Cradock Nowell: A Tale of the New Forest. Volume 1 of 3

“No; but I mean to tell him, the moment I have got to the end of it”.

“Good child, and most dutiful! When you have swallowed the poison, youʼll tell us”.

“Poison indeed, Aunt Eudoxia! How dare you talk to me like that? Do you dare to suppose that I would read a thing that was unfit for me”?

“No, I donʼt think you would, knowingly. But you are not the proper judge. Why did you not ask your father or me, before you began this book”?

“Because I thought you wouldnʼt let me read it”.

“Well, that does beat everything. Candid impudence, I call that, perfectly candid insolence”! Aunt Doxyʼs throat began to swell; there was weak gorge in the family. Meanwhile, Miss Amy, who all the time had been jerking her shoulders and standing upright, in a manner peculiarly her own – Amy felt that her last words required some explanation. She had her fatherʼs strong sense of justice, though often pulled crooked by womanhood.

“You know well enough what I mean, aunt, though you love to misrepresent me so. I mean that you would not let me read it, not because it was wrong (which it isnʼt), but for fear of making me nervous. And upon that subject, at least, I think I have a right to judge for myself”.

“Oh, I dare say; you, indeed! And pray who lent you that book? Unless, indeed, in your self–assertion, you went to a railway and bought it”.

“That is just the sort of thing I would rather die than tell, after all the fuss you have made about it”.

“Thank you; I quite perceive. A young gentleman – not to be betrayed —scamp, whoever he is”. It was Clayton Nowell who had lent the book.

“Is he indeed? I wish you were only half as upright and honourable”.

Hereupon Miss Eudoxia, who had dragged her niece down to the book–room, with dialogue all down the stairs, muttered something about her will, that she had a little to leave, though not much, but honestly her own – God knew – and down she went upon the chair, with both hands to her side. At the sequel, as we have seen, Sir Cradock Nowell assisted, and took little for his pains.

After this, of course, there was a great reconciliation. For they loved each other thoroughly; and each was sure to be wild with herself for having been harsh to the other. They agreed that their eyes were much too red now to go and see the nascent fireworks.

“A gentlemanʼs party to–night; my own sweet love, how glad I am! I ought to know better, Amy dearest; and they have never sent the goulard. I ought to know, my own lovey pet, that we can trust you in everything”.

“No, aunty dear, you oughtnʼt. I am as obstinate as a pig sometimes; and I wish you would box my ears, aunt. I hope my hair wonʼt be right for a month, dearest aunt, where you pulled it; and as for the book, I have thrown it into the kitchen–fire long ago, though I do wish, darling aunt, you could have read about the descent into the Mäelstrom. I declare my head goes round ever since! What amazing command of language! And he knows a great deal about cooking”.

James Pottles, groom and gardener, who even aspired to the hand, or at any rate, to the lips, of the plump and gaudy Jemima, was not at all the sort of fellow you would appreciate at the first interview. His wits were slow and mild, and had never yet been hurried, for his parents were unambitious. It took him a long time to consider, and a long time again to express himself, which he did with a roll of his tongue. None the less for that, Jem Pottles was quoted all over the village as a sayer of good things. No conclusion was thought quite safe, at least by the orthodox women, until it had been asked with a knowing look – “And what do Jem Pottles say of it”? Feeling thus his responsibility, and the gravity of his opinion, Jem grew slower than ever, and had lately contracted a habit of shutting one eye as he cogitated. As cause and effect always act and react, this added enormously to his repute, until Mark Stote the gamekeeper, and Reuben Cuff the constable, ached and itched with jealousy of that “cock–eyed, cock–headed boy”.

Sir Cradock found Jem quite at his leisure, sweeping up some of the leaves in the shrubbery, and pleasantly cracking the filberts which he discovered among them. These he peeled very carefully, and put them in the pocket of his stable waistcoat, ready for Jemima by–and–by. He swished away very hard with the broom the moment he saw the old gentleman, and touched his hat in a way that showed he could scarcely spare time to do it.

