Ringfield Part 9

He was silent; new and conflicting ideas clashed in his brain, while very close to him in the warm, fragrant night sat this alluring, sorely tried and lonely creature, who soon found the silence insupportable.

To keep talking was safe; to be long silent impossible, since they seemed to draw nearer and nearer with every moment, and soon it would either be Ringfield's hand upon that dark lock he perceived adorning her white neck, or her head with its crown of hair stealing tenderly towards his shoulder. From such a precipitation of events they were saved by timely recollection of their position and the sounds which reached them from the road. The boat was leaving again, and they knew they had been thus together for an hour. Ringfield rose.

"There is now only the man himself to be seen and made to understand that such stories about you must cease. I shall speak to him at once, to-night perhaps, certainly to-morrow."

At this she quailed and could not control herself; she laid her hands on his arm and all the delicate art of the actress was called upon to a.s.sist her pleading.

"Oh!" she cried, "do you not see that it is better left alone? You take my word--you take my word of honour with you this night--I was never married to that man. Let it rest there. Do not speak with him about me. I could not bear it! I should be so ill, so worried, so unhappy. We scarcely see each other now; let it all be dropped and forgotten. He--he--exaggerated, forgets---- Oh! I do not know how to put it, but you must not speak of it. He did not know what he was saying, you know that yourself."

"That was what I thought at first, certainly."

They remained standing; eye on eye and her firm hands still clasping his arm. "You will promise me?"

He reflected a moment and then gave her his promise.

"On this condition, that if he speaks of it again, to my knowledge, to anyone, anywhere, I must then confront him and prove it a lie on your own showing."

Miss Clairville, only too glad to have gained her point, readily acceded, and Ringfield at once withdrew, fortunately without meeting anyone on the stairs or verandah. And now once more for him prospects were partly fair. Pauline's denial satisfied him; easily deceived on such a score, he knew nothing of intermediate stages of unlicensed and unsanctified affection. In his opinion women were either good or bad, married or unmarried, and to find this coveted one free was enough.

The problem was how to manage the future; whether he would ever be in a position to marry, for it had come to that, and whether Miss Clairville would consent to leave the stage; as far as he was concerned the sooner the better.

CHAPTER X

THE PICNIC

".... The charm Of pious sentiment diffused afar And human charity and social love."

There is an idea which prevails among many thoughtful people, but which is nevertheless a good deal of a fallacy, that in the complex and congested life of cities greater opportunities for observation of character can be found than in the country. Ringfield, for example, would have combated this idea, feeling that he might have left college and taken up his work in some large Western town, preaching every Sunday to a numerous and flourishing congregation, and continued thus for several years without encountering the strongly marked types he had met within a few weeks at St. Ignace. It may be said in general of life in cities of the new world that dwellers in such populous centres are apt to undergo considerable change of character; their natural traits become altered or turned aside, dissimulation and caution are engendered by force of circ.u.mstances, while conformity to usage and imitation enter largely into daily conduct. Thus, environment becomes stronger than heredity; respectability at least is demanded, individualities disappear, and the natural man is outwardly vanquished.

In the village, family failings, vices and virtues remain on exhibition, as it were, for years, known to all about. The blend here and there is recognized; individuals are often remarkable for peculiarities or defects of moral and physical construction, and heredity is strong. The simplicity of surrounding life supplies an impressive background for the elemental pa.s.sions which reveal themselves in primitive or aboriginal force. Absence of standards, absence of amus.e.m.e.nts, the lack of contrast, these are a few of the causes that contribute towards the self-centred existence led by most inhabitants of rural communities. To prove this, one has but to think of a cripple, or a dwarf, or a drunken man, or a maniac; also, to revert to pleasanter images, of an unusual flower or animal, or of convincing and conspicuous personal beauty. What is a cripple in the city? He is pa.s.sed by without a glance, for there are, alas! many like him. What is a dwarf? He only suggests the unnatural or unpleasant; the last circus or a fairy-book. What is a drunken man in a city? Or what a poor maniac? Officers of the police, and places of correction, physicians and nurses are at hand; the suffering and the evildoer are taken away and we know them no more.

