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CHAPTER XXVIII
THE SECOND MEETING OF THE CYNIC AND THE COUNTRYWOMAN

"You'll be back for your lunch, Mr. Ricordo?"

"No, Mrs. Briggs. I'm going for a long walk, a very long walk; I don't know how far."

"But you'll be back for dinner to-night?"

"Don't expect me till you see me."

The simple country-woman looked up into his face, and although she did not know why, she thought she saw a change in him. The old look of cynical melancholy was gone, the eyes were no longer half closed, but wide open, eager, expectant.

"Did 'ee sleep well last night, sur?"

"I had strange dreams, Mrs. Briggs, very strange."

"Pleasant, I hope, sur."

"They were very strange, very wonderful. Good-morning, Mrs. Briggs. Don't be anxious about me."

He left the house and took the road up to the golf links. When he reached the top of the hill, he stopped and took a long look at Olive's home. He knew she expected him this morning; he had told her that he would come and ask her father to consent to her becoming his wife. But he did not intend going; he wanted to be away among the moors, he wanted to think. His last evening's experiences had meant more to him than he knew. Mrs. Briggs was right when she thought she saw a change in him. The world yesterday and the world to-day were different, and he was different. He was no longer the thoughtful, melancholy Eastern gentleman who called himself Ricordo; he was Radford Leicester. Not only had he risen from the dead, but the past had risen. The buried years seemed to be with him again, in a way he could scarcely realise.

When he had left England long years before, he had left it with one thought in his mind. He would go away only to return again, and he would return only to be revenged on the woman he had loved. For his love had turned to hatred. As he had loved passionately, and with all the fervour of his nature, now he hated with as much intensity. For a few weeks he had lived in paradise only to be cast into an inferno, all the more ghastly because of the paradise in which he had lived. Through her he had become disgraced, through her he had become the byword of all who had known him. He had been a proud man, and this woman had wounded his pride, she had wounded his sense of justice, she had aroused all that was evil in him. And he had vowed vengeance. Revenge is one of the primitive passions of humanity, and when Leicester found himself cast on the sea of life, without anchor or rudder, he determined that he would make Olive Castlemaine suffer as he had suffered. His disgrace should be hers. If he had been the byword for all who had known him, so should she.

At length when the time was ripe he came to England again. In his mind only one thought held possession in his heart, only one feeling was dominant – his hatred for the woman whom he had once loved should find expression. When he came to Vale Linden, and saw how matters stood, he formulated his plans. The thing he had conceived was cruel, but he had gloated over it. After all, the veneer of civilisation counts for very little. Rob a man of religion and he is only a savage, with a savage's instincts and desires. The Mosaic code expresses the natural bent of the heart; "An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth." For years Leicester had brooded over his vow, and now the debt should be paid to the uttermost farthing. No thought of pity or of mercy came into his mind. He felt he had been wronged; love had turned to hatred, and he would be revenged. The savage in him was covered by the thin veneer of civilisation, but it was there.

He seemed in a strange mood as he walked rapidly across the moors. Sometimes he laughed quietly, as though some pleasant thought possessed him, and again he became moody, stern, and silent. But he was no longer the "Eastern gentleman with a fez." The day was warm, and he had clothed himself in a suit of light flannels, and instead of a fez he wore a panama. In spite of his black beard and brown skin he would no longer be taken for an Eastern. Every movement was that of an athletic Englishman. He was no longer acting a part; the old life was soon to come to an end, and he would begin anew. What that new life was he hardly dared to confess even to himself, but it was there, in the background of his mind.

"I have won, I have got my way, I have conquered," he said again and again as he strode along. "God, if there is a God, is giving me my revenge. And if there is any justice in the world, it is just."

Hour after hour he walked; he seemed to be trying to tire himself, to, in some way, throw off the abundant energy that surged within him. Presently he came to a shady dell, where he stopped. At his feet gurgled a stream of clear water. He lay flat on his face and took a long, deep drink.

