'A strange story!' said the man who had been the cause of the
narration.--'Stranger still if it comes about as you predict. Is that all?'
A question so unexpected, nettled Solomon Daisy not a little. By dint of
relating the story very often, and ornamenting it (according to village report)
with a few flourishes suggested by the various hearers from time to time, he had
come by degrees to tell it with great effect; and 'Is that all?' after the
climax, was not what he was accustomed to.
'Is that all?' he repeated, 'yes, that's all, sir. And enough too, I think.'
'I think so too. My horse, young man! He is but a hack hired from a roadside
posting house, but he must carry me to London to- night.'
'To-night!' said Joe.
'To-night,' returned the other. 'What do you stare at? This tavern would seem
to be a house of call for all the gaping idlers of the neighbourhood!'
At this remark, which evidently had reference to the scrutiny he had
undergone, as mentioned in the foregoing chapter, the eyes of John Willet and
his friends were diverted with marvellous rapidity to the copper boiler again.
Not so with Joe, who, being a mettlesome fellow, returned the stranger's angry
glance with a steady look, and rejoined:
'It is not a very bold thing to wonder at your going on to-night. Surely you
have been asked such a harmless question in an inn before, and in better weather
than this. I thought you mightn't know the way, as you seem strange to this
part.'
'The way--' repeated the other, irritably.
'Yes. DO you know it?'
'I'll--humph!--I'll find it,' replied the nian, waving his hand and turning
on his heel. 'Landlord, take the reckoning here.'
John Willet did as he was desired; for on that point he was seldom slow,
except in the particulars of giving change, and testing the goodness of any
piece of coin that was proffered to him, by the application of his teeth or his
tongue, or some other test, or in doubtful cases, by a long series of tests
terminating in its rejection. The guest then wrapped his garments about him so
as to shelter himself as effectually as he could from the rough weather, and
without any word or sign of farewell betook himself to the stableyard. Here Joe
(who had left the room on the conclusion of their short dialogue) was protecting
himself and the horse from the rain under the shelter of an old penthouse roof.
'He's pretty much of my opinion,' said Joe, patting the horse upon the neck.
'I'll wager that your stopping here to-night would please him better than it
would please me.'
'He and I are of different opinions, as we have been more than once on our
way here,' was the short reply.
'So I was thinking before you came out, for he has felt your spurs, poor
beast.'
The stranger adjusted his coat-collar about his face, and made no answer.
'You'll know me again, I see,' he said, marking the young fellow's earnest
gaze, when he had sprung into the saddle.
'The man's worth knowing, master, who travels a road he don't know, mounted
on a jaded horse, and leaves good quarters to do it on such a night as this.'
'You have sharp eyes and a sharp tongue, I find.'
'Both I hope by nature, but the last grows rusty sometimes for want of
using.'
'Use the first less too, and keep their sharpness for your sweethearts, boy,'
said the man.
So saying he shook his hand from the bridle, struck him roughly on the head
with the butt end of his whip, and galloped away; dashing through the mud and
darkness with a headlong speed, which few badly mounted horsemen would have
cared to venture, even had they been thoroughly acquainted with the country; and
which, to one who knew nothing of the way he rode, was attended at every step
with great hazard and danger.
The roads, even within twelve miles of London, were at that time ill paved,
seldom repaired, and very badly made. The way this rider traversed had been
ploughed up by the wheels of heavy waggons, and rendered rotten by the frosts
and thaws of the preceding winter, or possibly of many winters. Great holes and
gaps had been worn into the soil, which, being now filled with water from the
late rains, were not easily distinguishable even by day; and a plunge into any
one of them might have brought down a surer-footed horse than the poor beast now
urged forward to the utmost extent of his powers. Sharp flints and stones rolled
from under his hoofs continually; the rider could scarcely see beyond the
animal's head, or farther on either side than his own arm would have extended.
At that time, too, all the roads in the neighbourhood of the metropolis were
infested by footpads or highwaymen, and it was a night, of all others, in which
any evil- disposed person of this class might have pursued his unlawful calling
with little fear of detection.
Still, the traveller dashed forward at the same reckless pace, regardless
alike of the dirt and wet which flew about his head, the profound darkness of
the night, and the probability of encountering some desperate characters abroad.
At every turn and angle, even where a deviation from the direct course might
have been least expected, and could not possibly be seen until he was close upon
it, he guided the bridle with an unerring hand, and kept the middle of the road.
Thus he sped onward, raising himself in the stirrups, leaning his body forward
until it almost touched the horse's neck, and flourishing his heavy whip above
his head with the fervour of a madman.
There are times when, the elements being in unusual commotion, those who are
bent on daring enterprises, or agitated by great thoughts, whether of good or
evil, feel a mysterious sympathy with the tumult of nature, and are roused into
corresponding violence. In the midst of thunder, lightning, and storm, many
tremendous deeds have been committed; men, self-possessed before, have given a
sudden loose to passions they could no longer control. The demons of wrath and
despair have striven to emulate those who ride the whirlwind and direct the
storm; and man, lashed into madness with the roaring winds and boiling waters,
has become for the time as wild and merciless as the elements themselves.