But if we change a little part of speech and write the cripple, and proceed to think of the cripple in a village, or the dwarf, or the drunken man or the maniac, we instantly perceive how their presence must greatly colour the limited society in which they exist; how they must either amuse or disgust, arouse sympathy or create fear, as the case may be, and although a calla lily and a red-blooming cactus, a parrot or Persian kitten, are scarcely regarded as curiosities or rarities in the city, they may easily come to be regarded as such in the village.

From uninteresting and unimpersonal generalizations and aggregations such as dwarfs, cripples, lunatics, cats and parrots, we turn to the individuals of the species and behold--it is now The Cripple, The Dwarf, The Maniac, and so on, and how profoundly important the appearance and conduct, habits and dwellings of these--our companions--immediately become. We cannot get away from them, nor they from us. And the beautiful young girl! She is often safer in the city, where a kind of dove-like wisdom soon informs and protects, than in the lonely and silent places of the wilderness. The beauty that was fatally conspicuous in the village finds its rival and its level in the town.

Ringfield had certainly had his full share of ministering to the decadent and the unhappy at St. Ignace, and he was therefore very pleased one day to be called on by the Rev. Mr. Abercorn, inc.u.mbent of St Basil's at Hawthorne, the latter a small settlement, about nine miles distant, in which the English element predominated. Once a year the congregation of St. Basil's gave a picnic tea, when members of surrounding denominations met tranquilly on common ground and neutral territory. Macaulay's description of the peculiar position of the Church of England is nowhere truer than in some isolated districts like these Lower Canadian hamlets. She does, indeed, occupy a happy middle place between the unadorned wooden temples with whitewashed windows of the sects, and the large, aggressive stone churches of the Romish faith. Were her clergy as alive to the situation and the peculiar wants of the _peuple gentil-homme_ as they ought to be, one would meet with greater numbers of adherents to the Episcopal ritual.

Mr. and Mrs. Abercorn were fully in sympathy with the countryside, and acted themselves as runners and scouts in connexion with the picnic tea, the lady seconding her husband in the most able and sagacious manner, the latter bringing to his duties all those charms of culture and presence which ministers of the Episcopal Church so often possess, even when not too richly dowered with profound theological learning or magnetic gifts of oratory. Moral and social wisdom, tact and experience of the world, often atone for intellectual shortcomings, especially in rural districts, and Ringfield was compelled to admit that he was not the only worker in the neighbourhood capable of understanding the wants of the people. Mr. Abercorn was about fifty, but as enthusiastic and energetic as a much younger man.

"I knew something of French life and character before I came out here.

My wife is a native of Jersey. Our severe climate with its long, rigorous winter and short but hot summer has helped to form the national character; also the scenery. I mean that the beauty of the place, of all these fine but lonely, austere rivers and forests creates a melancholy, reflective tendency, and this makes it difficult in the matter of recreation, which last is what so many of our people require, particularly the French. I would have amus.e.m.e.nts going all the time if I could afford it, but that, of course, is not feasible; the _joie de vivre_ is only to be arrived at modestly, and in our small way we try to make our picnic tea a success. We hope you will come over and join us on that occasion. We shall be having it later than usual this year, one reason for this being the fact that such serious illness exists in your own parish. I refer to Mr. Henry Clairville. It would not do to have much visiting between the parishes. And how is he getting on, for I suppose you hear all about him from time to time."

Ringfield, as it happened, knew very little of what was transpiring at the Manor House, but remarked that the worst was over, that the wife of Poussette was still absent from her home, and that Miss Clairville had not returned to her vocation.

"Ah," e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Mr. Abercorn thoughtfully, "a peculiar family, a peculiar family indeed; but they are very fortunate in having you here.

Oh, yes, I am not in the least bigoted, you know,--can't afford to be down here,--and I only hope you'll stay and make a great success of the new church. If everything goes well, we'll hold our picnic on the 1st of November, sort of Harvest Festival and Thanksgiving all in one, and either I or Mrs. Abercorn will drive over for you, as I suppose you will not be setting up a horse just yet."