"I wonder what whisky would taste like now," he said to himself. "It is six years since I touched it, six years; but the first year was a year of torment."

He shuddered at the thought of it. The memory of the time when it held him enslaved was terrible to him even yet.

"But I conquered it," he went on; "I vowed I would, and I have. Had the struggle been ten times as hard, I would have conquered it. No man is master of anything if whisky masters him."

He sat down beneath the tree and ate a simple lunch, then, taking another deep draught of the water, he continued his walk. A high hill was in front of him covered with gorse and bracken. In a few minutes he reached the top, and then he looked around him.

A look of recognition came into his eyes. He saw the cottage at which he had stayed after he had been driven out of Taviton; away in the distance was the pool which the country people said was haunted by the devil. He remembered it when he saw it last as dark and forbidding, but to-day it gleamed in the sunlight. Below him, not much more than a mile away, was the farmhouse in which he had sheltered himself from a storm, when he was planning what he should do with his life.

Scarcely without knowing why, he turned his footsteps towards the farm.

"I wonder if the woman lives there still?" he said to himself. "Let me see, what was she called? Yes, Mrs. Pethick, I remember now, and she talked religion to me. She believed in it, too!"

He cast his mind back over the years again, and remembered what the woman had said to him.

"I wonder, I wonder if there's anything in it, after all?" he said with a sigh.

Everything was quiet at the farmyard when he came to it. A sheep-dog lifted his head sleepily and prepared to growl, but, seeing a well-dressed man, decided that all was well. The chickens crouched beneath the shade of a tree; evidently the day was too warm for them to care to seek for food. Nothing was to be heard save the hum of insects and the occasional chirp of a bird. It was far warmer there in the farmyard than up among the moors where he had been walking.

Leicester walked up to the kitchen door and knocked.

"Come in," said a voice which, in spite of the years which had elapsed, Leicester remembered.

He opened the door and walked in. He recognised the kitchen at once – the cool slate floor, the huge chimney-place at the end, and the long deal table. Then a huge fire leaped up the chimney. Now there were only a few red embers, on which a kettle sang merrily.

Mrs. Pethick appeared as he entered. She was but little altered; the six years had sat lightly upon her, and she looked the same healthy, buxom country-woman that she had looked then. And yet Leicester thought he saw a sadder look in her eyes, and he wondered why it was.

"I wondered if you would sell me a glass of milk, ma'am," he said by way of introducing himself.

"Glass ov milk," she replied. "You c'n 'ave so much milk as you mind to, but I shaan't zell a drap a milk. 'Twud'dn be vitty."

"You mean that you won't take any money?" said Leicester.

"To be sure I wa'ant. I shud be shaamed to look 'ee in the faace, ef I wos to taake yer money fer a drop o' milk."

Leicester laughed at the woman's vehemence.

"Have 'ee come from far then, sur; you do look 'ot and tired?" she continued.

"Yes, I have walked a good many miles – from Vale Linden. Have you ever heard of it?"

"Iss, I've 'eerd ov it, but I've never been there. Why, that must be more'n twenty mile."

"Very likely. I've walked from there."

"And how be 'ee goin' back?"

"I'm going to walk."

"Good gracious! Why – but wudden 'ee ruther 'ave a cup of tay, sur?"

"I am afraid it would be troubling you."

"Trouble! Nothin' of the sort. Besides, I be goin' to 'ave one myzelf. Ef you'll jist wait two or three minits 't 'll be ready. There, you go and set in the armchair there, while I d' git et."

For the first time he realised that he was tired. He accepted the woman's invitation, and sat down. How quiet and peaceful everything was! Not a sound save the ticking of the eight-day clock and the kettle singing on the glowing embers. A little later Mrs. Pethick laid a snowy cloth on the end of the table nearest Leicester, and then brought a loaf of white bread and a basin of clotted cream.

