CHAPTER VI
THE MARTYR
On a Saturday afternoon full of sunshine was presented the rich but simple picture of Ashprington village under conditions of autumn. The hamlet lay on a slope under a hillcrest and through it fell steep paths by meadow and orchard past the cottages to Bow Bridge far distant in the vale.
Crowning Ashprington rose the church-tower of uniform grey, battlemented, with a great poplar standing on its right, and a yew tree throwing shadow upon the western porch. Then fell the land abruptly, and the whole foreground was filled with an apple orchard, that rippled to the churchyard walls and spread a rich cloth of scarlet and gold around them.
At this hour the tree-foundered village seemed oppressed and smothered with falling leaves. Its over-abundant timber mastered the place and flung down foliage in such immense masses that the roads and alleys, drinking fountain, little gardens subtending the street and the roofs of the cottages were all choked with them.
But it was a dry and joyous hour, the latter rains had yet to fall and submerge Ashprington in mud and decay. Virginian creeper flamed on the house fronts and dahlias, michaelmas daisies and chrysanthemums still flaunted in the gardens.
Through this cheerful scene came Miss Finch and Medora Dingle with their baskets to pick blackberries. Medora’s home was a stone’s throw from the church and they now crossed the churchyard to enter certain fields beyond it.
The well-kept sward spread level with the arms of the apple trees over the wall, for the ground fell sharply from the graveyard to the orchard below; and now, at the limits of the burial place, cider apples fell on the graves and spattered their mounds and flat surfaces with gold.
Daisy stopped at a tomb and removed a windfall of fruit from the broken marble chips that covered it.
“That’s old Mr. Kellock,” she said. “He wouldn’t like them there, would he—such a thrifty old man as he was.”
“And such a tidy one,” added Medora.