On the day appointed Ringfield was sitting dully enough in his room over the carpenter's shop. Pauline was lingering on at Poussette's, partly because she had no other place to go, and partly because Ringfield was near. Their relations had not outwardly progressed since the evening on her balcony; several other meetings had taken place, but once a.s.sured that she was free, Ringfield settled to his work, preferring to put the whole episode from him for a while, until he could feel satisfied that she might be approached on the subject of the theatre. Thus their feelings were like Tennyson's wood, all in a mist of green with nothing perfect; meanwhile only a couple of planks separated them at this very instant, and, as usual, his thoughts were hovering about her at this hour, about half-past one o'clock, when he heard his name called by a younger member of the Gagnon family (a numerous one of five boys and four little girls), and descended to meet Mrs. Abercorn. This lady was taking the opportunity, in her role of auxiliary parson and general parochial a.s.sistant, of putting in a good word for Hawthorne and St. Basil's as she sat in her buggy at the door, surrounded by Poussette, Martin, and eight or ten children.

An intractable little mare pawed and shuffled in an uncertain frame of mind, apparently viewing with special disfavour the fiddling of Antoine Archambault, who had been hanging around the village ever since Pauline's return. Glancing consciously up, Ringfield thought he perceived a white hand and gleaming bracelet at the window of his old room.

"We have a rough drive before us, with a bad four miles in one place,"

said Mrs. Abercorn, "so we'll get away at once. You haven't been over to Hawthorne yet, Mr. Ringfield, how is that? But never mind, you'll be one of us after this afternoon at any rate. Do you play croquet?"

Looking rather astonished, Ringfield said "_No_," and the emphasis led Mrs. Abercorn to smile as she observed him more closely. She herself was one of those people of good birth who instinctively ask, no matter where they are placed, of everybody they meet, "Is she a _lady_?" "Is he a _gentleman_?" but who, in spite of this inherent and clannish trait, manage to make friends with the mammon of No-Family. She was literally as broad as she was high; short hair, turning grey, was fantastically curled about her clever, dark eyes; she had two hats, one for summer and one for winter, the latter a man's old seal cap; her skirts and jackets were skimp and dowdy, and her features and complexion unattractive, yet the authority and ease, the whole manner of the true lady made her a delightful companion, and she would have been equally diverting and diverted at a Royal Audience in Buckingham Palace or at a bean-feast on an Indian reserve. She displayed ornaments that were not precisely jewels, the value of which was of genealogical order; thus, she wore her grandfather's fobs and seals, her mother's bracelets of bog-oak and lava, and her brooch contained the hair of her only child, long deceased. She had had one dinner-dress for ten years of black "uncrushable grenadine," cut square, and it was quite true that she was the niece of an earl and the daughter of an admiral, and that she had eloped with the Rev. Marcus Abercorn eighteen years ago.

Ringfield had never met any one like her before, but in spite of her accent, so extremely English that in the Canadian country it was almost certain to be dubbed "affected," and in spite of a bright worldliness he found unusual in a clergyman's wife, he liked her very much and watched her manipulation of the mare--Flora Macdonald--with great interest, and not a little apprehension.

The bad four miles turned out to consist of alternate patches of ancient corduroy road, the logs exposed for a foot or so above the soil, and a long hogs-back of d.y.k.e-veined limestone, the ridges of spar and quartz cutting deep into the rock.

Mrs. Abercorn sighed eloquently for the lanes of Old England as the mare pranced, and the buggy flew over the various obstructions, b.u.mping and swinging in a reckless manner Ringfield had never seen equalled.

"We are a little late," said his aristocratic charioteer, her hat crooked and her mouth quite as vicious as Flora's when touched up with a ragged whip, "but we'll be in time for a game of croquet before tea.

We have the tea at five, because it's beginning to darken so early, and then we have a nice little show in the school-house: Marcus and I both believe in amusing the people. So you see it's not exactly a picnic, but quite a lot of things put together. You'll see presently."

And he did. Father and mother of their people, Mr. and Mrs. Abercorn had inst.i.tuted a remarkable series of "events," as they say on regatta programmes--nautical, terpsich.o.r.ean, athletic, musical and histrionic--grouped under the head of "games" and the large and delighted crowd drawn from several parishes rewarded their cheerful and untiring efforts. The Rector was not only all things to all men but to many women and numerous children as well, and Ringfield noted that, unlike the West, the men a.s.sembled were nearly all old men; there was a marked scarcity of boys and youths, and these old men appeared to be many years older than they had any right to appear. Many of them possessed but a couple of sound teeth apiece, others had retained the lower set more or less horribly intact, while a single tusk adorned the upper gum. Absence of regular visits to the dentist, or indeed of any visits at all, had wrought this ruin in faces also wrinkled and weather-beaten by exposure to the strenuous climate. The women showed to better advantage than the men, and the French were more prepossessing and better preserved than the English, especially in the matter of teeth, owing probably to a steady diet of onions and comparative lack of meat.

