CHAPTER VII--THE WALK TO WARM'ELL CROSS AND AFTERWARDS
As the goods had all to be carried to Budmouth that night, the
excisemen's next object was to find horses and carts for the
journey, and they went about the village for that purpose. Latimer
strode hither and thither with a lump of chalk in his hand, marking
broad-arrows so vigorously on every vehicle and set of harness that
he came across, that it seemed as if he would chalk broad-arrows on
the very hedges and roads. The owner of every conveyance so marked
was bound to give it up for Government purposes. Stockdale, who had
had enough of the scene, turned indoors thoughtful and depressed.
Lizzy was already there, having come in at the back, though she had
not yet taken off her bonnet. She looked tired, and her mood was
not much brighter than his own. They had but little to say to each
other; and the minister went away and attempted to read; but at this
he could not succeed, and he shook the little bell for tea.
Lizzy herself brought in the tray, the girl having run off into the
village during the afternoon, too full of excitement at the
proceedings to remember her state of life. However, almost before
the sad lovers had said anything to each other, Martha came in in a
steaming state.
'O, there's such a stoor, Mrs. Newberry and Mr. Stockdale! The
king's excisemen can't get the carts ready nohow at all! They
pulled Thomas Ballam's, and William Rogers's, and Stephen Sprake's
carts into the road, and off came the wheels, and down fell the
carts; and they found there was no linch-pins in the arms; and then
they tried Samuel Shane's waggon, and found that the screws were
gone from he, and at last they looked at the dairyman's cart, and
he's got none neither! They have gone now to the blacksmith's to
get some made, but he's nowhere to be found!'
Stockdale looked at Lizzy, who blushed very slightly, and went out
of the room, followed by Martha Sarah. But before they had got
through the passage there was a rap at the front door, and Stockdale
recognized Latimer's voice addressing Mrs. Newberry, who had turned
back.
'For God's sake, Mrs. Newberry, have you seen Hardman the blacksmith
up this way? If we could get hold of him, we'd e'en a'most drag him
by the hair of his head to his anvil, where he ought to be.'
'He's an idle man, Mr. Latimer,' said Lizzy archly. 'What do you
want him for?'
'Why, there isn't a horse in the place that has got more than three
shoes on, and some have only two. The waggon-wheels be without
strakes, and there's no linch-pins to the carts. What with that,
and the bother about every set of harness being out of order, we
shan't be off before nightfall--upon my soul we shan't. 'Tis a
rough lot, Mrs. Newberry, that you've got about you here; but
they'll play at this game once too often, mark my words they will!
There's not a man in the parish that don't deserve to be whipped.'
It happened that Hardman was at that moment a little further up the
lane, smoking his pipe behind a holly-bush. When Latimer had done
speaking he went on in this direction, and Hardman, hearing the
exciseman's steps, found curiosity too strong for prudence. He
peeped out from the bush at the very moment that Latimer's glance
was on it. There was nothing left for him to do but to come forward
with unconcern.
'I've been looking for you for the last hour!' said Latimer with a
glare in his eye.
'Sorry to hear that,' said Hardman. 'I've been out for a stroll, to
look for more hid tubs, to deliver 'em up to Gover'ment.'
'O yes, Hardman, we know it,' said Latimer, with withering sarcasm.
'We know that you'll deliver 'em up to Gover'ment. We know that all
the parish is helping us, and have been all day! Now you please
walk along with me down to your shop, and kindly let me hire ye in
the king's name.'
They went down the lane together; and presently there resounded from
the smithy the ring of a hammer not very briskly swung. However,
the carts and horses were got into some sort of travelling
condition, but it was not until after the clock had struck six, when
the muddy roads were glistening under the horizontal light of the
fading day. The smuggled tubs were soon packed into the vehicles,
and Latimer, with three of his assistants, drove slowly out of the
village in the direction of the port of Budmouth, some considerable
number of miles distant, the other excisemen being left to watch for
the remainder of the cargo, which they knew to have been sunk
somewhere between Ringsworth and Lulstead Cove, and to unearth
Owlett, the only person clearly implicated by the discovery of the
cave.
Women and children stood at the doors as the carts, each chalked
with the Government pitchfork, passed in the increasing twilight;
and as they stood they looked at the confiscated property with a
melancholy expression that told only too plainly the relation which
they bore to the trade.
