Chapter XXIII.
Treasure trove.
In a few moments they were safe in the thicket at the foot of what had
been their enemy and was now their friend--the garden-wall. How many
things and persons there are whose other sides are altogether
friendly! These are their true selves, and we must be true to get at
them.
Tommy again took the lead, though with a fresh sinking of the heart
because of that other place with the moon in it. Through the tangled
thicket they made or found their way--and there stood the house, with
the moon looking down on its roof, and the drunkard's thunder
troubling her still pale light--her _moon-thinking_. But for the noise
and the haste, Clare would have been frightened at them. There seemed
some secret between the house and the moon which they were determined
no one else should share. They were of one mind to terrify man or boy
who should attempt to cross the threshold! There was no time, however,
to heed such fancies. "If we could only get in without spoiling
anything!" thought Clare. Once in, they would hurt nothing, take but
the shelter and rest lying there of no good to anybody, and leave them
there all the same when they had done with them!
While they stood looking at the house, the thundering at the door of
the smithy ceased. Presently they heard voices in altercation. One
voice was that of the smith, quieter than when last they heard it, but
ill-tempered and growling as at first. The other seemed that of a
woman. She had been able so far to quiet him, probably, that he
remembered he had the key in his pocket; for they thought they heard
the door of the smithy open. Then all was silent, and the outcasts
pursued their quest of an entrance to the house.
Clare went ferreting as Tommy had done. He also tried to get a peep
through the window with the swinging shutter, but had no better
success than Tommy. Then he started to go round the corner next the
blacksmith's yard.
"Look out!" cried Tommy in a loud whisper, when he saw where he was
going.
"Why?" asked Clare.
"Because there's a horrible hole there, full of water," answered
Tommy.
"I'll keep a look out," returned Clare, and went.
When he was about half-way along the end of the house, he heard a
noise he did not understand, and stopped to listen. Some one seemed
moving somewhere.
Then came a kind of scrambling sound, and presently the noise of a
great watery splash. Clare shivered from head to foot.
"Something has fallen into the hole Tommy mentioned!" he said to
himself, and ran on to see. A few steps brought him to what Tommy had
taken for a great hole. It was nothing but a pool of rain-water: the
splash could not have come from that!
Then it occurred to him that the water-but could not be far off. He
forced his way through shrubs of various kinds, and reaching the wall,
went back along it until he came to the but. A ray of moonlight showed
him that the side of it was wet, as if the water had lately come over
the edge. He looked about for some means of getting a peep into the
huge thing. It stood on a brick stand, of which it left a narrow edge
clear, but on this edge the bulge of the but would not permit him to
mount. With the help of a small tree, however, he got on the wall,
which was better.
Spying into the but, he could see nothing at first, for a chimney was
now between it and the moon. A moment more, however, and he descried
something white in the dull iron gleam of the water. It was under the
water, but floating near the surface. He lay down on the wall, plunged
his arm into the but, laid hold of it, and drew it out. It was a
little heavy for the size, for what should it be but a tiny baby, in a
flannel night-gown, which, as he drew it out, sent back little noisy
streams into the but! It lay perfectly still in his arms, he did not
know whether dead or alive, but he thought it could hardly be drowned
so soon after the splash. It had been drugged, and the antagonism of
the two means employed to kill it was probably the saving of its life.
Clare stood in stony bewilderment. What was he to do? Certainly not to
go after the mother! The first thing was to get it down from the
wall. That he could easily have done on the other side, by the heap;
but that was the side whence it must have been thrown, and they would
be but in worse difficulty there! He must get the baby down inside the
wall! With at least one arm occupied, the tree-way was impracticable.
There was only one other way, and that full of danger! But where there
is only one way, that way must be taken, and Clare did not hesitate.
He started along the top of the wall, with the poor unconscious germ
of humanity in his arms. He had lifted it from its watery coffin, out
of the cold arms of death, up into the clear air of life! True, that
air was cold, and filled only with moonshine; but there was the house
whose seal might be broken! and the moon saw the sun making warm the
under world! Along the narrow way, through the still, keen glimmer,
unseen, probably, by any eye in the sleeping town, he bore his burden,
speeding as fast as he dared, for he must not set a foot down amiss!