“What way, my lad, do you think it likely your master will come home to–day”?

This was just the sort of question upon which Jem might commit himself, and lose a deal of prestige; so he pretended not to hear it, and brushed the very ground up. These tactics, however, availed him not, for Sir Cradock repeated his inquiry in a tone of irritation. Jem leaned his chin on the broom–handle, and closed one eye deliberately.

“Well, he maight perhaps come the haigher road, and again a maight come the lower wai, and Iʼve a knowed him crass the chase, sir, same as might be fram alongside of Meester Garnetʼs house. There never be no telling the wai, any more than the time of un. But itʼs never no odds to me”.

“And which way do you think the most likely now”?

“Not to say ‘now’, but bumbai laike. If so be a cooms arly, a maight come long of the haigher road as goes to the ‘Jolly Foresters;’ and if a comʼth middlin’ arly, you maight rackon may be on the town wai; but if he cometh unoosial late, and a heap of folks be sickenin’ or hisself hath pulled a book out, a maight goo round by Westacot, and come home by Squire Garnetʼs wai”. Rich in alternatives, Jem Pottles opened the closed eye, and shut the open one.

“What a fool the fellow is”! said Sir Cradock to himself; “Iʼll try the first way, at any rate. For if John is so late, I could not stop for him, with all those people coming. How I wish we were free from strangers to–night, with all these events in the family! But perhaps, if we manage it well, it will carry it off all the better”.

Sir Cradock Nowell was in high spirits as he started leisurely for a saunter along the higher road. This was the road which ran eastward, both from the Hall and the Rectory, into the depth of the forest. In all England there is no lovelier lane, if there be one to compare with it. Many of the forest roads are in fault, because they are too open. You see too far, you see too much, and you are not truly embowered. In a forest we do not want long views, except to rejoice in the amplitude. And a few of those, just here and there, enlarge the great enjoyment. What we want, as the main thing of all, as the staple feeling, is the deep, mysterious, wondering sense of being swallowed up, and knowing it: swallowed up, not as we are in catacombs, or wine–vaults, or any railway tunnel; but in our own motherʼs love, with God around us everywhere. To many of us, perhaps to most, so placed at fall of evening, there is a certain awe, a dread which overshades enjoyment. If so, it springs in part at least from our unnatural nature; that is to say, the education which teaches us so very little of the things around us.

How the arches spring overhead, and the brown leaves flutter among them! In and out, and through and through, across and across, with delicacy, veining the very shadows. For miles we may wander beneath them, and see no two alike. How, for fear of wearying us, after infinite twists and turns – but none of them contortions – after playing across the heavens, and sweeping away the sunshine, now in this evening light they hover, and rustle like the skirts of death. Is there one of them with its lichen–mantle copied from its neighbourʼs? Is there one that has borrowed a line, a character, even a cast of complexion from its own brother rubbing against it? Their arms bend over us as we walk, we are in their odour and influence, we know that, like the Magi of old, they adore only God and His sun; and, when we come out from under them, we never ask why we are sad.

CHAPTER XX

There is a long, mysterious thrill, a murmur rather felt than heard, a shudder of profundity, which traverses the woodland hollows at the sunʼs departure. In autumn most especially, when the glory of trees is saddening, and winter storms are in prospect, this dark disquietude moves the wood, this horror at the nightfall, and doubt of the coming hours. Touched as with a subtle stream, the pointlets of the oak–leaves rise, the crimped fans of the beech are fluttered, and lift their glossy ovals, the pendulous chains of the sycamore swing; while the poplar flickers its silver skirts, the tippets and ruffs of the ivy are ruffling, and even the three–lobed bramble–leaf cannot repress a shiver.

Touched with a stream at least as subtle, we, who are wandering among the dark giants, shiver and shrink, we know not why; and our hearts beat faster, to feel how they beat. The cause is the same both for tree and for man. Earthly nature has not learned to count upon immortality. Therefore all her works, unaided, loathe to be undone.

