The Star-Gazers Part 48

"Here, don't you do anything of the kind, my lads," cried Oldroyd. "I forbid it, mind. Now get me my pony."

"All right, sir; we'll mind what you says," said the man who had spoken, looking mirthfully round at his companions, one of whom at once accompanied him to a low shed where the pony was munching some hay. The willing little beast was saddled while Oldroyd walked up and down the path with an abundance of sweet-scented and gay old-fashioned flowers on either side. Carnations and scarlet lychnis, and many-headed sun flowers and the like, were bright in the morning sunshine, for all seemed to have been well tended; but, all at once, he came upon a terrible tell-tale bit of evidence of the last night's work upon the red bricks that formed the path--one that made him sc.r.a.pe off a little mould from the bed with his foot, and spread it over the ugly patch.

"The cottage looks simple and innocent enough, with its roses, to be the home of peace," he muttered. "Ah! how man does spoil his life for the sake of coin. Thank you, my lad--that's right," he added, as his last night's messenger brought the pony to the gate.

He mounted, and thrust a coin, that he could not spare, into his temporary ostler's hand.

"Let him go. Fine morning, isn't it?"

But Caleb held on st.u.r.dily by the pony's bridle, and thrust the piece back with an air of st.u.r.dy independence.

"No, thankye, sir," he said. "Me and my mates don't want paying by a gentleman as comes to help one of us. 'Sides which, we're a-going to pay you; aren't we, lads?"

"Ay, that's so," growled the others. "Don't take it."

With the cleverness of a pickpocket, but the reverse action--say of a negative and not a positive pickpocket--the florin was thrust into Oldroyd's vest, and the man drew back, leaving the doctor to pursue his way.

"Poachers even are not so black as they are painted," he said to himself as he cantered along, and then he fell to thinking of the girl he had seen that morning. "They've better daughters than you would have suspected, more affectionate wives, the best of neighbours, and companions as honest and faithful as one could wish; and, all the while, they are a set of confounded scoundrels and thieves, for it's just as dishonest to shoot and steal a man's carefully-raised foreign birds--his pheasants--as it is to break into a hen-roost. As to partridges and hares, of course they are wild things; but, so long as they lived and bred on one's land, they must be as genuine property as the apples and pears that grow upon a fellow's trees. Yes, poachers are thieves; and I daresay my friend there, with the shot-hole in his body, is as great a scoundrel as the worst."

He laughed as he cantered along the soft green beside the road.

"My practice is improving. I shall have my connection amongst the rogues and vagabonds mightily increased, for I certainly shall not go and inform the police: not my business to do that. They're punished enough, even if I pull him through. And I shall," he said aloud. "I must and will, for the sake of his pretty daughter. I wonder whether they'll pay me after all," he went on, as the pony ambled over the gra.s.s, and the naturally sordid ideas of the man often pressed for money and struggling for his income, came uppermost. "When people are in the first throes of excitement and grat.i.tude for the help Doctor Bolus has rendered them, they almost worship him, and they'll give, or rather they will promise, anything; but when time has had his turn, and the grat.i.tude has begun to cool, it's a different thing altogether; and, last of all, when the bill goes in--oh dear, for poor human nature, if the case had been left alone, A, B, C, or D would have got better without help.

"Well, never mind," he said merrily, for the refreshment and the delicious morning air were telling upon his spirits, "the world goes round and round all the same, and human nature is one of the things that cannot be changed."

He had to turn the pony out on to the road here, for the long green strands of the brambles were hanging right out over the gra.s.s, and catching at his legs as he cantered by. The soft mists were floating away as he began to descend the hilly slope, still at his feet the landscape seemed to be half hidden by clouds, through which hillocks, and hedge, and trees were visible, with here and there a house or a brown patch of the rough common land; and right away on the other side, stood up, grim and depressing of aspect, the ugly brick house upon the big hillock of sand, with the various and grim-looking edifices that Moray Alleyne had raised. Forming a background were the sombre fir trees with the column-topped slope and hill; and, even at that distance, he could make out, here and there, portions of the sandy lane that skirted the pine slope, which formed so striking an object in the surrounding landscape.