'Well, Lizzy,' said Stockdale, when the crackle of the wheels had
nearly died away. 'This is a fit finish to your adventure. I am
truly thankful that you have got off without suspicion, and the loss
only of the liquor. Will you sit down and let me talk to you?'
'By and by,' she said. 'But I must go out now.'
'Not to that horrid shore again?' he said blankly.
'No, not there. I am only going to see the end of this day's
business.'
He did not answer to this, and she moved towards the door slowly, as
if waiting for him to say something more.
'You don't offer to come with me,' she added at last. 'I suppose
that's because you hate me after all this?'
'Can you say it, Lizzy, when you know I only want to save you from
such practices? Come with you of course I will, if it is only to
take care of you. But why will you go out again?'
'Because I cannot rest indoors. Something is happening, and I must
know what. Now, come!' And they went into the dusk together.
When they reached the turnpike-road she turned to the right, and he
soon perceived that they were following the direction of the
excisemen and their load. He had given her his arm, and every now
and then she suddenly pulled it back, to signify that he was to halt
a moment and listen. They had walked rather quickly along the first
quarter of a mile, and on the second or third time of standing still
she said, 'I hear them ahead--don't you?'
'Yes,' he said; 'I hear the wheels. But what of that?'
'I only want to know if they get clear away from the neighbourhood.'
'Ah,' said he, a light breaking upon him. 'Something desperate is
to be attempted!--and now I remember there was not a man about the
village when we left.'
'Hark!' she murmured. The noise of the cartwheels had stopped, and
given place to another sort of sound.
''Tis a scuffle!' said Stockdale. 'There'll be murder! Lizzy, let
go my arm; I am going on. On my conscience, I must not stay here
and do nothing!'
'There'll be no murder, and not even a broken head,' she said. 'Our
men are thirty to four of them: no harm will be done at all.'
'Then there IS an attack!' exclaimed Stockdale; 'and you knew it was
to be. Why should you side with men who break the laws like this?'
'Why should you side with men who take from country traders what
they have honestly bought wi' their own money in France?' said she
firmly.
'They are not honestly bought,' said he.
'They are,' she contradicted. 'I and Owlett and the others paid
thirty shillings for every one of the tubs before they were put on
board at Cherbourg, and if a king who is nothing to us sends his
people to steal our property, we have a right to steal it back
again.'
Stockdale did not stop to argue the matter, but went quickly in the
direction of the noise, Lizzy keeping at his side. 'Don't you
interfere, will you, dear Richard?' she said anxiously, as they drew
near. 'Don't let us go any closer: 'tis at Warm'ell Cross where
they are seizing 'em. You can do no good, and you may meet with a
hard blow!'
'Let us see first what is going on,' he said. But before they had
got much further the noise of the cartwheels began again; and
Stockdale soon found that they were coming towards him. In another
minute the three carts came up, and Stockdale and Lizzy stood in the
ditch to let them pass.
Instead of being conducted by four men, as had happened when they
went out of the village, the horses and carts were now accompanied
by a body of from twenty to thirty, all of whom, as Stockdale
perceived to his astonishment, had blackened faces. Among them
walked six or eight huge female figures, whom, from their wide
strides, Stockdale guessed to be men in disguise. As soon as the
party discerned Lizzy and her companion four or five fell back, and
when the carts had passed, came close to the pair.
'There is no walking up this way for the present,' said one of the
gaunt women, who wore curls a foot long, dangling down the sides of
her face, in the fashion of the time. Stockdale recognized this
lady's voice as Owlett's.
'Why not?' said Stockdale. 'This is the public highway.'
'Now look here, youngster,' said Owlett. 'O, 'tis the Methodist
parson!--what, and Mrs. Newberry! Well, you'd better not go up that
way, Lizzy. They've all run off, and folks have got their own
again.'
The miller then hastened on and joined his comrades. Stockdale and
Lizzy also turned back. 'I wish all this hadn't been forced upon
us,' she said regretfully. 'But if those excisemen had got off with
the tubs, half the people in the parish would have been in want for
the next month or two.'
