The Untilled Field Part 31

He told me his little boy came to fetch him in the evening.

"You're married?"

"Yes, sir, and I've got four children. They're going away for their holidays next week."

"Where are they going?"

"To the sea. It will do them good; a blow on the beach will do them a power of good."

"And when they come back they will tell you about it?"

"Yes."

"And do you ever go away for a holiday?"

"Last year I went with a policeman. A gentleman who pa.s.ses this way, one of my friends, paid four shillings for me. We had a nice dinner in a public house for a shilling, and then we went for a walk."

"And this year are you going with the policeman?"

"I hope so, a friend of mine gave me half-a-crown towards it."

"I'll give you the rest."

"Thankee, sir."

A soft south wind was blowing, and an instinct as soft and as gentle filled my heart, and I went towards some trees. The new leaves were beginning in the branches; and sitting where sparrows were building their nests, I soon began to see further into life than I had seen before. "We're here," I said, "for the purpose of learning what life is, and the blind beggar has taught me a great deal, something that I could not have learnt out of a book, a deeper truth than any book contains." ... And then I ceased to think, for thinking is a folly when a soft south wind is blowing, and an instinct as soft and as gentle fills the heart.

CHAPTER XI

SO ON HE FARES

His mother had forbidden him to stray about the roads, and standing at the garden gate, little Ulick Burke often thought he would like to run down to the ca.n.a.l and watch the boats pa.s.sing. His father used to take him for walks along the towing path, but his father had gone away to the wars two years ago, and standing by the garden gate he remembered how his father used to stop to talk to the lock-keepers. Their talk often turned upon the ca.n.a.l and its business, and Ulick remembered that the ca.n.a.l ended in the Shannon, and that the barges met ships coming up from the sea.

He was a pretty child with bright blue eyes, soft curls, and a shy winning manner, and he stood at the garden gate thinking how the boats rose up in the locks, how the gate opened and let the boats free, and he wondered if his father had gone away to the war in one of the barges. He felt sure if he were going away to the war he would go in a barge. And he wondered if the barge went as far as the war or only as far as the Shannon? He would like to ask his mother, but she would say he was troubling her with foolish questions, or she would begin to think again that he wanted to run away from home. He wondered if he were to hide himself in one of the barges whether it would take him to a battlefield where he would meet his father walking about with a gun upon his shoulder?

And leaning against the gate-post, he swung one foot across the other, though he had been told by his mother that he was like one of the village children when he did it. But his mother was always telling him not to do something, and he could not remember everything he must not do. He had been told not to go to the ca.n.a.l lest he should fall in, nor into the field lest he should tear his trousers. He had been told he must not run in about in the garden lest he should tread on the flowers, and his mother was always telling him he was not to talk to the school children as they came back from school, though he did not want to talk to them. There was a time when he would have liked to talk to them, now he ran to the other side of the garden when they were coming home from school; but there was no place in the garden where he could hide himself from them, unless he got into the dry ditch. The school children were very naughty children; they climbed up the bank, and, holding on to the paling, they mocked at him; and their mockery was to ask him the way to "Hill Cottage;" for his mother had had the name painted on the gate, and no one else in the parish had given their cottage a name.

However, he liked the dry ditch, and under the branches, where the wren had built her nest, Ulick was out of his mother's way, and out of the way of the boys; and lying among the dead leaves he could think of the barges floating away, and of his tall father who wore a red coat and let him pull his moustache. He was content to lie in the ditch for hours, thinking he was a bargeman and that he would like to use a sail.

His father had told him that the boats had sails on the Shannon--if so it would be easy to sail to the war; and breaking off in the middle of some wonderful war adventure, some tale about his father and his father's soldiers, he would grow interested in the life of the ditch, in the coming and going of the wren, in the chirrup of a bird in the tall larches that grew beyond the paling.

Beyond the paling there was a wood full of moss-grown stones and trees overgrown with ivy, and Ulick thought that if he only dared to get over the paling and face the darkness of the hollow on the other side of the paling, he could run across the meadow and call from the bank to a steersman. The steersman might take him away! But he was afraid his mother might follow him on the next barge, and he dreamed a story of barges drawn by the swiftest horses in Ireland.

But dreams are but a makeshift life. He was very unhappy, and though he knew it was wrong he could not help laying plans for escape. Sometimes he thought that the best plan would be to set fire to the house; for while his mother was carrying pails of water from the back yard he would run away; but he did not dare to think out his plan of setting fire to the house, lest one of the spirits which dwelt in the hollow beyond the paling should come and drag him down a hole.

