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Chapter III

October came—the green April month in New Zealand. The summer was coming on, and the master had made no sign of giving the women folk more help, when, one bright morning, Willie ran in with news which caused auntie to leave all her work, and tie on her sunbonnet with trembling hands.

'Don't hurry back, auntie; I'll manage,' said Cherry.

She was almost too busy to think or feel, all the morning. Chuckers came in to dinner, and asked for his wife.

'She is over at John's,' said Cherry. 'Sallie is very bad. Mother has been with her since eight o'clock last night, and they wanted auntie.'

Chuckers' brow clouded ominously, but he did page 124not speak. When dinner was over, Cherry was obliged to say, 'Please, Mr. Chuckers, if auntie doesn't come back, I shall want Jupp to help with the milking.'

She knew the men's own work was pressing now, but it could not be helped.

Chuckers stood and glared at her, then went out, muttering something she did not hear. Her heart misgave her, but she worked on.

It was drawing near milking-time when, looking out, she saw him pushing through the wire fence into John's paddock. He was going to fetch auntie home!

Cherry rushed to stop him, and then stopped herself, with an instinct that this battle must be left to stronger hands than hers.

Chuckers walked straight into John's house without knocking, and turned into the kitchen. There, as it befell, his wife stood alone, hurriedly making up the fire. Her back was turned to him; her tears were falling on the fire-irons, and she did not observe his step.

'What are you after here?' said the harsh voice of her husband.

She started as if she had been shot, and dropped the shovel on the hearth.

'Oh, let me stay, Chuckers!' she cried, turning and lifting her hands beseechingly. 'She's all the page 125child I have, and her so ill, and clinging to her auntie.'

'You just come back and do your milking. That's what you've got to do,' said Chuckers. There was an evil light in his eye.

'I can't.'

It was the first time she had ever resisted him in her life, and it maddened him.

Sallie had heard him. From the room within, her voice pleaded faintly, 'Auntie, come back. Let auntie stay with me.'

'You come,' said Chuckers.

'Auntie.' Again the feeble voice was heard, and then the voice of Mrs. Harkiss, soothing and reassuring. Mrs. Chuckers turned towards the bedroom door. Her husband strode after her and laid a heavy hand upon her shoulder.

'You come home to your duty, or it'll be the worse for you. Mark my words!' he said, in a tone of suppressed fury.

There was a sound of movement in the next room, and John came out, with a set look in his blue eyes.

'Will you come outside with me a minute, Mr. Chuckers?' he said.

They stood still and faced each other. John had the name of being 'as easy a fellow as any going,'—no match at all for an old tyrant like page 126Chuckers; but it was the tyrant's eyes that fell. He turned towards the house door. John opened it for him, and, turning, signed to Mrs. Chuckers to go back to Sallie; and she obeyed.

John went out and shut the door behind him. The two men walked a few paces from the house and stopped.

'Mr. Chuckers,' said John, 'my wife has served you like the best of daughters. You know best how you have served her. Auntie is all the mother she has had, since she lost her own; and now, when God only knows how many hours she has left to live, you want to part them; and I tell you, you shan't do it. Your wife's under my protection, and if you put your foot across my door to get her away'—

He stopped short, and set his teeth. 'I'm a younger man than you,' he said thickly, 'and I've remembered it. If you do that, I shall forget it. That's all.'

He turned quietly and walked back to the house, shut the door and bolted it. Chuckers stood rooted to the spot for some minutes; then slowly moved away, but not out of sight. A hundred yards or so from the house, some logs were lying, and he sat down on one of them. John looked out and saw him.

'He's watching for her. Brute!' he thought. page 127'But so long as he doesn't come in it won't matter. Auntie can't see him.'

The window of the bedroom looked the other way. The young husband's heart was there; he had soon forgotten Timothy Chuckers.