"There now," she said presently, "draw yer cheer up and 'ave some tay; 't 'll be better than cloggy stuff like milk on a 'ot day like this."

It did not seem strange that this woman should treat him so kindly. He knew that her hospitality was nothing uncommon in rural districts. Nevertheless, he felt thankful to her. The sight of her face did him good.

"Es the tay to yer likin', then?" she asked.

"It is beautiful tea," he replied. "As for your Devonshire cream, 'tis delicious."

"I'm glad you like 'et, but I'd allays call et Cornish craim. I've lived 'ere now better'n twenty 'ear, but I can never make out that I bean't in Cornwall. I caan't fer sure. I was raired there, you zee. 'Ave 'ee ever bin to Cornwall then, zur, maakin' so bowld?"

"Never."

"Then you shud, zur. Some people do like Devonshire best, but I've never seed nothin' in Devonshire so purty as Truro revver. Besides, I do miss the Cornish revivals, I do."

"Revivals?"

"Iss; I was converted at a revival, I was. Not but wot we do 'ave good meetin's over to the Brianite Chapel, but ted'n like Cornwall. Be you a perfessor yerself then, sur?"

"A professor? – what of?"

"Of religion, zur. Be 'ee a perfessin' Christian?"

"I'm afraid not," he replied.

"Ah," she said, "I thot I ded'n see the joy of the Lord in yer eyes."

Try as he would, he could not help laughing. But there was nothing derisive in his laughter. The woman was too sincere.

"I am afraid I've seen too much of the devil to have the joy of the Lord," he replied.

"Aw, my deear," she said, dropping into the Cornish vernacular, "you do mind me of a gen'l'man wot called 'ere years and years agone, afore my 'usband and my pore dear boy died."

"Oh," said Leicester, "what gentleman?"

"Not that you be anything like en," assured Mrs. Pethick. "Aw, my deear, 'ee was as pale as a ghost, and as thin as a coot, 'ee was. Not but wot 'ee was a fine 'an'some gen'leman, for oal that. 'Twas, lev me zee, six years agone this last spring. Aw, 'ee ded talk funny, he ded. He zed 'ee loved the devil, 'ee ded, and towld me 'ow the devil tempted un to go to Crazzick pool, and sink, and sink, and sink, and thus find paice."

"And what did you say to him?"

"I towld un that 'ee'd never find no paice that way. Ther's no paice 'cept in the dear Lord. I'm sorry you be'ant a perfessin' Christian, sur."

It did not seem strange to Leicester that she should talk in this way. It seemed natural to her. Besides, in the rural parts of Cornwall and Devonshire, religion is the main topic of conversation among those who love the little roadside chapels.

"Well, as I was a-sayin'," she went on, "this gen'l'man ded zay funny things. He zed 'ee'd nuther father, nor mawther, nor wife, nor sweetheart, and that he ded'n care nothin' 'bout livin'. And then all ov a sudden he axed me wot I wud do ef I wos in his plaace."

"And what did you tell him?" asked Leicester.

"I towld 'im that he must seek the Lord, and fight the devil. Ther's no other way fer et, sur."

"And did he, do you think?"

"I'm feard not, sur. For afterwards it comed to me who he was. I d' believe he was the gen'leman who tried to git into Parliament for Taviton. I s'pose 'ee wos a awful character. He decaived 'is young laady, he was a ter'ble drunkard, and then afterwards, he thrawed hisself in the revver up to London. 'Twa'sn' he that ded conquer the devil, but the devil conquered he. Ah well, the poor thing es ded now ef 'twas 'ee; 'tes a sad pity."

"And do you believe if he'd sought the Lord, as you call it, that he would have conquered the devil?"

"I doan't believe, sur, I'm sure."

Again Leicester became interested in the country-woman's simple talk. There was such a ring of sincerity in her voice, that he could not but be respectful.