Diversity among the ladies included the fat, motherly looking ones, several of whom were spinsters; the young, too-smartly dressed daughters of farmers, possessing very little beauty, but of good height and figure; one person clothed entirely in black silk and very conscious of a new kind of watch, of gold and colours and small, pinned to her left bosom; and last, a couple of conventional Englishwomen staying at the Rectory.

It was natural that Mrs. Abercorn should desire to present to her friends and a few of the "quality" so good-looking a young man as Ringfield, and as soon as the buggy had been tied up under a grove of maples, he was led about by the energetic queen of the feast, whose attire, weird enough while driving, had now culminated in a highly rational although unusual aspect. Everything upon her partook of an unpleasing and surely unnecessary brevity; thus her figure was too short for her breadth, and her skirts too short for her figure; her jacket was too short over her hips, and her gloves too short over her wrists; her hair was too short on her neck and her veil too short over her nose. Yet the rakish hat settled, and the fobs and seals shaken out, she appeared mentally fresh and charming, and the rich cadences of her cultivated voice gave Ringfield pleasure, slightly recalling Miss Clairville's accents, and he was happy in experiencing for the first time in his life that amiable naturalness, inimitable airiness, ease and adaptability, which characterize the Anglican clergy and their method of doing things. Attenuated tennis, Lilliputian Badminton, swings, a greased pole, potato and sack races, fiddling, and dancing on a platform, for the French, all these he pa.s.sed in review with Mrs.

Abercorn and the English ladies, presently partic.i.p.ating in a merry game of croquet on a rocky, uneven, impossible kind of ground. The Rev. Marcus, and the person in black silk joined in this game of croquet, the latter so exclusive that it gave Ringfield the feeling that people must have when they are chosen for a _quadrille d'honneur_.

Without relief or intermission the amus.e.m.e.nts held sway till about half-past four, when even the quality tired of their croquet; the day, though bright, was cold, and a bonfire on the rocks was greatly patronized by the very old and very young, while distant preparations for tea were viewed, at first with stealthy, half-reluctant admiration, and then with open restlessness. The patriarchs--toothless and wrinkled, yet not a man of them over fifty-eight--stood around in expectant silent cl.u.s.ters, and also in their best clothes, of which a great deal of faded red neck-tie and pepper and salt trousers seemed chiefly to strike the eye.

The tea was to be served in the large barn adjoining the church, surrounded on two sides by tall plantations of Indian corn, a rough kind known as horse corn, and not used at table. Very soon those engaged in the games fell away by twos and threes, and the rector and his wife gaily beating the covers afforded by forest and grove, all gradually converged to the meeting point outside the big doors of the barn, through which were now pa.s.sing the wives and daughters of the plough, bearing coa.r.s.e bedroom jugs of tea and coffee, plates of cakes, pies, and sandwiches. The people waiting thus in patient content at the doors were orderly and sober, and none ventured to enter till their rector, having unearthed even the remotest and shyest member of his flock, advanced in florid hurry and taking his wife and Ringfield with him, pa.s.sed under the hanging branches of maize, asparagus, fern and crabapples which decorated the great door. The floor of the barn, although partially cleared, was still half full of straw, and flecks of it flew through the air as the people trooped in, decently awed but amused too, for the ripple of lowered laughter and pleased hum of voices resounded throughout the building. The walls, draped with flags and coloured curtains, held sheaves of gra.s.ses and several lamps in brackets at the sides, and the food, good, plain, with plenty of it, adorned the two long tables that ran down the middle. Ringfield, at the head of a table, was comparing the scene with some Harvest Homes of his youth, and wondering who would start the Doxology, when he heard the rector say, standing a long way off at the end of the other table:--

"We have the Rev. Mr. Ringfield of St. Ignace with us this afternoon, and I have no doubt that he is already as anxious as the rest of you for a share of the good things we see here before us, so I am going to ask him to say--ah--Grace, then we can fall to. Mr. Ringfield, will you be kind enough to ask the blessing?"