One day he forgot to hide himself in the ditch, and the big boy climbed up the bank, and asked him to give him some gooseberries, and though Ulick would have feared to gather gooseberries for himself he did not like to refuse the boy, and he gave him some, hoping that the big boy would not laugh at him again. And they became friends, and very soon he was friends with them all, and they had many talks cl.u.s.tered in the corner, the children holding on to the palings, and Ulick hiding behind the hollyhocks ready to warn them.

"It's all right, she's gone to the village," Ulick said, one day the big boy asked him to come with them, they were going to spear eels in the brook, and he was emboldened to get over the fence and to follow across the meadow, through the hazels, and very soon it seemed to him that they had wandered to the world's end. At last they came to the brook and the big boy turned up his trousers, and Ulick saw him lifting the stones with his left hand and plunging a fork into the water with his right. When he brought up a struggling eel at the end of the fork Ulick clapped his hands and laughed, and he had never been so happy in his life before.

After a time there were no more stones to raise, and sitting on the bank they began to tell stories. His companions asked him when his father was coming back from the wars, and he told them how his father used to take him for walks up the ca.n.a.l, and how they used to meet a man who had a tame rat in his pocket. Suddenly the boys and girls started up, crying "Here's the farmer," and they ran wildly across the fields. However, they got to the high road long before the farmer could catch them, and his escape enchanted Ulick. Then the children went their different ways, the big boy staying with Ulick, who thought he must offer him some gooseberries. So they crossed the fence together and crouched under the bushes, and ate the gooseberries till they wearied of them. Afterwards they went to look at the bees, and while looking at the insects crawling in and out of their little door, Ulick caught sight of his mother, and she coming towards them. Ulick cried out, but the big boy was caught before he could reach the fence, and Ulick saw that, big as the boy was, he could not save himself from a slapping. He kicked out, and then blubbered, and at last got away. In a moment it would be Ulick's turn, and he feared she would beat him more than she had beaten the boy--for she hated him, whereas she was only vexed with the boy--she would give him bread and water--he had often had a beating and bread and water for a lesser wickedness than the bringing of one of the village boys into the garden to eat gooseberries.

He put up his right hand and saved his right cheek, and then she tried to slap him on the left, but he put up his left hand, and this went on until she grew so angry that Ulick thought he had better allow her to slap him, for if she did not slap him at once she might kill him.

"Down with your hands, sir, down with your hands, sir," she cried, but before he had time to let her slap him she said: "I will give you enough of bees," and she caught one that had rested on a flower and put it down his neck. The bee stung him in the neck where the flesh is softest, and he ran away screaming, unable to rid himself of the bee.

He broke through the hedges of sweet pea, and he dashed through the poppies, trampling through the flower beds, until he reached the dry ditch.

There is something frightful in feeling a stinging insect in one's back, and Ulick lay in the dry ditch, rolling among the leaves in anguish. He thought he was stung all over, he heard his mother laughing, and she called him a coward through an opening in the bushes, but he knew she could not follow him down the ditch. His neck had already begun to swell, but he forgot the pain of the sting in hatred.

He felt he must hate his mother, however wicked it might be to do so.

His mother had often slapped him, he had heard of boys being slapped, but no one had ever put a bee down a boy's back before; he felt he must always hate her, and creeping up through the brambles to where he could get a view of the garden, he waited until he saw her walk up the path into the house; and then, stealing back to the bottom of the ditch, he resolved to get over the paling. A few minutes after he heard her calling him, and then he climbed the paling, and he crossed the dreaded hollow, stumbling over the old stones.

As he crossed the meadow he caught sight of a boat coming through the lock, but the lock-keeper knew him by sight, and would tell the bargeman where he came from, and he would be sent home to his mother.

He ran on, trying to get ahead of the boat, creeping through hedges, frightened lest he should not be able to find the ca.n.a.l! Now he stopped, sure that he had lost it; his brain seemed to be giving way, and he ran on like a mad child up the bank. Oh, what joy! The ca.n.a.l flowed underneath the bank. The horse had just pa.s.sed, the barge was coming, and Ulick ran down the bank calling to the bargeman. He plunged into the water, getting through the bulrushes. Half of the barge had pa.s.sed him, and he held out his hands. The ground gave way and he went under the water; green light took the place of day, and when he struggled to the surface he saw the rudder moving. He went under again, and remembered no more until he opened his eyes and saw the bargeman leaning over him.

"Now, what ails you to be throwing yourself into the water in that way?"

