The Wooden Horse

by Hugh Walpole

"Remember, Bill! Why, of course! It was only for a moment. I had got the face all right but not the name. Yes, I have, as a matter of fact, come before, but there were things that have made it difficult at first, and of course there was a lot to do up there. But it's good to be down here! The other place is changed; I had been a bit disappointed, but here it is just the same—the same old lights and smells and sea, and the same old friends——"

"Yer think that?" Tregarvis looked at him. "Because we'd been fearing that all your travelling and sight-seeing might have harmed you—that you'd be thinking a bit like the folk up-along with their cars and gas and filth. Aye, it's a changed world up there, Mr. Harry; but down-along there's no difference. It's the sea keeps us steady."

And then they talked about the old adventurous days when Harry had been eighteen and the world had been a very wonderful place: the herring fishing, the bathing, the adventures on the moor, the tales at night by candlelight, the fun of it all. The room began to fill, and one after another men came forward and claimed friendship on the score of old days and perils shared. They received him quite simply—he was "Mr. Harry," but still one of themselves, taking his place with them, telling tales and hearing them in return.

There were nine or ten of them, and a wild company they made, crowding round the fire, with the flames leaping and flinging gigantic shadows on the walls. The landlord, a short, ruddy-faced man with white hair and a merry twinkle of the eye, was one of the best men that Harry had ever known.

He was a man whose modesty was only equalled by his charity; a man of great humour, wide knowledge of the most varied subjects, and above all a passionate faith in the country of his birth, Cornwall. He was, like most Cornishmen, superstitious, but his belief in Nature as a wise and beneficent mother, stern but never unjust, controlled his will and justified his actions. In those early days Harry had worshipped him with that whole-hearted adoration bestowed at times by young hero-worshippers on those that have travelled a little way along the path and have learnt their lesson wisely. Tony Newsome's influence had done more for Harry in those early years than he had realised, but he knew now what he owed to him as he sat by his side and recalled those other days. They had written once or twice, but Tony was no correspondent and hated to have a pen between his fingers.

"Drive a horse, pull a boat, shoot a gun, mind a net—but God help me if I write," he had said. Not that he objected to books; he had read a good deal and cared for it—but "God's air in the day and a merry fire at night leaves little room for pen and ink" was his justification.

He treated Harry now as his boy of twenty years ago, and laughed at him and scolded him as of old. He did not question him very closely on the incidents of those twenty years, and indeed, with them all, Harry noticed that there was very little curiosity as to those other countries. They welcomed him quietly, simply. They were glad that he was there again, sitting with them, taking his place naturally and easily—and again the twenty years seemed as nothing.

He sat with the dog at his feet. Newsome's hand was on his knee, and every once and again he gave a smothered chuckle. "I knew you'd come back, Mr. Harry," he said. "I just waited. Once the sea has got hold of you it doesn't loosen its grip so quick. I knew you'd come back."

They told wild stories as they had been telling them for many years at the same hour in the same place—strange things seen at sea, the lights and mists of the moor, survivals of smuggling days and fights on the beach under the moon; and it always was the sea. They might leave it for a moment perhaps, but they came back to it—the terror of it, the joy of it, the cruelty of it; the mistress that held them chained, that called their children and would not be denied, the god that they served.

They spoke of her softly with lowered voices and a strange reverence. They had learnt her moods and her dangers; they knew that she could caress them, and then, of a sudden, strike them down—but they loved her.