"Mrs. Pethick," he said, "I've been in many countries, and known many religions, but I don't find that the devil is easily killed."

"The Lord Jesus can do et, sur."

"How do you know?"

"Knaw, sur! I do knaw the difference in my heart before I was converted, and after. Besides, there was Aaron Goudge; you doan't know Aaron Goudge, I s'poase?"

"No, I don't know him."

"Well, ef you do look out of the winder you can zee his 'ouse. Aaron was a ter'ble character, 'ee was. He killed his wife, 'ee ded. Ah, poor critter, she ded live a life! Not as you may say oal to wance he ded'n kill her, but little by little. She jist faaded away, she ded. Aaron was a poacher too, and used to stail things. He was allays a-gittin' drunk and fightin'. He was a terror to the parish, he was. Aw, many es the time I've talked to un, bit 'twas oal no use. Grace ded'n tich his heart, so to spaik. Then after his poor wife died, his maid got into trouble, and ef there wos wawn thing in life Aaron cared 'bout, 'twas this maid, and the man that ruined her was Bill Liddicoat, Squire Hendy's gamekeeper. Nothin' could be proved 'gin un, and then, to maake matters wuss, Bill Liddicoat catched Aaron poachin', and he wos put to gaol. When Aaron comed out ov gaol, I spoke to un, and tried to do un good. 'Mrs. Pethick,' ses 'ee, 'I've sould myself to the devil to do fer Bill Liddicoat. I've offered un my soul, ef 'ee'll 'elp me, and 'ee've promised to. And I tell 'ee what, I'll never rest till I've paid out Bill Liddicoat, ef I've got to swing fer it, and ef I've got to go to hell for it, I'll be square with un.' 'But what good'll that do 'ee?' ses I. ''Tes oal I've got to live fer now,' ses 'ee, 'and I b'leeve I cud be 'appy ef I cud pay en out. And I will too, by God, I will!' I tried to raison weth un, but 'twas no use. You cud zee murder in 'is eyes, as he walked the roads. Then wawn mornin', we 'eard 'ow Bill Liddicoat was vound up in Ternouth woods in a pool of blood. He wad'n dead, but the doctors ded'n give much 'ope ov his life. Aaron was tooked up, and tried, but nothin' could be proved agin him. He proved wot is called a allyby – that es, he made out that he was zum plaace else that very night."

Leicester listened eagerly to the story.

"And was he ever found out?" he asked.