Stockdale was not paying much attention to her words, and he said,
'I don't think I can go back like this. Those four poor excisemen
may be murdered for all I know.'
'Murdered!' said Lizzy impatiently. 'We don't do murder here.'
'Well, I shall go as far as Warm'ell Cross to see,' said Stockdale
decisively; and, without wishing her safe home or anything else, the
minister turned back. Lizzy stood looking at him till his form was
absorbed in the shades; and then, with sadness, she went in the
direction of Nether-Moynton.
The road was lonely, and after nightfall at this time of the year
there was often not a passer for hours. Stockdale pursued his way
without hearing a sound beyond that of his own footsteps; and in due
time he passed beneath the trees of the plantation which surrounded
the Warm'ell Cross-road. Before he had reached the point of
intersection he heard voices from the thicket.
'Hoi-hoi-hoi! Help, help!'
The voices were not at all feeble or despairing, but they were
unmistakably anxious. Stockdale had no weapon, and before plunging
into the pitchy darkness of the plantation he pulled a stake from
the hedge, to use in case of need. When he got among the trees he
shouted--'What's the matter--where are you?'
'Here,' answered the voices; and, pushing through the brambles in
that direction, he came near the objects of his search.
'Why don't you come forward?' said Stockdale.
'We be tied to the trees!'
'Who are you?'
'Poor Will Latimer the exciseman!' said one plaintively. 'Just come
and cut these cords, there's a good man. We were afraid nobody
would pass by to-night.'
Stockdale soon loosened them, upon which they stretched their limbs
and stood at their ease.
'The rascals!' said Latimer, getting now into a rage, though he had
seemed quite meek when Stockdale first came up. ''Tis the same set
of fellows. I know they were Moynton chaps to a man.'
'But we can't swear to 'em,' said another. 'Not one of 'em spoke.'
'What are you going to do?' said Stockdale.
'I'd fain go back to Moynton, and have at 'em again!' said Latimer.
'So would we!' said his comrades.
'Fight till we die!' said Latimer.
'We will, we will!' said his men.
'But,' said Latimer, more frigidly, as they came out of the
plantation, 'we don't KNOW that these chaps with black faces were
Moynton men? And proof is a hard thing.'
'So it is,' said the rest.
'And therefore we won't do nothing at all,' said Latimer, with
complete dispassionateness. 'For my part, I'd sooner be them than
we. The clitches of my arms are burning like fire from the cords
those two strapping women tied round 'em. My opinion is, now I have
had time to think o't, that you may serve your Gover'ment at too
high a price. For these two nights and days I have not had an
hour's rest; and, please God, here's for home-along.'
The other officers agreed heartily to this course; and, thanking
Stockdale for his timely assistance, they parted from him at the
Cross, taking themselves the western road, and Stockdale going back
to Nether-Moynton.
During that walk the minister was lost in reverie of the most
painful kind. As soon as he got into the house, and before entering
his own rooms, he advanced to the door of the little back parlour in
which Lizzy usually sat with her mother. He found her there alone.
Stockdale went forward, and, like a man in a dream, looked down upon
the table that stood between him and the young woman, who had her
bonnet and cloak still on. As he did not speak, she looked up from
her chair at him, with misgiving in her eye.
'Where are they gone?' he then said listlessly.
'Who?--I don't know. I have seen nothing of them since. I came
straight in here.'
'If your men can manage to get off with those tubs, it will be a
great profit to you, I suppose?'
'A share will be mine, a share my cousin Owlett's, a share to each
of the two farmers, and a share divided amongst the men who helped
us.'
'And you still think,' he went on slowly, 'that you will not give
this business up?'
Lizzy rose, and put her hand upon his shoulder. 'Don't ask that,'
she whispered. 'You don't know what you are asking. I must tell
you, though I meant not to do it. What I make by that trade is all
I have to keep my mother and myself with.'
He was astonished. 'I did not dream of such a thing,' he said. 'I
would rather have swept the streets, had I been you. What is money
compared with a clear conscience?'
'My conscience is clear. I know my mother, but the king I have
never seen. His dues are nothing to me. But it is a great deal to
me that my mother and I should live.'
'Marry me, and promise to give it up. I will keep your mother.'
'It is good of you,' she said, trembling a little. 'Let me think of
it by myself. I would rather not answer now.'