So beautiful was the scene in the early morning, so varied the tints, that Oldroyd checked his pony, and told himself that he could not do better than pause and admire the landscape. But somehow his eyes lit upon the ugliest object there, focused themselves so as to get the most photographic idea upon the polished plate of his memory, and there they stayed, for he saw nothing else but Mrs Alleyne's gloomy house.

This, however, is not quite the fact, for in a most absurd way--for a young medical man who had been telling himself a hundred times over that it would be insanity for him to think of marrying--he furnished that gloomy picture with one figure that seemed to him to turn the whole place into a palace of beauty, of whose aspect he could never tire.

"Go along!" he exclaimed aloud at last, as if to himself for his absurd thoughts; but the pony took the order as being applied to the beast of burden present, and went off at once in a good canter, one that gained spirit from the fact that he knew the way and that way was homewards.

So absorbed was Oldroyd that he left the st.u.r.dy little animal to itself, and it went pretty swiftly over the driest bits of close, velvety turf, cleverly avoiding the bigger furze clumps, and reaching at last the lighter ground where the fir trees grew. Then it snorted and would have increased its pace, but there were awkward stumps here and there, and slippery places, such as the cleverest pony could not avoid, so the rider drew rein, and let the little steed amble gently along.

All at once Philip Oldroyd's heart seemed to stand still, and he checked the pony suddenly, sitting breathless and half stunned, gazing straight before him at a couple of figures pa.s.sing along the road.

He drew a long breath that hissed between his closed teeth; and even a pearl diver might have envied his power of retaining that breath, so long was it before he exhaled it again.

Then he turned his pony's head, bent down his darkened face till his chin rested upon his breast, and rode forward again; but the pony began to resist a change which suggested going right away from home. He drummed its ribs fiercely with his heels, and pressed it on, but only to turn its head directly after, forcing himself into a state of composure as he rode quietly by Lucy Alleyne and Rolph, and saluted them as he pa.s.sed.

It was hard work to ride on like that, without looking back, but he mastered himself and went quickly on for some distance before drawing rein, and sitting like a statue upon the pony, which began to graze, and only lifted its head and gave a momentary glance at Lucy, when, sobbing as if she would break her heart, the little lady nearly ran up against the waiting rider and his steed.

"Mr Oldroyd!" cried Lucy, after giving vent to that astonished, frightened "Oh!"

"Yes, Miss Alleyne," he said coldly, "Mr Oldroyd."

"Why--why are you stopping me like that? Oh, I beg your pardon; good-morning!" she cried hastily, and in a quick, furtive way she swept the tears from her eyes, and wiped her pretty little nose, which crying was turning of a pinky hue.

"Was I stopping you?" he said, speaking mechanically, and glancing straight before him. "I have been out all night with a patient six miles away."

"Indeed!" said Lucy, hastily; "yes, it is a beautiful morning."

She went by him without trusting herself to look in his face.

"If I did so, I should burst out sobbing," she said to herself.

But by the time Lucy had gone half a score yards, Oldroyd was by her side, the pony keeping step with her, pace for pace, while the little woman's breast was heaving with love, sorrow and despair.

"What will he think? what will he think?" she kept saying to herself as she longed to lay her hands in his, and to tell him that it was no fault of hers, but an accident that Captain Rolph had met her during her walk.

But she could not tell him--she dared not. It was like a confession that she cared for his opinion more than for that of anybody in the world. It would be unmaidenly, and degrading, and strange; and there was nothing for her to do but a.s.sume anger and annoyance, and treat Oldroyd as if he had been playing the part of spy.

A very weak conclusion, no doubt, but it was the only one at which, in her misery, she arrived.