"No, as you may zay he wos never vound out. But aw, my deear, wot a way 'ee wos in. You never seed such a ghastly faace as 'ee 'ad. Ef ever the devil 'aunted a man, it was Aaron. He went as thin and pale as a ghoast. In a way he 'ad 'is rights in payin' out Bill Liddicoat, but he suffered the torments of the lost. He wudden tell nothin' and nothin' cud be proved agin un, but 'ee wos the most miserable man that ever walked the earth. Wawn day I spoked to un, but 'ee wudden zay nothin,' but 'The devil's a 'ard maaster, Mrs. Pethick.' I axed un to come to chapel, but he wudden come. Night after night I wrastled in prayer fur un, but 'ee wad'n altered. He jist went round like a man weth a 'alter round 'is neck. I've been the class laider up to the Bible Christian Chapel for a long time, and one night we zed as 'ow we would agree to pray fer Aaron, and we ded. For two weeks we prayed, and then wawn Sunday night Aaron comed to chapel. The praicher ded'n come that night, so we turned the sarvice into a prayer-meetin'. Oa, Aaron was convicted of sin, but 'ee wudden yield for a long while; but after a time he got 'pon his knees, and began to cry, 'God be merciful to me, a sinner.' But he ded'n git no liberty. 'Wy caan't I git paice?' he cried. So I said, 'Ef we repent ov our sins, He is faithful and just to fergive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.' 'Wot do 'ee main by repent?' ses 'ee. 'Be sorry fer all the wrong you've done,' I sed; 'make yer paice with man and God, and fergive everybody, and then trust in the mercy of the Lord for salvation.' 'Wot! fergive Bill Liddicoat?' he zed; 'never!' 'But you've paid un out,' I zed; 'surely you can fergive un now.' ''Ow do you knaw I've paid un out?' he asked. 'The Lord tould me,' I said. For a long time he was hardened, then he said, 'Lord, ef You'll fergive me, I'll fergive Bill Liddicoat.' And still 'ee ded'n git no paice. At this my faith was a bit shaken; then it comed to me that I hadn't quoted the Scripture right, so I repeated et agean. 'Ef we confess our sins,' I sed. 'Confess wot?' ses 'ee. 'Confess wot you've done to Bill Liddicoat, and ax un to forgive 'ee,' I sed. 'Wot, ax Bill Liddicoat to forgive me?' he said; 'wot, 'ee that 'ave ruined my little maid? I'll burn in hell first.' 'If ye fergive not men their trespasses, neither will your Heavenly Father forgive your trespasses,' I said. 'Is that in the Bible?' ses 'ee. 'Our dear Lord said it Himself,' I replied. Oh, the struggle was terrible. 'I've bin in hell for weeks,' ses 'ee, 'ever since I tried to kill Bill. I thought ef I 'ad my revenge I should be 'appy, but I was in hell.' Then oal of a sudden he cried out, 'Lord, ef You'll give paice, ef You'll make a new man ov me, I'll do wotever You want me to. I'll forgive Bill Liddicoat, I'll ax un to forgive me, I'll confess that I tried to kill un. 'Tes ter'ble 'ard, but I'll do et.'"

Mrs. Pethick stopped in her recital, and looked at the eager face of the man who was watching her.

"Would you believe et, sur, his faace changed in a moment. He seemed to become like a little child. Then he got on his feet, and praised the Lord. That was five years agone, and Aaron Goudge is a local preacher now, and the happiest man in the parish. As for Bill Liddicoat, well, sur, he got better, and now Aaron's maid is his wife. Tha's wot the dear Lord Jesus can do fer a man, sur."

Leicester made no reply. He tried to think of something mocking to say, but the words would not come. It seemed to be impossible to call up a sneer in the face of the woman's simple faith.

"Plaise forgive me, sur, for talkin' like this. But I was prayin' when I heerd you knock; besides, in a way you do make me think of the poor gen'l'man that comed 'ere years agone, and wot throwed 'isself into the revver afterwards. As I sed to 'ee, ef we doan't conquer the devil, 'ee'll conquer we. You be'ant offended, be 'ee, sur?"

"Offended? Certainly not." He tried to laugh, but somehow the laugh died on his lips. "But you see, it's – it's a long time since I heard any one talk like this."

"Es et, sur? Ah, but the dear Loard Jesus es oal I've got to live for now. Four years ago my 'usband died, and then my boy was killed in the war. I felt 'ard and bitter for a little time. But 'tes oal right, I shall meet them again. They will not come to me, but I shall go to them."

Leicester rose to his feet, and looked for his hat.

"You wa'ant 'ave another cup of tay, sur?"

"No, thank you."

"You'll forgive an old woman, sur, and I knaw I'm very bould in spaikin' to 'ee, and I'm fast baitin' on for sixty, but you do'ant look 'appy, sur. I'm tould sometimes that I talk too much 'bout the Lord Jesus, but He's all I've got now, and d'reckly you comed into the 'ouse, I had a feelin' that you wad'n 'appy. Be 'ee, sur?"

"No, great God, no," and Leicester seized his hat as though he were angry.

"Then you do'ant mind an old woman prayin' for 'ee, do 'ee, sur?"

"Yes, pray for me, I need it," he said. "Thank you very much for the tea, and, by the way, I want you to give something for me to your chapel."

He gave her a sovereign, and walked away. A few minutes later he was out on the moors again.