She reserved her answer till the next day, and came into his room
with a solemn face. 'I cannot do what you wished!' she said
passionately. 'It is too much to ask. My whole life ha' been
passed in this way.' Her words and manner showed that before
entering she had been struggling with herself in private, and that
the contention had been strong.
Stockdale turned pale, but he spoke quietly. 'Then, Lizzy, we must
part. I cannot go against my principles in this matter, and I
cannot make my profession a mockery. You know how I love you, and
what I would do for you; but this one thing I cannot do.'
'But why should you belong to that profession?' she burst out. 'I
have got this large house; why can't you marry me, and live here
with us, and not be a Methodist preacher any more? I assure you,
Richard, it is no harm, and I wish you could only see it as I do!
We only carry it on in winter: in summer it is never done at all.
It stirs up one's dull life at this time o' the year, and gives
excitement, which I have got so used to now that I should hardly
know how to do 'ithout it. At nights, when the wind blows, instead
of being dull and stupid, and not noticing whether it do blow or
not, your mind is afield, even if you are not afield yourself; and
you are wondering how the chaps are getting on; and you walk up and
down the room, and look out o' window, and then you go out yourself,
and know your way about as well by night as by day, and have
hairbreadth escapes from old Latimer and his fellows, who are too
stupid ever to really frighten us, and only make us a bit nimble.'
'He frightened you a little last night, anyhow: and I would advise
you to drop it before it is worse.'
She shook her head. 'No, I must go on as I have begun. I was born
to it. It is in my blood, and I can't be cured. O, Richard, you
cannot think what a hard thing you have asked, and how sharp you try
me when you put me between this and my love for 'ee!'
Stockdale was leaning with his elbow on the mantelpiece, his hands
over his eyes. 'We ought never to have met, Lizzy,' he said. 'It
was an ill day for us! I little thought there was anything so
hopeless and impossible in our engagement as this. Well, it is too
late now to regret consequences in this way. I have had the
happiness of seeing you and knowing you at least.'
'You dissent from Church, and I dissent from State,' she said. 'And
I don't see why we are not well matched.'
He smiled sadly, while Lizzy remained looking down, her eyes
beginning to overflow.
That was an unhappy evening for both of them, and the days that
followed were unhappy days. Both she and he went mechanically about
their employments, and his depression was marked in the village by
more than one of his denomination with whom he came in contact. But
Lizzy, who passed her days indoors, was unsuspected of being the
cause: for it was generally understood that a quiet engagement to
marry existed between her and her cousin Owlett, and had existed for
some time.
Thus uncertainly the week passed on; till one morning Stockdale said
to her: 'I have had a letter, Lizzy. I must call you that till I
am gone.'
'Gone?' said she blankly.
'Yes,' he said. 'I am going from this place. I felt it would be
better for us both that I should not stay after what has happened.
In fact, I couldn't stay here, and look on you from day to day,
without becoming weak and faltering in my course. I have just heard
of an arrangement by which the other minister can arrive here in
about a week; and let me go elsewhere.'
That he had all this time continued so firmly fixed in his
resolution came upon her as a grievous surprise. 'You never loved
me!' she said bitterly.
'I might say the same,' he returned; 'but I will not. Grant me one
favour. Come and hear my last sermon on the day before I go.'
Lizzy, who was a church-goer on Sunday mornings, frequently attended
Stockdale's chapel in the evening with the rest of the double-
minded; and she promised.
It became known that Stockdale was going to leave, and a good many
people outside his own sect were sorry to hear it. The intervening
days flew rapidly away, and on the evening of the Sunday which
preceded the morning of his departure Lizzy sat in the chapel to
hear him for the last time. The little building was full to
overflowing, and he took up the subject which all had expected, that
of the contraband trade so extensively practised among them. His
hearers, in laying his words to their own hearts, did not perceive
that they were most particularly directed against Lizzy, till the
sermon waxed warm, and Stockdale nearly broke down with emotion. In
truth his own earnestness, and her sad eyes looking up at him, were
too much for the young man's equanimity. He hardly knew how he
ended. He saw Lizzy, as through a mist, turn and go away with the
rest of the congregation; and shortly afterwards followed her home.