Whether it were this, or his craving for his dinner, that made Sir Cradock Nowell feel chilled, as he waited under the shuddering trees for his friend John Rosedew – far be it from me to say, because it may have been both, sir. And the other cause to which he always ascribed it – after the event – to wit, a divine afflatus of diabolical presentiment, is one we have no faith in, until we own to nightmare. Anyhow, there he was, for upwards of an hour; and no John Rosedew came up the hill, which Sir Cradock did not feel it at all his duty to descend, on the very safe presentiment of the distress revocare gradum.

Meanwhile John Rosedew was speeding merrily, according to his ideas of speed (which were relative to the last degree), along a narrow bridle–way, some two miles to the westward. It would be a serious insult – so the parson argued – to the understanding of any man who understood a horse, and now John Rosedew had owned Coræbus very nearly nine months, and though he had never owned a horse before, surely by this time he could set papers in the barbara celarent of the most recondite horse–logic – or was it dialectics? – an insult it would be to that Hippicus who felt himself fit now to go to a fair and discuss many points with the jockeys, if anybody suggested to him that Coræbus ought to trot.

“Trot, sir”! cried John Rosedew, to an imaginary Hippodamas, “hasnʼt he been trotting for nearly an hour to–day, sir? Quite an equus tolutarius. And upon my word, I only hope he is not so sore as I am”. Then he threw the reins over the ponyʼs neck, and let him crop some cytisus.

“Coræbus, have no fear, my horse, you shall not be overworked. Or if Epirus or Mycenæ be thy home and birthplace —incertus ibidem sudor– thrice I have wiped it off, and no oaten particles in it; urit avenœ, so I suppose oats must dry the skin. ‘Ad terramque fluit devexo pondere cervix’, a line not to be rendered in English, even by my Cradock. How fine that whole description, but made up from alien sources! Oh how Lucretius would have done it! Most sad that he was not a Christian”.

A believer was what John Rosedew meant. But by this time he was beginning to look upon all his classical friends as in some sort Christians, if they only believed in their own gods. Wherein, I fear, he was far astray from the text of one of the Articles.

Cob Coræbus by this time knew his master thoroughly; and exercising his knowledge cleverly, made his shoes last longer. If the weather felt muggy and “trying” – from an equine view of probation – if the road was rough and against the grain, even if the forest–fly came abroad upon business, Coræbus used (in sporting parlance) to “shut up” immediately. This he did, not in a defiant tone, not in a mode to provoke antagonism; he was far too clever a horse for that; but with every appearance of a sad conviction that his master had no regard for him. At this earnest appeal to his feelings, John Rosedew would dismount in haste, and reflect with admiration upon the weeping steeds of Achilles, or the mourning horse of Mezentius, while he condemned with acrimony the moral conveyed by a song he had heard concerning the “donkey wot wouldnʼt go”. Then he would loosen the girths, and, remonstrating with Coræbus for his want of self–regard, carefully wipe with his yellow silk pocket–handkerchief first all the accessible parts of the cob that looked at all uncomfortable, and then his own capacious forehead. This being done, he would search around for a juicy mouthful of grass, or dive for an apple or slice of carrot – Coræbus at the same time diving nasally – into the depths of his black coat pocket, where he usually discovered his lunch, which he had altogether forgotten. While the horse was discussing this little refreshment, John would put his head on one side, and look at him very knowingly, revolving in his mind a question which very often presented itself, whether Coræbus were descended from Corytha or Hirpinus.

However this may have been – and from his “staying qualities” one would have thought him rather a chip from the old block of Troy – he was the first horse good John Rosedew had ever called his own; and he loved and admired him none the less for certain calumnies spread by the envious about seedy–toes, splints, and spavins. Of these crimes, whatever they might be, the parson found no mention in Xenophon, Pliny, or Virgil, and he was more than half inclined to believe them clumsy modern figments. As for the incontestable fact that Coræbus began to whistle when irrationally stimulated beyond his six miles an hour, why, that John Rosedew looked upon as a classical accomplishment, and quoted a line from Theocritus. Very swift horses were gifted with this peculiar power, for the safety of those who would otherwise be the victims of their velocity, even as the express train always whistled past Brockenhurst station.