Whether the traveller was possessed by thoughts which the fury of the night
had heated and stimulated into a quicker current, or was merely impelled by some
strong motive to reach his journey's end, on he swept more like a hunted phantom
than a man, nor checked his pace until, arriving at some cross roads, one of
which led by a longer route to the place whence he had lately started, he bore
down so suddenly upon a vehicle which was coming towards him, that in the effort
to avoid it he well-nigh pulled his horse upon his haunches, and narrowly
escaped being thrown.
'Yoho!' cried the voice of a man. 'What's that? Who goes there?'
'A friend!' replied the traveller.
'A friend!' repeated the voice. 'Who calls himself a friend and rides like
that, abusing Heaven's gifts in the shape of horseflesh, and endangering, not
only his own neck (which might be no great matter) but the necks of other
people?'
'You have a lantern there, I see,' said the traveller dismounting, 'lend it
me for a moment. You have wounded my horse, I think, with your shaft or wheel.'
'Wounded him!' cried the other, 'if I haven't killed him, it's no fault of
yours. What do you mean by galloping along the king's highway like that, eh?'
'Give me the light,' returned the traveller, snatching it from his hand, 'and
don't ask idle questions of a man who is in no mood for talking.'
'If you had said you were in no mood for talking before, I should perhaps
have been in no mood for lighting,' said the voice. 'Hows'ever as it's the poor
horse that's damaged and not you, one of you is welcome to the light at all
events--but it's not the crusty one.'
The traveller returned no answer to this speech, but holding the light near
to his panting and reeking beast, examined him in limb and carcass. Meanwhile,
the other man sat very composedly in his vehicle, which was a kind of chaise
with a depository for a large bag of tools, and watched his proceedings with a
careful eye.
The looker-on was a round, red-faced, sturdy yeoman, with a double chin, and
a voice husky with good living, good sleeping, good humour, and good health. He
was past the prime of life, but Father Time is not always a hard parent, and,
though he tarries for none of his children, often lays his hand lightly upon
those who have used him well; making them old men and women inexorably enough,
but leaving their hearts and spirits young and in full vigour. With such people
the grey head is but the impression of the old fellow's hand in giving them his
blessing, and every wrinkle but a notch in the quiet calendar of a well-spent
life.
The person whom the traveller had so abruptly encountered was of this kind:
bluff, hale, hearty, and in a green old age: at peace with himself, and
evidently disposed to be so with all the world. Although muffled up in divers
coats and handkerchiefs--one of which, passed over his crown, and tied in a
convenient crease of his double chin, secured his three-cornered hat and bob-wig
from blowing off his head--there was no disguising his plump and comfortable
figure; neither did certain dirty finger-marks upon his face give it any other
than an odd and comical expression, through which its natural good humour shone
with undiminished lustre.
'He is not hurt,' said the traveller at length, raising his head and the
lantern together.
'You have found that out at last, have you?' rejoined the old man. 'My eyes
have seen more light than yours, but I wouldn't change with you.'
'What do you mean?'
'Mean! I could have told you he wasn't hurt, five minutes ago. Give me the
light, friend; ride forward at a gentler pace; and good night.'
In handing up the lantern, the man necessarily cast its rays full on the
speaker's face. Their eyes met at the instant. He suddenly dropped it and
crushed it with his foot.
'Did you never see a locksmith before, that you start as if you had come upon
a ghost?' cried the old man in the chaise, 'or is this,' he added hastily,
thrusting his hand into the tool basket and drawing out a hammer, 'a scheme for
robbing me? I know these roads, friend. When I travel them, I carry nothing but
a few shillings, and not a crown's worth of them. I tell you plainly, to save us
both trouble, that there's nothing to be got from me but a pretty stout arm
considering my years, and this tool, which, mayhap from long acquaintance with,
I can use pretty briskly. You shall not have it all your own way, I promise you,
if you play at that game. With these words he stood upon the defensive.
'I am not what you take me for, Gabriel Varden,' replied the other.
'Then what and who are you?' returned the locksmith. 'You know my name, it
seems. Let me know yours.'
'I have not gained the information from any confidence of yours, but from the
inscription on your cart which tells it to all the town,' replied the traveller.
'You have better eyes for that than you had for your horse, then,' said
Varden, descending nimbly from his chaise; 'who are you? Let me see your face.'
While the locksmith alighted, the traveller had regained his saddle, from
which he now confronted the old man, who, moving as the horse moved in chafing
under the tightened rein, kept close beside him.
'Let me see your face, I say.'
'Stand off!'
'No masquerading tricks,' said the locksmith, 'and tales at the club
to-morrow, how Gabriel Varden was frightened by a surly voice and a dark night.
Stand--let me see your face.'
Finding that further resistance would only involve him in a personal struggle
with an antagonist by no means to be despised, the traveller threw back his
coat, and stooping down looked steadily at the locksmith.
