Tis looking terrible grimy."

"I know the paint's rubbed off but there 'edn't time to do't now," said Byron and, lest she should have other suggestions to make, hurried through his meal and went out. A glance round the yard showed that old George was at work preparing the place for the influx expected on the morrow, an influx which would be welcome to Byron when it came but the thought of which was momentarily disturbing. Sufficient unto the hour the emotion thereof. This was the day of anticipation, the day between the end of the old order and the beginning of the new. He would not have it broken in upon by claims from either side. Shaking off thoughts of yesterday and to-morrow, as a man shakes raindrops from his coat, Byron turned out of the yard. This time he went uphill. Dark Head lay before him to the south and from its crest he could survey the good lands that sloped from the ridge—the cornfields and the cider orchard, the meadows between which Trevorrick River wound its way and above which St. Cadic Mill lifted a grey tower. Byron's heart sang to the rhythm of his striding feet and his mind busied itself with schemes. If the hinds would not work the land as he wished he would advertise for strangers, experienced men. He would find them cottages, there were some on the farm, Hindoo Cottage, Hesselwood, Towan Veals. The men would keep each other in countenance. For all he was himself a 'foreigner,' he knew how the country people would look on these strangers. But in the end, when he was reaping his fat harvests, when one field was bringing in what would cover the rent of a farm, the folks about would change their note. He saw himself on the crest of the wave, a man who had fought his way to the top, who had deserved what he had won. And how much more than the material award would that winning be!

From where he stood on the landward slope of Dark Head, the slope that was washed by the morning and the midday sun, his glance fell naturally on the square outstanding block of Hember, the cheery ugly house, grey but with its many bright windows set in white cement, the house which had some far-off look of a hive and about which was always the murmur of life. A sunny garden, sunk between stone walls, between black wind-bent firs, ran down to the road and in it a girl was moving from patch to patch of earth. His heart leapt for, as her hair gave out no dazzle of light beneath the sun, he knew it must be Gray. He would have known without that indication, without any; his blood would have recognized her in the dark. His 'little umuntz!' The significant black gown gave her an unfamiliar look but, in his eager pleasure at the sight of her, he missed the difference, missed too another difference, that change that comes to fruit when, after hanging green upon the bough, the sun has warmed it to ripeness and a hand, a desirous hand, has gone out to it. From time to time Gray stooped over the garden beds. She was picking the flowers that yet lingered in sheltered nooks, the flowers of the dying year and those that were burgeoning to greet the new. A rosebud that would never open hung on the brier, a few snowdrops had pushed up from their bulbs. Gray was binding her treasure-trove with a long dark hair. Flowers from Hember garden should lie between Sabina's dead fingers and go down with her into the grave; and, as the girl moved from one lew corner to another, her tears fell on the old roots and on the blossoms in her hand. Leadville watching, wondered what she was about. His mind being wholly occupied with the future, he had forgotten that past for which Sabina stood.

Until the flowers were gathered to the last bud he stood looking on and in his eyes was a kindliness strange to them. Gray, moving hither and thither on her loving task, showed young and helpless. Once she was his, once he had overcome her faint reluctance—and, thinking of it, his face hardened with resolution. He would take any measure he esteemed necessary to gain his end. But, once he had overcome the reluctance which he must admit, he would be good to her. He would live for her—for her and Wastralls. She should have no wishes that he would not gratify. She should be rich, looked up to and beloved; and what more could a woman want? The thought of what he would do when Gray was his and Wastralls his, quickened his steps and he walked on, in a warm content, walked until he, even he, felt a weariness in his bones. A scarlet sun was setting in splendour over a milky sea as he made his way home. In the kitchen Mrs. Bate, now installed as housekeeper, had prepared a meal. He ate of it in happy silence, not missing Mrs. Tom, if anything pleased to have only a servant in the room. The place, with only the old women present, seemed more utterly his.

For a little he sat on by the hearth, his shirt open at the neck to the agreeable warmth of the fire, his eyes on the leaping blue and purple flames. It had been a 'borrowed' day, it had been full of happy anticipation, of planning no longer vague. To-morrow would be even better for, with its dawning, the countryside would gather to Sabina's funeral and all must recognize him as owner of the place. His heart sang a wild measure of triumph. He was no longer a man in the forties, moving with unimpaired strength yet with a growing stiffness, but one who had renewed his youth. That day had been the beginning. He was dreaming great dreams, passionate hot dreams, the dreams of a man with immense capacities for emotion. Mrs. Bate, shutting up for the night, broke in at long last on a vision of himself teaching a little son—his son and Gray's—to ride the black stallion; and, getting up, he stretched himself with a laugh, a laugh the old woman thought indecorous.

"You'm for overstairs? Well, so be I."

"Do I rake out the ashes, maister?" she asked timidly.

"Oh, leave'n be." He had no more use for petty economies than he had for petty spite. The day of small things was at an end.

To Mrs. Tom the revelation of the previous night had been as the rolling away of a mist from the face of a landscape already dimly familiar. Its horrific nature had banished sleep and darkened a natural grief but had not startled her by its unexpectedness. Subconsciously she had expected something of the sort to happen. She did not dwell on Sabina's stubborn withholding of the land, on her failure to understand the more emotional more desperate nature of her husband. She accepted it as a fact. Sabina had been like a person riding out to sea, who had believed fondly that she was only fording a river and, with patience and management, must presently find her horse's hoofs on the shingle of the opposite bank. Tragedy had been the outcome and this Mrs. Tom, with her sure instinct for life, had known would come to pass. Not even the form it had taken had seemed other than natural. A man's weapons are those to his hand, the things he has handled from his youth up, not something strange and foreign. Byron had poisoned his wife, as he had poisoned old Shep and many another used-up creature. With the means to hand the only wonder was that he had not done it before. He had been married twenty years and every day must to him have been more unhappy and more disappointing than the last. Mrs. Tom was aware of the provocation he had received but accepted it as a cause, not an excuse. Because she saw it with the imagination of the country-woman who, having never been to a theatre is yet able to stage for her own pleasure the dramas being enacted within her reach, saw it with a deadly clarity from faint beginnings to the culmination, her moral sense was not the less outraged. Her attitude towards animals used for food had not affected her belief that human life was sacred; and Byron's crime, though easy to understand, was to her mind unpardonable.

But Mrs. Tom's attitude was not one of mere condemnation. That warm and pitiful heart had agonized through the dark hours over her friend's fate, over the snatching away of that fag-end which was all Sabina had of life. Sabina who had been so trusting, so simple! Well, she had not known. She was saved that. She had carried her optimism with her, her fond belief that all would come right, that discomforts were only of the moment and that peace must follow, peace and affection. Good, she would have said, must prevail. Mrs. Tom, reviewing that sunny faith, that placid acceptance of weather conditions, both in life and with regard to the land, that wholesome jovial point of view, felt her gorge rise against the man who had lived with Sabina without loving her who, for his own ends, had done her to death.