She invited him to supper, and they sat down alone, her mother
having, as was usual with her on Sunday nights, gone to bed early.
'We will part friends, won't we?' said Lizzy, with forced gaiety,
and never alluding to the sermon: a reticence which rather
disappointed him.
'We will,' he said, with a forced smile on his part; and they sat
down.
It was the first meal that they had ever shared together in their
lives, and probably the last that they would so share. When it was
over, and the indifferent conversation could no longer be continued,
he arose and took her hand. 'Lizzy,' he said, 'do you say we must
part--do you?'
'You do,' she said solemnly. 'I can say no more.'
'Nor I,' said he. 'If that is your answer, good-bye!'
Stockdale bent over her and kissed her, and she involuntarily
returned his kiss. 'I shall go early,' he said hurriedly. 'I shall
not see you again.'
And he did leave early. He fancied, when stepping forth into the
grey morning light, to mount the van which was to carry him away,
that he saw a face between the parted curtains of Lizzy's window,
but the light was faint, and the panes glistened with wet; so he
could not be sure. Stockdale mounted the vehicle, and was gone; and
on the following Sunday the new minister preached in the chapel of
the Moynton Wesleyans.
One day, two years after the parting, Stockdale, now settled in a
midland town, came into Nether-Moynton by carrier in the original
way. Jogging along in the van that afternoon he had put questions
to the driver, and the answers that he received interested the
minister deeply. The result of them was that he went without the
least hesitation to the door of his former lodging. It was about
six o'clock in the evening, and the same time of year as when he had
left; now, too, the ground was damp and glistening, the west was
bright, and Lizzy's snowdrops were raising their heads in the border
under the wall.
Lizzy must have caught sight of him from the window, for by the time
that he reached the door she was there holding it open: and then,
as if she had not sufficiently considered her act of coming out, she
drew herself back, saying with some constraint, 'Mr. Stockdale!'
'You knew it was,' said Stockdale, taking her hand. 'I wrote to say
I should call.'
'Yes, but you did not say when,' she answered.
'I did not. I was not quite sure when my business would lead me to
these parts.'
'You only came because business brought you near?'
'Well, that is the fact; but I have often thought I should like to
come on purpose to see you . . . But what's all this that has
happened? I told you how it would be, Lizzy, and you would not
listen to me.'
'I would not,' she said sadly. 'But I had been brought up to that
life; and it was second nature to me. However, it is all over now.
The officers have blood-money for taking a man dead or alive, and
the trade is going to nothing. We were hunted down like rats.'
'Owlett is quite gone, I hear.'
'Yes. He is in America. We had a dreadful struggle that last time,
when they tried to take him. It is a perfect miracle that he lived
through it; and it is a wonder that I was not killed. I was shot in
the hand. It was not by aim; the shot was really meant for my
cousin; but I was behind, looking on as usual, and the bullet came
to me. It bled terribly, but I got home without fainting; and it
healed after a time. You know how he suffered?'
'No,' said Stockdale. 'I only heard that he just escaped with his
life.'
'He was shot in the back; but a rib turned the ball. He was badly
hurt. We would not let him be took. The men carried him all night
across the meads to Kingsbere, and hid him in a barn, dressing his
wound as well as they could, till he was so far recovered as to be
able to get about. He had gied up his mill for some time; and at
last he got to Bristol, and took a passage to America, and he's
settled in Wisconsin.'
'What do you think of smuggling now?' said the minister gravely.
'I own that we were wrong,' said she. 'But I have suffered for it.
I am very poor now, and my mother has been dead these twelve months
. . . But won't you come in, Mr. Stockdale?'
Stockdale went in; and it is to be supposed that they came to an
understanding; for a fortnight later there was a sale of Lizzy's
furniture, and after that a wedding at a chapel in a neighbouring
town.
He took her away from her old haunts to the home that he had made
for himself in his native county, where she studied her duties as a
minister's wife with praiseworthy assiduity. It is said that in
after years she wrote an excellent tract called Render unto Caesar;
or, The Repentant Villagers, in which her own experience was
anonymously used as the introductory story. Stockdale got it
printed, after making some corrections, and putting in a few
powerful sentences of his own; and many hundreds of copies were
distributed by the couple in the course of their married life.
April 1879.