Perhaps two men more powerfully contrasted, never opposed each other face to
face. The ruddy features of the locksmith so set off and heightened the
excessive paleness of the man on horseback, that he looked like a bloodless
ghost, while the moisture, which hard riding had brought out upon his skin, hung
there in dark and heavy drops, like dews of agony and death. The countenance of
the old locksmith lighted up with the smile of one expecting to detect in this
unpromising stranger some latent roguery of eye or lip, which should reveal a
familiar person in that arch disguise, and spoil his jest. The face of the
other, sullen and fierce, but shrinking too, was that of a man who stood at bay;
while his firmly closed jaws, his puckered mouth, and more than all a certain
stealthy motion of the hand within his breast, seemed to announce a desperate
purpose very foreign to acting, or child's play.
Thus they regarded each other for some time, in silence.
'Humph!' he said when he had scanned his features; 'I don't know you.'
'Don't desire to?'--returned the other, muffling himself as before.
'I don't,' said Gabriel; 'to be plain with you, friend, you don't carry in
your countenance a letter of recommendation.'
'It's not my wish,' said the traveller. 'My humour is to be avoided.'
'Well,' said the locksmith bluntly, 'I think you'll have your humour.'
'I will, at any cost,' rejoined the traveller. 'In proof of it, lay this to
heart--that you were never in such peril of your life as you have been within
these few moments; when you are within five minutes of breathing your last, you
will not be nearer death than you have been to-night!'
'Aye!' said the sturdy locksmith.
'Aye! and a violent death.'
'From whose hand?'
'From mine,' replied the traveller.
With that he put spurs to his horse, and rode away; at first plashing heavily
through the mire at a smart trot, but gradually increasing in speed until the
last sound of his horse's hoofs died away upon the wind; when he was again
hurrying on at the same furious gallop, which had been his pace when the
locksmith first encountered him.
Gabriel Varden remained standing in the road with the broken lantern in his
hand, listening in stupefied silence until no sound reached his ear but the
moaning of the wind, and the fast-falling rain; when he struck himself one or
two smart blows in the breast by way of rousing himself, and broke into an
exclamation of surprise.
'What in the name of wonder can this fellow be! a madman? a highwayman? a
cut-throat? If he had not scoured off so fast, we'd have seen who was in most
danger, he or I. I never nearer death than I have been to-night! I hope I may be
no nearer to it for a score of years to come--if so, I'll be content to be no
farther from it. My stars!--a pretty brag this to a stout man--pooh, pooh!'
Gabriel resumed his seat, and looked wistfully up the road by which the
traveller had come; murmuring in a half whisper:
'The Maypole--two miles to the Maypole. I came the other road from the Warren
after a long day's work at locks and bells, on purpose that I should not come by
the Maypole and break my promise to Martha by looking in--there's resolution! It
would be dangerous to go on to London without a light; and it's four miles, and
a good half mile besides, to the Halfway-House; and between this and that is the
very place where one needs a light most. Two miles to the Maypole! I told Martha
I wouldn't; I said I wouldn't, and I didn't--there's resolution!'
Repeating these two last words very often, as if to compensate for the little
resolution he was going to show by piquing himself on the great resolution he
had shown, Gabriel Varden quietly turned back, determining to get a light at the
Maypole, and to take nothing but a light.
When he got to the Maypole, however, and Joe, responding to his well-known
hail, came running out to the horse's head, leaving the door open behind him,
and disclosing a delicious perspective of warmth and brightness--when the ruddy
gleam of the fire, streaming through the old red curtains of the common room,
seemed to bring with it, as part of itself, a pleasant hum of voices, and a
fragrant odour of steaming grog and rare tobacco, all steeped as it were in the
cheerful glow--when the shadows, flitting across the curtain, showed that those
inside had risen from their snug seats, and were making room in the snuggest
corner (how well he knew that corner!) for the honest locksmith, and a broad
glare, suddenly streaming up, bespoke the goodness of the crackling log from
which a brilliant train of sparks was doubtless at that moment whirling up the
chimney in honour of his coming--when, superadded to these enticements, there
stole upon him from the distant kitchen a gentle sound of frying, with a musical
clatter of plates and dishes, and a savoury smell that made even the boisterous
wind a perfume--Gabriel felt his firmness oozing rapidly away. He tried to look
stoically at the tavern, but his features would relax into a look of fondness.
He turned his head the other way, and the cold black country seemed to frown him
off, and drive him for a refuge into its hospitable arms.
'The merciful man, Joe,' said the locksmith, 'is merciful to his beast. I'll
get out for a little while.'
And how natural it was to get out! And how unnatural it seemed for a sober
man to be plodding wearily along through miry roads, encountering the rude
buffets of the wind and pelting of the rain, when there was a clean floor
covered with crisp white sand, a well swept hearth, a blazing fire, a table
decorated with white cloth, bright pewter flagons, and other tempting
preparations for a well- cooked meal--when there were these things, and company
disposed to make the most of them, all ready to his hand, and entreating him to
enjoyment!
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