Four Winds Farm

"No, my child. I only meant to warn you. It is my part both to correct and to warn – of the two I would rather, by far, warn. Don't get your little head turned – don't think there is nothing worth, nothing beautiful, except in the new things you may see and hear and learn. And never think yourself quite anything. That is always a mistake. What will seem new to you is only another way of putting the old – and the path to any real good is always the same – never think to get on faster from leaving it. You can't understand all this yet, but you will in time. Now put your arms out, darling – I am here beside you. Clasp them round my neck; never mind if it feels cold – there. I have you safe, and here goes – "

A whirl, a rapid upbearing, a rush of cold, fresh air, and a pleasant, dreamy feeling, as when one is rocked in a little boat at sea. Gratian closed his eyes – he was tired, poor little chap, for nothing is more tiring than new sights and feelings – and knew no more till he found himself lying on the heather, a few yards from the Farm gates.

He looked about him – it was quite night by now – he felt drowsy still, but no longer tired, and not cold – just pleasantly warm and comfortable.

"Gray-wings must have wrapped me up somehow," he said to himself. "She's very kind, really. But I must run in – what would mother think if she saw me lying here?"

And he jumped up and ran home.

The gate was open, the door of the house was open too, and just within the porch stood his mother.

"Is that you, Gratian?" she said, as she heard his step.

"Yes, mother," he replied; and as he came into the light he looked up at her. She was much, much older-looking than Fergus's mother, for she had not married young, and Gratian was the youngest of several, the others of whom had died. But as he glanced at her sunburnt face, and saw the love shining out of her eyes, tired and rather worn by daily work as she was, she somehow reminded him of the graceful lady with the sweet blue eyes.

"I understand some of what Gray-wings said," he thought. "It's the same in mother's face and in hers when she looks at Fergus."

And he held up his mouth for a kiss.

"Have you been happy at the Big House?" Mrs. Conyfer asked. "Were they kind to you? She seems a kind lady, if one can trust to pretty looks."

"Oh! she's very kind," answered Gratian eagerly; "and so's Fergus. He's her boy, mother – he can't walk, nor scarcely stand. But he's getting better – the air here will make him better."

"It's to be hoped so, I'm sure," said the farmer's wife, with great sympathy in her tone. "It must be a terrible grief – the poor child – I couldn't find it in my heart to refuse to let you go when Mr. Cornelius told me of his affliction. But you were happy, and they were good to you?"

"Oh, mother! yes – happier than ever I was in my life."

Mrs. Conyfer smiled and yet sighed a little. She knew her child was not altogether like his compeers of the moor country – she was proud of it, and yet sometimes afraid with a vague misgiving.

"Come in and warm yourself – it's a cold evening. There's some hot girdle cakes and a cup of Fernflower's milk for your supper – though maybe you had so many fine things to eat at the Big House that you won't be hungry."

"Ah, but I am, though," he said brightly; and the big kitchen looked so cheery, and the little supper so tempting, that Gratian smiled with satisfaction.

"How good of you to make it so nice for me, mother!" he said. "I could never like anywhere better than my own home, however beautiful it was."

CHAPTER X

THE STORY OF THE SEA-GULL

"Now my brothers call from the bay,
Now the great winds shoreward blow,
Now the salt tides seaward flow,
Now the wild white horses play,
Champ and chafe and toss in the spray,
Children dear, let us away!
This way, this way!"

    The Forsaken Merman
The winter – the real winter, such as it is known up in that country – came on slowly that year. There was no snow and but little frost before Christmas. Fergus gained ground steadily, and his mother, who at first had dreaded the experiment of the bleak but bracing air, was so encouraged that she stayed on from week to week. And through these weeks there was never a half-holiday which the two boys did not spend together.

Gratian was learning much – more than even those who knew him best had full understanding of; much, much more than he himself knew.

"He is like a different child," said the schoolmaster one day to the lady, when she had looked in as she was passing through the village; "if you had seen him a year ago; he seemed always dreaming or in the clouds. I really thought I should never succeed in teaching him anything. You have opened his mind."

"His mind had begun to open before he ever saw me, Mr. Cornelius," said Fergus's mother with a smile. "It is like a flower – it asks nothing but to be allowed to grow. He is a very uncommon child – one could imagine that some specially happy influences surrounded him. He seems to take in and to feel interest in so many different things. I wonder what he will grow up."

"Ah yes, ma'am," said the schoolmaster with a sigh. "It is a pity to think of his being no more than his father before him. But yet, what can one do?"

"One would like at least to find out what he might be," she said thoughtfully. "He will be a good man, whether he ever leaves the moors or not – of that I feel sure. And if it is his duty to stay in this quiet corner of the world, I suppose we must not regret it."

"I suppose not. I try to think so," said the schoolmaster. But from something in his tone the lady suspected that he was looking back rather sadly on dreams, long ago past, of his own future – dreams which had never come to pass, and left him but the village schoolmaster.

And her sympathy with this half-understood disappointment made her think still more of Gratian.

"Cornelius would live again in this child if he should turn out one of the great few," she thought to herself.

It was one of the afternoons Gratian now always spent with Fergus. She could leave her lame boy with perfect comfort in his friend's care, sure that he would be both safe and happy. As she made her way up the pine avenue and drew near to the house, she heard bright voices welcoming her.

"Mother dear," Fergus called out, "I have walked twelve times along the south terrace – six times up and six times down – with Gratian's arm. It is so sheltered there – just a nice little soft breeze. Do you know, Gratian, I so often notice that breeze when you are here? It is as if it came with you."

"But it is getting colder now, my boy," she answered. "You must come in. I have been to see Mr. Cornelius, Gratian. I am so glad to hear that he is pleased with your lessons. I would not like him to think that being with us distracted your attention."

"I'm sure it doesn't, ma'am," said Gratian simply. "So often the things you tell me about or read to us, or that I hear about somehow when I am here, seem to come in just at the right minute, and to make my lessons easier. I have never found lessons so nice as this winter."

"I don't like lessons," said Fergus. "I never shall like them."

"You will have to look upon them as necessary evils then," said his mother.

"I usedn't to like them," said Gratian. "Now I often think I'd like to go on till I'm quite big."

"Well, so you can, can't you?" said Fergus.

"No," Gratian replied; "boys like me have to stop when they're big enough to help their fathers at home, and I've no big brother like Tony. I'll have to stop going to school before very long. I used to think I'd be very glad. Now I'd be sorry even if I was to be a shepherd."

"How do you mean?" asked the lady.

Gratian looked up at her with his soft brown eyes.

"I used to think being a shepherd and lying out on the heather all day – alone with the sheep and Watch, like old Jonas – would be the best life of any. But now I want to know things. I think one can fancy better when one knows more. And I'd like to do more than fancy."

"What would you like to do?" asked Fergus's mother. "Would you like to learn to make music as well as to play it? That is what Fergus wants to do."

Gratian shook his head.

"I don't know," he replied. "I don't know yet. And isn't it best not to plan about it, because I know father will need me on the farm?"

"Perhaps it is best," she said. But she answered as if thinking of something else at the same time.

And then Andrew came out to help Fergus up the steps into the house, where tea was waiting for them in the library.