Wandering Heath Part 5

"I doubt if that will do. You see," said Captain Pond, lifting his voice for the benefit of the Die-hards, who by this time were quite as sorely puzzled as their prisoner, "we are about to bury one of our Company, Sergeant Fugler--"

"Ah! he is dead?"

"He is dying," Captain Pond pursued, the more quickly since he now guessed, not without reason, that Fugler was the "good Cornishman" to whose door M. Trinquier had been directed. "He is dying of a hobnailed liver. It is his wish to have the Dead March played at his burying."

"He whistled the tune over to me," said the Doctor; "but plague take me if I can whistle it to you. I've no ear: but I'd know it again if I heard it. Dismal isn't the word for it."

"It will be Handel. I am sure it will be Handel--the Dead March in his _Saul_."

"In his what?"

"In his oratorio of _Saul_. Listen--_poum, poum, prrr, poum_--"

"Be dashed, but you've got it!" cried the Doctor, delighted; "though you do give it a sort of foreign accent. But I daresay that won't be so noticeable on the key-bugle."

"But about this key-bugle, monsieur? And the other instruments?--not to mention the players."

"I've been thinking of that," said Captain Pond. "There's Butcher Tregaskis has a key-bugle. He plays 'Rule Britannia' upon it when he goes round with the suet. He'll lend you that till we can get one down from Plymouth. A drum, too, you shall have. Hockaday's trader calls here to-morrow on her way to Plymouth; she shall bring both instruments back with her. Then we have the church musicians--Peter Tweedy, first fiddle; Matthew John Ede, second ditto; Thomas Tripconey, scorpion--"

"Serpent," the Doctor corrected.

"Well, it's a filthy thing to look at, anyway. Israel Spettigew, ba.s.s-viol; William Henry Phippin, flute; and William Henry Phippin's eldest boy Archelaus to tap the triangle at the right moment.

That boy, sir, will play the triangle almost as well as a man grown."

"Then, monsieur, take me to your house. Give me a little food and drink, pen, ink, and paper, and in three hours you shall have _la part.i.tion_."

Said the Doctor, "That's all very well, Pond, but the church musicianers can't march with their music, as you told me just now."

"I've thought of that, too. We'll have Miller Penrose's covered three-horse waggon to march ahead of the coffin. Hang it in black and go slow, and all the musicianers can sit around inside and play away as merry as grigs."

"The cover'll give the music a sort of m.u.f.fly sound; but that,"

Lieutenant Clogg suggested, "will be all the more fitty for a funeral."

"So it will, Clogg; so it will. But we're wasting time. I suppose you won't object, sir, to be marched down to my house by the Company?

It's the regular thing in case of taking a prisoner, and you'll be left to yourself as soon as you get to my door."

"Not at all," said M. Trinquier amiably.

"Then, gentlemen, fall in! The practice is put off. And when you get home, mind you change your stockings, all of you. We're in luck's way this morning, but that's no reason for recklessness."

So M. Trinquier, sometime Director of Periodical Festivities to the Munic.i.p.ality of Dieppe, was marched down into East Looe, to the wonder and delight of the inhabitants, who had just recovered from the shock of Gunner Spettigew's false alarm, and were in a condition to be pleased with trifles. As the Company tramped along the street, Captain Pond pointed out the Town Hall to his prisoner.

"That will be the most convenient place to hold your practices.

And that is Fugler's house, just opposite."

"But we cannot practise without making a noise."

"I hope not, indeed. Didn't I promise you a big drum?"

"But in that case the sick man will hear. It will disturb his last moments."

"Confound the fellow, he can't have everything! If he'd asked for peace and quiet, he should have had it. But he didn't: he asked for a Dead March. Don't trouble about Fugler. He's not an unreasonable man. The only question is, if the Doctor here can keep him going until you're perfect with the tune."

And this was the question upon which the men of Looe, and especially the Die-hards, hung breathless for the next few days. M. Trinquier produced his score; the musicianers came forward eagerly; Miller Penrose promised his waggon; the big drum arrived from Plymouth in the trader _Good Intent_, and was discharged upon the quay amid enthusiasm. The same afternoon, at four o'clock, M. Trinquier opened his first practice in the Town Hall, by playing over the air of the "Dead Marching Soul"--(to this the popular mouth had converted the name)--upon his cornet, just to give his pupils a general notion of it.