Had any one caught sight of him, what a commotion would not the tale
have roused--of the spectre of a boy with a baby in his arms, gliding
noiseless in the moon and the middle night, along the top of the high
brick wall of a deserted house, where no one had lived within the
memory of man!
When he reached the door-ladder, he found descent difficult but
possible. It was more difficult to make his way through the tangled
bushes without scratching the baby, which, after all, might, alas, be
beyond hurt! He held it close to his bosom, life coaxing life to "stay
a little."
Thus laden, he appeared before Tommy, who had heard the splash, and
thought Clare had fallen into the deep hole, but had not had courage
to go and see, partly from the fear of verifying his fear, but more
from his horror of the watery abyss. He stood trembling where Clare
had left him.
To save the baby was now Clare's only thought. The baby was now the
one thing in the universe! If only the light that shone on it were
that of the hot sun instead of the cold moon, which looked far more
like killing than bringing to life! "And," thought Clare with himself,
"there ain't much more heat in my body than in that shivery moon!" But
the sun would wake and mount the sky, and send the moon down, and all
would be different! Only, if nothing could be done in the meantime,
where would baby be by then!
"Here, Tommy," he cried, "come and see what I found in the water-but."
At the word, Tommy turned to flee; but confidence in Clare, and
curiosity to see what, in Clare's arms, could hardly hurt him,
prevailed, and he drew near cautiously.
"Lord, it's a kid!" he cried.
"It's not a kid," said Clare, who had no slang; "it's a baby!"
"Well! ain't a baby a kid, just?"
Tommy did not know that the word stood for anything else than a child,
which was indeed its meaning long before it was specially applied to
the young of the goat. A _kidnapper_ or _kidnabber_ is a stealer of
children. Mr. Skeat tells us that _kid_ meant at first just a young
one.
"You can't tell me what to do with it, I'm afraid, Tommy!" said Clare.
Already it was as if from all eternity he had loved this helpless
little waif of Time, with its small, thin, blue-gray, gin-drugged
face; this tiny life, so hopeless, so miserable, yet so uncomplaining:
the thing that was, was the thing for it to bear; it had come into the
world to bear it! Ready to die, even Death would not have it; it must
live where it was not wanted, where it was not welcome!
"Yes, I can!" answered Tommy with evil promptitude. "Put it in again."
"But that would drown it, you know, Tommy!" answered Clare, treating
him like the child he was not. "We want it to live, Tommy!"
His tenderness for the baby made him speak with foolish gentleness.
"No, we don't!" returned Tommy. "What business has _it_ to live, when
we can't get nothing to eat?"
Clare held faster to the baby with one arm, and with the fist of the
other struck straight out at Tommy, hit him between the eyes, and
knocked him flat. It was a miserable thing to have to do, and it made
Clare miserable, for Tommy was not half his size, and was still
suffering from his fall on the iron. But then the dying baby was not
half Tommy's size, and any milder argument would have been lost on
him: he was thus sent on the way to understand that the baby had
rights; and that if the baby could not enforce them, there was one in
the world that could and would. Never in his life did Clare show more
instinctive wisdom than in that knock-down blow to the hardly blamable
little devil!
Tommy got up at once. He was not much hurt, for he had a hard head
though he was easily knocked over. From that moment he began to
respect Clare. He had loved him before in a way; he had patronized
him, and feared to offend him because he was stronger than he; but
until now he had had no respect for him, believing little Tommy a much
finer fellow than big Clare. There are thousands for whom a blow is a
better thing than expostulation, persuasion, or any sort of
kindness. They are such that nothing but a blow will set their door
ajar for love to get in. That is why hardships, troubles,
disappointments, and all kinds of pain and suffering, are sent to so
many of us. We are so full of ourselves, and feel so grand, that we
should never come to know what poor creatures we are, never begin to
do better, but for the knock-down blows that the loving God gives us.
We do not like them, but he does not spare us for that.