After contemplating the animal till admiration was exhausted, and wondering why some horses have hairy, while others have smooth ankles, he would refresh himself with a reverie about the Numidian cavalry; then declaring that Jem Pottles was “impolitiæ notandus”, he would pass his arm through the bridle, and calling to mind the Pæon young lady who unduly astonished Darius, pull an old book from some inner pocket, and stroll on, with Coræbus sniffing now and then at his hat–brim.

To any one who bears in mind what a punctual body Time is, this account of the rectorʼs doings will make it not incredible that he was often late for dinner. But he never lost reckoning altogether in his circumnavigation, because his leisure did not begin till he had passed the “Jolly Foresters”; for there he must be by a certain hour, or Coræbus would feel aggrieved, and so would Mrs. Cripps, who always looked for him at or about 1.30 P.M. For some mighty fine company was to be had by a horse who could behave himself, in the stable of the “Jolly Foresters”, about middle–day on a Wednesday. Several high–stepping buggy–mares, one or two satirical Broughamites, even some nags who gave a decided tone to the neighbourhood, silver–hamed Clevelands, and champ–the–bit Clydesdales: even these were not too proud – that they left for vulgarian horses – to snort and blow hard at the “Forestersʼ” oats, and then eat them up like winking. To this select circle our own Coræbus had been admitted already, and his conversational powers admired, when he had produced an affidavit that his master was in no way connected with trade.

Coræbus now bade fair to be spoiled by all this grand society. Every Wednesday he came home less natural, more coxcombical. He turned up his nose at many good horses, whom he had once respected, fellows who wandered about in the forest, and hung down their chins when the rain came! And then he became so affected and false, with an interesting languor, when Amy jumped out to caress him! Verily, friend Coræbus, thou shalt pay out for this! What call, pray, hast thou to become a humbug, from seeing how men do flourish?

John Rosedew awoke quite suddenly to the laws of time and season, as the hazel branches came over his head, and he could see to read no longer. The grey wood closed about him, to the right hand and to the left; the thick shoots of the alder, the dappled ash, and the osier, hustled among the taller trees whose tops had seen the sunset; tufts of grass, and blackberry–tangles, hipped dog–roses leaning over them, stubby clumps of buckthorn, brake–fern waving six feet high where the ground held moisture – who, but an absent man, would have wandered at dusk into such a labyrinth?

“ʼActum est’ with my dinner”, exclaimed the parson aloud, when he awoke to the situation; “and what, perhaps, is more important to thee, at least, Coræbus, thine also is ‘pessum datum’. And there is no room to turn the horse round without scratching his eyes and his tail so. Nevertheless, this is a path, or at one time must have been so; ‘semita, callis, tramesʼ – that last word is the one for it, if it be derived from ‘traho’ (which, however, I do not believe) – for, lo! there has been a log of wood dragged here even during a post–diluvial period: we will follow this track to the uttermost; what says the cheerful philosopher: – ‘παντοίην βιότοιο τάμοις ὁδόν’. Surely a gun, nay, two, or, more accurately, two explosions; now for some one to show us the way. Coræbus, be of good cheer, there is supper yet in thy φάτνῃ, not ἐϋξέστῳ; advance then thy best foot. Why not? – seest thou an ἔιδωλον? Come on, I say, mine horse – Great God! – ” And he was silent.