The sun was shining now from a pure, blue sky, the birds were darting beneath the trees, where the long spider webs hung, strung with jewels, that flashed and glowed as they were pa.s.sing fast away. There was a delicious aroma, too, in the soft breeze that floated from among the gloomy pines; but to those who went on, side by side, it was as if the morning had become overcast; all was stormy and grey, and life was in future to be one long course of desolation and despair. Nature was at her best, and all was beautiful; but Lucy could not see a ray of hope in the far-off future. Philip Oldroyd could see a gloomy, wasted life--the life of a man who had trusted and believed; but to find that the woman was weak and vain as the rest of her s.e.x.

They had relapsed into silence, and were going on pretty swiftly towards The Firs, but their proceedings did not seem to either to be at all strange. Lucy's destination was, of course, home, and Oldroyd appeared resolved to accompany her; why, he knew not, and it did not trouble him after the first few minutes, seeming quite natural that he should take her to task, and he determined, as a punishment, to see her safely back.

She did not deserve it, of that she was sure, but there was something comfortable and satisfactory in being thus silently scolded by one much wiser and stronger than herself.

Oldroyd wished to speak. He had a good deal to say--so he felt, but not a word escaped him till they reached the steep path that ran up to the gates at The Firs, when he drew rein, and made way for Lucy to pa.s.s.

"Good-bye," he said.

"Good-bye," faltered Lucy, looking at him wistfully.

He looked down into her eyes from where he sat, with his very heart ready to leap from his breast towards her; but, as he gazed, he saw again the sunny sandy road with the velvety gra.s.s, and golden-bloomed furze on either side; the long, sloping bank with its columnar pines, and the dark background of sombre green, while in front was Lucy, the girl in whom he had so believed, walking with Rolph; and then all was bitterness and cloud once more.

"He was marked," thought Oldroyd; "there was a patch of plaister on his forehead. Hang it all! could he have shot that man?"

The doctor's heart beat fast, for, in a confused fashion, light, the glimmering light upon a reflector when an image plays about the focus of a telescope, he saw difficulties dragging Captain Rolph away from that neighbourhood: a man dying of his wounds, and Lucy Alleyne turning from her idol in utter disgust.

But he shook his head.

"Nothing to me," he cried, with a bitter laugh, as he rode away. "The old story--Nature a.s.serting herself once more. A fine figure, grand muscles, a chest that is deep and round, and the n.o.ble bovine front of a bull, and you have the demi-G.o.d gentle woman makes her worship. Ah, well, it was time I awakened from a silly dream. Good-bye, little Lucy, good-bye! Next time I come to see your brother, I'll wear the armoured jerkin of common sense. What a weak idiot I have been."

There were no mushrooms that morning for Mrs Alleyne's breakfast; those which Lucy should have brought home lying by the wayside, whereat the slugs rejoiced and had a glorious banquet all to themselves.

Volume 2, Chapter IX.

THE MAJOR HAPPENS TO BE THERE.

A poaching affray was too common an affair in the neighbourhood of Brackley to make much stir. Sir John went in for two or three discussions with his keepers, and the rural policeman had been summoned, this worthy feeling sure that he would be able--in his own words--to put his hand upon the parties; but though the officer might have had the ability to put his hand upon the parties, he did not do so, or if he did, he forgot to close it. Then the dog was buried, and as a set off, Sir John had a fire made of the nets and stakes that had been taken from the gang; these, and their spoil of several brace of pheasants and partridges and a few hares, having been left behind in their hurried flight.

So, as it happened, the active and intelligent constable made no discoveries; but Rolph did, and whereas the one would have revelled in the hopes of promotion, and in seeing his name several times in the county paper; the other, when he had made his discovery, said only--and to himself--that it was "doosid awkward," and held his peace.

"I never did see such a girl as you are to read," said Rolph, entering the drawing-room one afternoon, when he had ridden over from Aldershot; "at it again."