There was a pause, not because Ringfield was unready on these occasions nor because of any fear lest his special kind of intercessory gastronomic prayer might fail to carry conviction with it, but on account of the intrusion of two belated arrivals down by the door. He could not distinguish very clearly, but there seemed to be some one either invalided or very young in a basket-chair, wheeled in by a young woman of twenty-two or twenty-three, who entering brusquely, on a run, and laughing, was silenced, and the chair and its occupant pushed back against the wall. This slight but untimely interruption over, Ringfield gazed solemnly around--it was already growing a little dim in the barn--and spoke as follows, with head thrown back, and closed eyes:--

"O Lord, the giver of all good things, who sendest seed-time and harvest, rain and sun on the fruits of the earth and crownest the year with fatness, look down on us at this time and bless us." At this point the Anglicans present sat down under the impression that the "grace" was over. They rose again in confusion as Ringfield continued:--

"We thank Thee for these, Thy temporal blessings vouchsafed unto us as a people. We have Thy pledge in the book of Thy Holy Word, that while the earth remaineth, seed-time and harvest shall not fail. We thank Thee for the fields white with harvest. We thank Thee for our great and beautiful country; for its beneficent laws, its opportunities, its great and unequalled privileges, and we pray for our rulers, for all in authority, for all engaged in the ministry of whatever denomination, for the Queen and the Royal Family. We pray for him whose duty it is to go in and out before this a.s.sembly; grant him wisdom and spiritual strength; bless also the partner of his life work, and may their united labours prevail and resound to Thy glory and the honour of Thy name, and while we remember at this time to thank Thee with full hearts for these temporal gifts, let us be swift to remember also Thy choicer, greater, holier gift of Free Salvation; Mercy, Pardon, Peace, and glorious relief from sin and its thraldom--these may be ours for the asking. O Lord, if any sinner lurk among us, if any poor sinner be at this board to-night, search him, O Lord, and purge his mortal body, try it with Thy true refiner's fire. As our snows are pure, so let us be pure. As our waters are deep yet clear, let our minds be clear of evil, and rid of all offence; and for all who by reason of sin, or pain, or sickness, or any other infirmity either of body or of mind cannot be with us at this time, we pray that Thou wilt comfort, uplift, forgive and relieve them. All--for Christ's sake--Amen."

CHAPTER XI

"ANGEEL!"

"Like a sheep enthralled 'Mid thorns and brambles."

On the conclusion of this address, which was Ringfield's idea of a "grace" and which was modelled on the Methodist formula customary on such occasions, the people, whose appet.i.tes had been held over-long in check, took their seats with expressions of relief and in some cases with audible grunts and whispers of annoyance. The truth was, Ringfield had exhibited a want of tact in expatiating in an eloquent prayer on things better left alone, from the village point of view. It was bad enough to occupy so much time when already it was darkening and soon the lamps would have to be lighted; it was bad enough to pray in public for the rector and his wife; it was entirely inexcusable to hint at the presence of a sinner in their midst, at the very board now covered with the home-made dainties cooked and sent in by the ladies of Hawthorne. In itself perhaps the prayer, though trite and redundant (Ringfield was not in his best vein, no longer single-minded), was eloquent and pointed, and the reference to the snows and rivers of the country extremely poetic and suggestive, yet it was not in accordance with the best taste, although prompted by the best feeling. The rector and his wife, ignoring their own sentiments, made haste to smooth away the little difficulty that had thus unexpectedly arisen, and in a few minutes all was in a pleasant clatter and babble with the pouring of tea, cutting of huge three-decker cakes, and pa.s.sing of large, solid plates holding pyramids of equally large and solid sandwiches.

Ringfield, devoting himself to the English visitors and the person in black silk, who was the widow of a deceased lumber king correctly reputed to have left an enormous fortune, was by the nature of things the last to perceive that he had wounded the delicate sensibilities of the company, and therefore he made a good meal, unconscious of the comments lower down his table and also around the rector.

"It's always the way with them Methodists," said one speaker in a careful undertone, a venerable body of fifty or so, with four teeth left in his head, bent, bald and wrinkled. "They pride themselves on what they call 'extem-pore' speaking." He gave the word only three syllables of course. "Why, it's mostly out of the Prayer Book anyway!