The Bail Jumper Part 18

But Riles' displeasure during his drive home was a small thing compared with his rage on discovering that the hailstorm had swept out forty acres of his best crop. The destruction had caught only a corner of his farm, and although his poor neighbour to the south had every stalk of his crop destroyed Riles wasted no sympathy on neighbours, but walked his floor all night nursing his anger and vexation. At an earlier hour than usual he wakened London, and cuffed the boy soundly before he made his escape to the stables. The cows in the corral yawned and rose lazily, stretching their hind quarters to throw off the night's cramp, as a soft mist rose from the warm spots where they had lain. London glanced at the house, but there was no sign of Riles; then he softly set the dog on the astonished cattle. For a minute or two they circled the corral; then one old cow, more venturesome than the rest, sprang over the fence, breaking the upper wire in the effort, and all followed her to liberty.

"That'll give 'im somethink helse to worry habout," reflected the boy.

"'E'll think they broke away when the 'ail struck 'em."

Riles' temper showed no improvement during the day, nor for many days thereafter. The loss of forty acres of grain was a matter calling for at least as many days' mourning. The poor neighbour, whose crop was all he had, had taken heart again, and whistled as he ploughed the ruin of the storm underfoot, but Riles could not forget that Providence had been most unfair to him, and was even more brutal than ever with his help, both beast and human.

But London was not the child he had been when first he entered the farmer's employ. He was now eighteen years old, and although small and ungainly of stature, and erratic in many of his mental exploits, he had imbibed something of the ambition and independence of the young men of the district, and he chafed more than ever under Riles' authority. He found opportunity frequently to visit the Grant farmhouse; in fact, whenever the cattle were lost he first inquired at Grant's, and it was noticed that on such occasions the stray animals were never discovered until long after dark. This meant a booting from Riles, but London held a couple of hours' respite with the Grant boys well worth the price.

Sometimes, too, he would chat with Susy Grant or Miss Vane, and neither girl guessed the strange workings of his dwarfed little intellect.

"Everybody calls you London," said Miss Vane, one evening. "But that must be a nickname. Tell me, what is your real name? What did your mother call you, or do you remember your mother?" she added, softly.

"My real name is Wilfred Vickery," answered the boy, "but n.o.body calls me that. Guess Hi'm not worth a real name," he continued, with a bitter little laugh. "My mother gave me that name, but Hi never 'eard 'er speak it, leastways, not as Hi remembers hof."

"That is a nice name," said Myrtle. "I am going to call you Wilfred. You must not think you are not worthy of a good name. You must feel worthy-and then be worthy."

"That's not wot they say hin the churches," the boy replied. "Once Hi went to church hin the school'ouse, to see w'at hit was loike, an' the preacher said as 'ow we was all sinners, an' 'ow we was hall to think wot big sinners we was, an' 'ow we was all to think we was a bigger sinner than anybody helse. Hi guess Hi am, too, bigger'n anybody-'cept old Riles."

"Have you tried not to be a sinner?" the girl asked.

"Wot? Not to be a sinner? Hi tried to do wot the preacher said, an' be the biggest sinner ever was. An' Hi guess Hi am-all but Riles."

"But that is not what the minister meant, Wilfred. He meant that you must be humble, and that you must be sorry for your own wrongdoing."

"Wot is 'umble?"

"Why, to be humble is to feel that you are in the world to help, and to be of service to other people, no matter who they may be."

"Are you 'umble, Miss Vane?"

The question was quite unexpected, and the girl hesitated for a moment as she descended from the abstract to the concrete.

"I hope I am," she said at length.

"But people say as 'ow you are proud an' stuck hup."

"Do they Wilfred? Who say that?"

"Riles an' Mrs. Riles. She says as 'ow you're a 'ot-'ouse plant, fer hornament more than use."

"Dear me, that is too bad," laughed the girl, and the ripple of her voice was good to hear. Even London knew that it was-he couldn't describe it-but _different_ from any other voice. "But, supposing Mrs.

Riles is right, don't you think that to be an ornament is to be useful?

Look at that tiger lily; is it not beautiful? But of what use is it?"

"Hi guess. .h.i.t haint no use," said the boy. "But when Hi go over the prairie after the cattle hoften Hi pull a lily, hand Hi loike to walk w'ere they grow."

"And if G.o.d took all the beautiful flowers, and the wonderful clouds, and the glorious sunsets and dawns, and the singing birds, and the weep of the wind as it blows up out of the dark, and-and the beautiful people out of the world, it wouldn't be such a nice place to live in, would it?"

"No, because 'Ee would 'ave to take you, Miss Vane."

The girl coloured, pleased with the genuine and unexpected compliment.

But she turned it to account.

"Then it is possible for the ornamental to be useful, isn't it?"

The setting sun was crimsoning the fleecy clouds far overhead, and throwing long shadows in the warm August evening. Everywhere was the smell of ripening wheat. The tinkle of a cowbell came up from the distance; a meadowlark sang its short liquid tune from a neighbouring fence post.

"Hi guess you're right," said the boy, after a long pause: "Hi guess. .h.i.t's worth while bein' beautiful. Per'aps. .h.i.t's jist has himportant to be beautiful has to raise w'eat hand milk cows, but n.o.body hever talked that wy to me before."

