The Toilers of the Field Part 8

"Yes, mother."

"Thee must promise I one thing."

"What be it, mother?"

"As thee won't have I buried by the parish."

Madge began to cry.

"Dost thee hear?"

"I won't."

A long silence.

"Madge!"

"Yes, mother."

"Thee go to the fire. Dost thee see that brick in the chimbley as sticks out a little way?"

"Yes."

"Pull it out."

Madge caught hold, and after a few tugs pulled the brick out.

"Put thee hand in!"

Madge thrust hand and arm into the cavity, and brought out a dirty stocking.

"Has thee got th' stocking?"

"Yes, mother."

"Bury I wi' wots in thur, and take care o' the rest on't. Thee's want it bad enough afore th' spring comes."

Madge replaced the stocking without examining it. She was heavy at heart.

Before morning her mother was dead.

Madge went back to her own cottage, carrying with her just a sovereign in sixpences and fourpenny-bits. She sat down and wept. No one came near her. Her former gossips, always jealous of her beauty, left her alone with her sorrow. But she knew that she could not remain idle. Something must be done. So she went out to rick-work, but there was none to be had. From farm to farm Madge wearily toiled along, meeting the same answer everywhere--"Had got more on now than they could find work for."

Madge felt exceedingly ill as she slowly wended her way homewards. Then for the first time she remembered that she must shortly become a mother.

In her weak state Madge caught cold. She shivered incessantly. The poor child could not rise from her bed in the morning, her limbs were so stiff and her head so bad. She lay there all day, crying to herself.

Hunger at last, towards evening, compelled her to get up and seek food.

There was only a piece of crust in the cupboard and a little lard. She was trying to masticate these when there came a tap at the door. "Come in," said Madge. Farmer Humphreys now appeared in the doorway. He was a short, thick man, with a shock-head of yellow hair, small grey eyes, and lips almost blue.

"There be ten weeks' rent a-owing," said he, sitting down; "and we don't mean to wait no longer. And there's a half-side o' bacon an' a load of f.a.ggots."

"How much is it altogether?"

"Seventeen-and-six."

"I ain't a-got but a pound, and Absalom bean't come whoam."

"The vagabond--cuss 'im!"

"A bean't no vagabond," cried Madge, firing up in defence of her husband.

"Bist thee a-goin' to pay--or bisn't?" said the fellow, beginning to bully.

Madge counted him out the money, and he left, casting an ugly leer on her as he went.

Half-a-crown remained. On that half-crown Madge lived for one whole month. The cold clung to her and grew worse. Her tongue burned and her limbs shook; it was fever as well as cold--that low aguish fever, the curse of the poor. Bread and lard day by day, bread and lard, and a little weak tea. And at the month's end the half-crown was gone: sixpence went for her last half-dozen f.a.ggots. Madge crawled upstairs and wrapped herself up in a blanket, sitting on the side of the bed. It was her miserable loneliness which troubled the poor child most. Her cough, and the cold, and want of food and firing, might have been borne had there been some one to talk to. But alone they did their work. Her form was dreadfully shrunken, her hands as thin and bony as those her old mother last stretched over the fire. The ale-house which had absorbed her husband's earnings sent her no aid in this time of distress, and he had offended the clergyman who would otherwise have found her out. It grew dusky, as the poor creature sat on the edge of the bed. Suddenly there was a hand on the latch of the door downstairs.

Madge trembled with eagerness as a heavy step sounded on the floor--could it be Absalom? Her black eyes, looking larger from the paleness of her sunken cheeks, began to blaze with a new light. The steps came to the foot of the stairs and began ascending. She listened eagerly. A head of yellow hair came up through the trap-door, and the small grey eyes of young Humphreys leered on her. Disappointed and amazed, Madge remained silent. Humphreys came up and sat on the bed beside her.

"Thee's got thin," he said, with a sort of chuckle. "Like some grub, wouldn't ye?"

No answer. He put his hand on her shoulder and muttered something in her ear. Madge seemed scarcely to understand him, but sat staring wildly.

"I'll give thee sixpence," said Humphreys, showing one.

Then a full sense of his dishonourable intentions, mingled with shame and disgust at his unutterable meanness, came over Madge, and rising with a flush on her cheek, she struck him with all her might. It was a feeble blow, but he was unprepared: it over-balanced him; he staggered backwards, and fell heavily down the stairs. Madge, her heart beating painfully fast, leaned back on the bed and listened. There was not a sound. A dreadful thought that he might be killed flashed across her mind. Her impulse was to go down and see, but her strength failed, and she sat down again and waited. It seemed hours before she heard him stir and, after a noise like a great dog shaking himself, with mingled curses and threats, leave the house. Then a great pain came over her. She felt as if she should die, but the greatest dread was the dread of loneliness. She staggered to the window and looked out. A boy was pa.s.sing, and she told him to go to Mrs. Green's and send her down. Then she fell on the bed in a faint, with the window open and the cold, bitter, biting east wind blowing in.

It was half a mile to Mrs. Green's--one of Madge's old gossips. The boy got there in two hours. Mrs. Green was putting her baby to bed, but instantly transferred that duty to her eldest girl, and went off eager for news.

At nine that night the "Good Woman" inn resounded with talk of Madge.

Not a bit nor a drop was there in the house, according to Mrs. Green.

The landlord said Absalom owed him two shillings unpaid score: he could forgive her the debt, but he couldn't give nothing. Mrs. Green went home for her supper, and returning, found Madge conscious. She would not have the parish doctor.

"Bellows," the tinker, had during these late months been out on an itinerant journey. He came home that night, and at the "Good Woman"

heard the news. His quick wit put him up to a plan to serve the poor girl. Early in the morning he took his pack and went through the village up to the Rev. Mr. Horton's. There, under pretence of asking for kettles to mend, he told the most dismal tale to the housemaid. At breakfast-time this was reported to Mrs. Horton. Distress at such a time was sufficient to engage any lady's attention. Mrs. Horton was a frail, tender woman, but earnest in works of charity. The ponies were ordered, and down they drove. The tale was not overdrawn. "Not a crust in the cupboard--not a stick to light a fire: the poor creature starved, and--and--you know, coming," said the good lady afterwards, describing the scene. "John drove after the doctor instantly, and I stayed. Poor girl! It was still-born; and she, poor thing! we saw, could not live long."

Madge, indeed, died the same night, totally worn out at nineteen.

And Absalom? He had gone to work on a distant railway as a navvy, and, earning good wages and able to enjoy himself nightly at the taverns, forgot poor Madge. Months went on. News travels slowly among the poor, but at last intelligence did reach him that his mother was dead and Madge starving. To do him justice, he had never thought of that, and he started at once for home, travelling on foot. But pa.s.sing through a village with his bundle on his shoulders, he was arrested by a policeman who observed some blood on it. It was on the slop he had worn in the fight at the "Good Woman," and came only from the nose. But there had been a brutal murder in the neighbourhood, the public mind was excited, and Absalom was remanded for inquiries. It took a fortnight to prove his ident.i.ty, and by then Madge was dead.

Absalom went back to the railway and drank harder than ever. It was observed that he drank now by himself and for drinking's sake, whereas before he had only been fond of liquor with company. After a year he found his way back home. Madge was forgotten, and he easily got work.

Likely young men are not so common on farms: strict inquiries are rarely made.

The last that was heard of him appeared in the local newspaper:--

"DRUNK AND DISORDERLY.--Absalom White was brought up in custody, charged with obstructing the road while in a state of intoxication. Fined five shillings and seven-and-six costs."