Ulick closed his eyes; he had no strength for answering him, and a little while after he heard someone come on board the barge, and he guessed it must be the man who drove the horse. He lay with his eyes closed, hearing the men talking of what they should do with him. He heard a third voice and guessed it must be a man come up from the cabin. This man said it would be better to take him back to the last lock, and they began to argue about who should carry him. Ulick was terribly frightened, and he was just going to beg of them not to bring him back when he heard one of them say, "It will be easier to leave him at the next lock." Soon after, he felt the boat start again, and when Ulick opened his eyes, he saw hedges gliding past, and he hoped the next lock was a long way off.

"Now," said the steersman, "since you are awaking out of your faint you'll be telling us where you come from, because we want to send you home again."

"Oh," he said, "from a long way off, the Shannon."

"The Shannon!" said the bargeman. "Why, that is more than seventy miles away. How did you come up here?"

It was a dreadful moment. Ulick knew he must give some good answer or he would find himself in his mother's keeping very soon. But what answer was he to give? it was half accident, half cunning that made him speak of the Shannon. The steersman said again, "The Shannon is seventy miles away, how did you get up here?" and by this time Ulick was aware that he must make the bargemen believe that he had hidden himself on one of the boats coming up from the Shannon, and that he had given the bargemen some money, and then he burst into tears and told them he had been very unhappy at home; and when they asked him why he had been unhappy, he did not answer, but he promised he would not be a naughty boy any more if they would take him back to the Shannon. He would be a good boy and not run away again. His pretty face and speech persuaded the bargemen to bring him back to the Shannon; it was decided to say nothing about him to the lock-keeper, and he was carried down to the cabin. He had often asked his father if he might see the bargemen's cabin; and his father had promised him that the next time they went to the ca.n.a.l he should go on board a barge and see the cabin; but his father had gone away to the wars. Now he was in the bargemen's cabin, and he wondered if they were going to give him supper and if he would be a bargeman himself when he grew up to be a man.

Some miles further the boat b.u.mped the edge of the bridge, and on the other side of the bridge there was the lock, and he heard the lock gate shut behind the boat and the water pour into the lock; the lock seemed a long time filling, and he was frightened lest the lock-man might come down to the cabin, for there was no place where he could hide.

After pa.s.sing through the lock one of the men came down to see him, and he was taken on deck, and in the calm of the evening Ulick came to look upon the bargemen as his good angels. They gave him some of their supper, and when they arrived at the next lock they made their beds on the deck, the night being so warm. It seemed to Ulick that he had never seen the night before, and he watched the sunset fading streak by streak, and imagined he was the captain of a ship sailing in the Shannon. The stars were so bright that he could not sleep, and it amused him to make up a long story about the bargemen snoring by his side. The story ended with the sunset, and then the night was blue all over, and raising himself out of his blanket, he watched the moonlight rippling down the ca.n.a.l. Then the night grew grey. He began to feel very cold, and wrapped himself in his blanket tightly, and the world got so white that Ulick grew afraid, and he was not certain whether it would not be better to escape from the boat and run away while everybody slept.

He lay awake maturing his little plan, seeing the greyness pa.s.s away and the sky fill up with pink and fleecy clouds.

One of the men roused, and, without saying a word, went to fetch a horse from the stables, and another went to boil the kettle in the cabin, and Ulick asked if he might help him; and while he blew the fire he heard the water running into the lock, and thought what a fool they were making of the lock-keeper, and when the boat was well on its way towards the next lock the steersman called him to come up, and they breakfasted together. Ulick would have wished this life to go on for ever, but the following day the steersman said:--

"There is only one lock more between this and our last stopping-place.

Keep a look-out for your mother's cottage."

He promised he would, and he beguiled them all the evening with pretended discoveries. That cabin was his mother's cabin. No, it was further on, he remembered those willow-trees. Ulick's object was to get as far away from his home as possible; to get as near the Shannon as he could.

"There's not a mile between us and the Shannon now," said the steersman. "I believe you've been telling us a lot of lies, my young man."

Ulick said his mother lived just outside the town, they would see the house when they pa.s.sed through the last lock, and he planned to escape that night, and about an hour before the dawn he got up, and, glancing at the sleeping men, he stepped ash.o.r.e and ran until he felt very tired. And when he could go no further he lay down in the hay in an outhouse.

A woman found him in the hay some hours after, and he told her his story, and as the woman seemed very kind he laid some stress on his mother's cruelty. He mentioned that his mother had put a bee down his neck, and bending down his head he showed her where the bee had stung him. She stroked his pretty curls and looked into his blue eyes, and she said that anyone who could put a bee down a boy's neck must be a she-devil.

She was a lone widow longing for someone to look after, and in a very short time Ulick was as much loved by his chance mother as he had been hated by his real mother.