"It's worth thinking about, Wilfred. So many people in this country have not learned that 'the life is more than food, and the body more than raiment.' They can see the use of potatoes, but not of poetry. And they are in such a hurry! Such a hurry to live, one would think they wanted to get their lives over with. Poise and repose are lost arts."

She was looking at the gathering dusk in the east, and spoke as though soliloquizing with herself. London brought her back to earth.

"Hi don't know hall you sy, but hi know wothever you sy his roight," he declared, with sincere gallantry. "Hand Miss Vane, can Hi come at noights w'enhever Hi can sneak away, an'-talk with you, loike we did to-noight?"

"Yes, Wilfred, you may come whenever you can, and we will talk about things that are beautiful, and things that are useful. And we will try to remember that there is nothing so beautiful as a useful life, and nothing so useful as a beautiful life. And there is nothing so precious as-a friend."

She took the hand of the boy, so long friendless, in her own, and in that moment the soul of the little Barnardo orphan burst the bonds of eighteen years' environment and lit up the face of a _man_.

This evening's conversation was the first of many. Wilfred was an artist at devising reasons and excuses for visiting Grants'. And soon an unlooked-for opportunity presented itself. Miss Vane had taken a deep interest in the boy, and did not hesitate to enlist her cousins in a little plan for setting Wilfred at liberty in the evenings. Accordingly, George Grant called on Riles, and, after the customary commonplaces about the weather and the crops, mentioned his desire to get a boy to sit up for an hour or two at night to watch the smudge fires, and put them out after the cattle had settled down. Could Mr. Riles spare London from nine to eleven for a job like that? They would either pay him in money for the boy's services, or allow it when they exchanged labour in threshing time. But perhaps London had enough to do as it was, and would be better in bed after his day's--.

Not a bit of it. He was rusting for want of exercise. Of course, he could go. Grants had always been good neighbours, and they would always find Hiram Riles ready to do a favour. The boy would go over every night as long as he was needed. For, be it said, it was one of the whims of Riles' nature that he entertained no aversion to the Grants.

So it came about that Wilfred spent many of his evenings at the Grant farm. The companionship of the Grant boys, the parental kindness of Mr.

and Mrs. Grant, the ready wit of Susy, which spared neither herself nor her acquaintances, were a relevation to the boy, who had always a.s.sociated farm life with grim labour, hard words and sour dispositions.

At nine at night the farm company gathered about the kitchen table, where were onions from the garden and b.u.t.termilk from the dairy; and as they ate, the exploits of the day were re-enacted, and the best of cheer and fellowship prevailed. And when the simple meal was over, and the "old folks" had gone upstairs, the young people engaged in harmless pastimes and amus.e.m.e.nts for another hour. Miss Vane was the soul of kindness and courtesy to the orphan boy, and although she joined in all the pleasantries of the evening she had through all a deeper purpose than mere pastime, and she seldom failed to have a few serious words with Wilfred before he started on his walk through the dew-laden gra.s.s to the Riles' farm. And the lad was responding to her interest and her confidence. A new spirit seemed to have been born in him, his slouchy habits gave way to an air of brisk alertness, and his speech, although not yet refined, had a tone of seriousness and responsibility unknown in the past.

In conversation Myrtle seized every opportunity to quote to the boy from the masters of literature such selections as his awakening intellect could appreciate, and she had the satisfaction at length of finding his interest excited, not only in the selections themselves, but in the authors of them. She now knew that she had attained her first purpose; she had made his world wider than the boundaries of a little farming community; she had raised him to the point where his mental eye fastened on something beyond his horizon of the past. She had wakened the desire for knowledge; all other things were now possible.

Walking up the path from the pasture field one evening-the self-same path she had walked with Burton in that spring that seemed so many years ago-the light night wind stirred in the tops of the willows growing by the little stream. Against the background of the faintly coloured west distances took on an enchanted perspective, and the little limbs a few feet above their heads could easily be seen as forest monsters stretching into the lowering sky. They paused and sat on a gra.s.sy bank, watching the dusk gather through the lattice-work of leaves, and as they sat the girl repeated softly-

"I remember, I remember The fir-trees dark and high; I used to think their slender tops Were close against the sky.

"It was a childish ignorance, But now 'tis little joy To know I'm farther off from heaven Than when I was a boy."

"I have heard old men choke on that last line, Wilfred," she added, but was hardly prepared for his answer,-

"Yes, but they started 'igh up and grew down. Hi started low down and ham-am, Hi mean-growing up. For me, Hi'm closer to 'even to-night than w'en Hi was a boy-a little boy-for Hi'm a boy yet. Hi'm close to 'even w'en Hi'm close to you," declared the lad, his face flushed with a light she could not see in the darkness.

She laughed lightly, all unguessing the streams of pa.s.sion of which his sincerity should have made her aware. From an equal she could not have accepted the remark without misgiving, but from Wilfred-the idea was so unique that it did not even occur to her.

"Oo wrote that?" the boy demanded, after a silence.

"Thomas Hood," was the answer. "But the night is growing chilly. Let us go to the house. I have a little volume of Hood's I will lend you-if you will read it."

"Hindeed Hi will," he answered, as they walked up the path.

At the house they found that all had retired. Myrtle slipped a little book into Wilfred's hand. "Read 'The Song of the Shirt,' and 'The Bridge of Sighs' and-perhaps-'Eugene Aram.' Good night."

"Good night," he said, and disappeared in the darkness.