The day had been a fine one, with just that suspicion of frost in the air which indicates winter on the warm south-western coast.

While the musicians were a.s.sembling the Doctor stepped across the street to see how the invalid would take it. Fugler--a sharp-featured man of about fifty, good-looking, with blue eyes and a tinge of red in his hair--lay on his bed with his mouth firmly set and his eyes resting, wistfully almost, on the last wintry sunbeam that floated in by the geraniums on the window-ledge. He had not heard the news. For five days now he expected nothing but the end, and lay and waited for it stoically and with calm good temper.

The Doctor took a seat by the bed-side, and put a question or two.

They were answered by Mrs. Fugler, who moved about the small room quietly, removing, dusting and replacing the china ornaments on the chimneypiece. The sick man lay still, with his eyes upon the sunbeam.

And then very quietly and distinctly the notes of M. Trinquier's key-bugle rose outside on the frosty air.

The sick man started, and made as if to raise himself on his elbow, but quickly sank back again--perhaps from weakness, perhaps because he caught the Doctor's eye and the Doctor's rea.s.suring nod. While he lay back and listened, a faint flush crept into his face, as though the blood ran quicker in his weak limbs; and his blue eyes took a new light altogether.

"That's the tune, hey?" the Doctor asked.

"That's the tune."

"Dismal, ain't it?"

"Ay, it's that." His fingers were beating time on the counterpane.

"That's our new bandmaster. He's got to teach it to the rest, and you've got to hold out till they pick it up. Whew! I'd no idea music could be so dismal."

"Hush 'ee, Doctor, do! till he've a-done. 'Tis like rain on blossom." The last notes fell. "Go you down, Doctor, and say my duty and will he please play it over once more, and Fugler'll gi'e 'em a run for their money."

The Doctor went back to the Town Hall and delivered this _encore_, and M. Trinquier played his solo again; and in the middle of it Mr.

Fugler dropped off into an easy sleep.

After this the musicians met every evening, Sundays and weekdays, and by the third evening the Doctor was able to predict with confidence that Fugler would last out. Indeed, the patient was strong enough to be propped up into a sitting posture during the hour of practice, and not only listened with pleasure to the concerted piece, but beat time with his fingers while each separate instrument went over its part, delivering, at the close of each performance, his opinion of it to Mrs. Fugler or the Doctor: "Tripconey's breath's failin'. He don't do no sort o' justice by that sarpint." Or: "There's Uncle Issy agen! He always do come to grief juss there! I reckon a man of sixty-odd ought to give up the ba.s.s-viol. He ha'n't got the agility."

On the fifth evening Mrs. Fugler was sent across to the Town Hall to ask why the triangle had as yet no share in the performance, and to suggest that William Henry Phippin's eldest boy, Archelaus, played that instrument "to the life." M. Trinquier replied that it was unusual to seek the aid of the triangle in rendering the Dead March in _Saul_. Mr. Fugler sent back word that, "if you came to _that_, the whole thing was unusual, from start to finish." To this M.

Trinquier discovered no answer; and the triangle was included, to the extreme delight of Archelaus Phippin, whose young life had been clouded for a week past.

On the sixth evening, Mr. Fugler announced a sudden fancy to "touch pipe."

"Hey?" said the Doctor, opening his eyes.

"I'd like to tetch pipe. An' let me light the brimstone mysel'.

I likes to see the little blue flame turn yellow, a-dancin' on the baccy."

"Get 'n his pipe and baccy, missis," the Doctor commanded. "He may kill himself clean-off now: the band'll be ready by the funeral, anyway."

On the three following evenings Mr. Fugler sat up and smoked during band practice, the Doctor observing him with a new interest.

The tenth day, the Doctor was called away to attend a child-birth at Downderry. At the conclusion of the cornet solo, with which M.

Trinquier regularly opened practice, the sick man said--

"Wife, get me out my clothes."