For Faith and Freedom

by Walter Besant

THE CAMP IN THE COMB.

Our camping-place, when I awoke in the morning, I found to be near the head of a most beautiful comb or valley among the Black Down Hills. I knew it not at the time, but it was not far from that old Roman stronghold which we had passed on our way to Taunton, called Castle Ratch. The hills on the Somerset side are of a gentle or gradual slope, and the valley was not deep, but yet, where we lay, so grown over with trees as to afford a complete shelter and hiding-place, while at our feet the brook took its rise in a green quagmire and began to make its way downwards among ferns and bushes, and through a wild, uncultivated country, beyond which the farms and fields began. The birds were singing, the sun was already high, and the air was warm, though there was a fresh breeze blowing. The warmth and sweetness filled my soul when I awoke, and I sat up with joy, until suddenly I remembered why we were here, and who were here with me. Then my heart sank like a lump of lead in water. I looked around. My father lay just as he had been lying all the day before, motionless, white of cheek, and as one dead, save for the slight motion of his chest and the twitching of his nostril. As I looked at him in the clear morning light, it was borne in upon me very strongly that he was indeed dead, inasmuch as his soul seemed to have fled. He saw nothing, he felt nothing. If the flies crawled over his eyelids he made no sign of disturbance; yet he breathed, and from time to time he murmured—but as one that dreameth. Beside him lay my mother sleeping, worn out by the fatigues of the night. Barnaby had spread his coat to cover her so that she should not take cold, and he had piled a little heap of dead leaves to make her a pillow. He was lying at her feet, head on arm, sleeping heavily. What should be done, I wondered, when next he woke?

First I went down the comb a little way till the stream was deep enough, and there I bathed my feet, which were swollen and bruised by the long walk up the comb. Though it was in the midst of so much misery there was a pleasure of dabbling my feet in the cool water and afterwards of walking about barefoot in the grass. I disturbed an adder which was sleeping on a flat stone in the sun, and it lifted its venomous head and hissed, but did not spring upon me. Then I washed my face and hands and made my hair as smooth as without a comb it was possible. When I had done this I remembered that perhaps my father might be thirsty or at least able to drink, though he seemed no more to feel hunger or thirst. So I filled the tin pannikin—it was Barnaby's—with water and tried to pour a little into his mouth. He seemed to swallow it, and I gave him a little more until he would swallow no more. Observe that he took no other nourishment than a little water, wine, or milk, or a few drops of broth until the end. So I covered his face with a handkerchief to keep off the flies, and left him. Then I looked into the basket. All that there was in it would not be more than enough for Barnaby's breakfast, unless his appetite should fail him by reason of fear; though, in truth, he had no fear being captured, or of anything else. There was in it a piece of bacon, a large loaf of bread, a lump of cheese, a bottle of cider; nothing more. When these provisions were gone, what next? Could we venture into the nearest village and buy food, or to the first farm-house? Then we might fall straight into the jaws of the enemy, who were probably running over the whole country in search of the fugitives. Could we buy without money? Could we beg without arousing suspicions? If the people were well-inclined to the Protestant cause we might trust them. But how could we tell that? So in my mind I turned over everything except the one thing which might have proved our salvation, and that you shall hear directly. Also, which was a very strange thing, I quite forgot that I had upon me, tied by a string round my waist and well concealed, Barnaby's bag of gold—two hundred and fifty pieces. Thus there was money enough and to spare. I discovered, next, that our pony had run away in the night. The cart was there, but no pony to drag it. Well, it was not much; but it seemed an additional burden to bear. I ventured a little way up the valley, following a sheep-track which mounted higher and higher. I saw no sign anywhere of man's presence; that, I take it, is marked in woods by circles of burnt cinders, by trees felled, by bundles of broom or fern tied up, or by shepherds' huts. Here there was nothing at all; you would have said that the place had never been visited by man. Presently I came to a place where the woods ceased, the last of the trees being much stunted and blown over from the west; and then the top of the hill began, not a sharp pico or point, but a great open plain, flat, or swelling out here and there with many of the little hillocks which people say are ancient tombs. And no trees at all, but only bare turf, so that one could see a great way off. But there was no sign of man anywhere: no smoke in the comb at my feet; no shepherd on the hill. At this juncture of our fortunes any stranger might be an enemy; therefore I returned, but so far well pleased.

Barnaby was now awake, and was inspecting the basket of provisions.

'Sister,' he said, 'we must go upon half rations for breakfast; but I hope, unless my skill fails, to bring you something better for supper. The bread you shall have, and mother. The bacon may keep till to-morrow. The cider you had better keep against such times as you feel worn out and want a cordial, though a glass of Nantz were better, if Nantz grew in the woods.' He looked around as if to see whether a miracle would not provide him with a flask of strong drink, but, seeing none, shook his head.

'As for me,' he went on, 'I am a sailor, and I understand how to forage. Therefore, yesterday, foreseeing that the provisions might give out, I dropped the shank of the ham into my pocket. Now you shall see.'

He produced this delicate morsel, and, sitting down, began to gnaw and to bite into the bone with his strong teeth, exactly like a dog. This he continued, with every sign of satisfaction, for a quarter of an hour or so, when he desisted, and replaced the bone in his pocket.

'We throw away the bones,' he said. 'The dogs gnaw them and devour them. Think you that it is for their amusement? Not so; but for the juices and the nourishment that are in and around the bone; for the marrow and for the meat that still will stick in odd corners.' He went down to the stream with the pannikin and drank a cup or two of water to finish what they called a horse's meal—namely, the food first and the water afterwards.

'And now,' he added, 'I have breakfasted. It is true that I am still hungry, but I have eaten enough to carry me on for a while. Many a poor lad cast away on a desert shore would find a shank of a ham a meal fit for a king; aye, and a meal or two after that. I shall make a dinner presently off this bone; and I shall still keep it against a time when there may be no provision left.'