Tired as he was, Coræbus had leaped back from the leading rein, then cast up his head and snorted, and with a glare of terror stood trembling. What John Rosedew saw at that moment was stamped on his heart for ever. Across his narrow homeward path, clear in the grey light, and seeming to creep, was the corpse of Clayton Nowell, laid upon its left side, with one hand to the heart, the wan face stark and spread on the ground, the body stretched by the final throe. The pale light wandered over it, and showed it only a shadow. John Rosedewʼs nerves were stout and strong, as of a man who has injured none; he had buried hundreds of fellow–men, after seeing them die; but, for the moment, he was struck with a mortal horror. Back he fell, and drove back his horse; he could not look at the dead manʼs eyes fixed intently upon him. One minute he stood shivering, and the ash–leaves shivered over him. He was conscious somehow of another presence which he could not perceive. Then he ran up, like a son of God, to what God had left of his brother. The glaze (as of ground glass) in the eyes, the smile that has swooned for ever, the scarlet of the lips turned out with the chalky rim of death, the bulge of the broad breast, never again to rise or fall in breathing – is there one of these changes we do not know, having seen them in our own dearest ones?

But a worse sight than of any dead man – dead, and gone home to his Father – met John Rosedewʼs quailing eyes, as he turned towards the opening. It was the sight of Cradock Nowell, clutching his gun with one hand, and clinging hard with the other, while he hung from the bank (which he had been leaping) as a winding–sheet hangs from a candle. The impulse of his leap had failed him, smitten back by horror; it was not in him to go back, nor to come one foot forward. The parson called him by his name, but he could not answer; only a shiver and a moan showed that he knew his baptism. The living was more startled, and more startling, than the dead.

CHAPTER XXI

There was a little dog that crept and moaned by Claytonʼs body, a little dog that knew no better, never having been taught much. It was a small black Swedish spaniel, skilful only in woodcocks, and pretty well up to a snipe or two, but actually afraid of a pheasant on account of the dreadful noise he made. She knew not any more than the others why her name was “Wena”, and she was perfectly contented with it, though it must have been a corruption. The men said it ought to be “Winifred”; the maids, more romantic, “Rowena”; but very likely John Rosedew was right, being so strong in philology, when he maintained that the name was a syncopated form of “Wadstena”, and indicated her origin.

However, she knew her masterʼs name better than her own. You had only to say “Clayton”, anywhere or anywhen, and she would lift her tangled ears in a moment, jerk her little whisk of a tail, till you feared for its continuity, and trot about with a sprightly air, seeking all around for him. Now she was cuddled close into his bosom, moaning, and shivering, and licking him, staring wistfully at his eyes and the wound where the blood was welling. She would not let John Rosedew touch him, but snapped as he leaned over; and then she began to whimper softly, and nuzzle her head in closer. “Wena”, he said, in a very low voice – “pretty Wena, let me”. And then she understood that he meant well, and stood up, and watched him intently.

John knew in a moment that all was over between this world and Clayton Nowell. He had felt it from the first glance indeed, but could not keep hope from fluttering. Afterwards he had no idea what he did, or how he did it, but the impression left by that short gaze was as stern as the death it noted. Full in the throat was the ghastly wound, and the charge had passed out at the back of the neck, through the fatal grape–cluster. Though the bright hair flowed in a pool of blood, and the wreck of life was pitiful, the face looked calm and unwrung by anguish, yet firm and staunch, with the courage summoned to ward death rather than meet it.

John Rosedew, shy and diffident in so many little matters, was not a man to be dismayed when the soul is moving vehemently. Now he leaped straight to the one conclusion, fearful as it was.

“Holy God, have mercy on those we love so much! No accident is this, but a savage murder”.

He fell upon his knees one moment, and prayed with a dead hand in his own. He knew, of course, that the soul was gone, a distance thought can never gaze; but prayer flies best in darkness.

Then, with the tears all down his cheeks, he looked round once, as if to mark the things he would have to tell of. In front of the corpse lay the favourite gun, with the muzzle plunged into the bushes, as if the owner had fallen with the piece raised to his shoulder. The hammer of one barrel was cocked, of the other on half–cock only; both the nipples were capped, and, of course, both barrels loaded. The line of its fire was not towards Cradock, but commanded a little by–path leading into the heart of the wood.