The time wore on. The cows came up, and stood in their places to be milked. Jupp came too, of his own accord, and he and Cherry milked in silence. No talking to the great, bossy cows—no light laughter at their wilful ways—the only sounds, their munching or moving, and the steady bubbling of the milk into the pails. Cherry set out the tea, and watched; no master came. Hugh looked in, ran over to Sallie's, and brought back the last report.

The day declined. Shadows stretched long across the green grass and the beds full of young green things growing. Chuckers sat still upon his log. He knew that it was past his tea-time; he was thirsty, but he did not move. Something stronger than any physical want possessed him. Was it the thirst for vengeance? or—remorse?

He saw the doctor's buggy drive up, and John come out and put up the horse. The shadows were growing very long, when, flitting across them, came a little black figure. Mrs. Wren had been coming that way, and saw the doctor drive past in page 128haste. She followed him, and seeing Chuckers, hurried towards him.

'Tell me, how is she?' she said.

'Very bad,' he shouted. His loud, rough voice was pleasant to her; she could hear it.

'Ah!' she said sadly, and added,' I won't go in. I'll sit here and wait with you.'

The chill of the cold Canterbury nights was creeping on. She wrapped a little shawl round her, and sat down to keep the watch of life or death for the wife, as she had kept it, in the year before, for the husband. The west behind her glowed and faded; the stars grew bright above, and still the two sat there in silence. Mrs. Wren was used to silence. She never felt it so little as under the stars, for they all seemed to speak to her. Sometimes lights and figures were seen moving in the house, and she watched feverishly; again all was still, and her eyes turned to those friendly eyes above—Sirius and his companions, friends of her youth in the old country; the great Ship filling a large tract of the south-eastern sky, the Southern Cross low down, and all the other groups of light she loved so well.

Presently there was moving in the house again. Someone put in the horse, and the doctor drove rapidly away.

'Stop him! Ask him!' cried the little old page 129lady, starting up in an agony, and running like a girl across the grass.

'All right. Tell her,' called the doctor, as his lights flashed on the two figures and were gone.

Chuckers bawled in her ear, 'All right.'

'Thank God!' Unawares, the old lady was kneeling on the path, her face upturned to those bright, bright stars, softly uttering her thanks. She heard not a sound herself, and did not remember that anyone else might hear; she hardly knew that she was speaking, in the fulness of her heart.

When she came to herself, and saw the figure near her in the darkness, she hurried to Chuckers' side, and seizing his hand gave him joy in torrents, without an idea that he could have been watching because of anything but love.

'Now we may go in for a minute,' she said, and turned towards the house, talking to him all the time, so that he had scarcely a choice but to walk with her. She pushed open the door and caught his sleeve, in her eagerness to drag him in and safely close the door. Then cautiously she opened the kitchen door and peeped.

Beside the fire sat the proud grandmother, cooing over a small flannel bundle in her lap. In still greater haste, Mrs. Wren's little fingers page 130clutched at Chuckers, and pulled him in. The door was shut, and he stood within it, his tough heart beating strangely for once in his life.

Lightly as the bird whose name she bore, Mrs. Wren crossed the room, caught up the bundle, and turning in triumph, laid it in the man's rough arms. Of course no one could stop her; anyone so very deaf can never be contradicted. Chuckers had to take the baby, and as it touched his arms he felt a thrill through a strong fibre which had been stirred before—long long ago, when just such another bundle had been laid in his young arms. Then, as now, he said nothing. No one ever knew how the dumb heart swelled and yearned within him for a few proud hours; and then it was all over, and he knew that his babe would never want anything but a little nameless grave. His wife mourned openly, and everyone comforted her. No one said a word to him, nor he to them.

He had never held a little child in his arms since, until this moment. Mrs. Wren uncovered a tiny red face and fists. Chuckers put his finger into a little velvet hand that closed upon it. Just then the inner door opened, and out came John, with rapture in every line of his face.

'Hallo, uncle!' he exclaimed—walked straight up to him, and grasped his hand with a vigour which Mrs. Wren thought simply proper to the occasion.

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'To think of your getting hold of the brat already,' said John, beaming all over, as he covered the precious little face again.

Chuckers held out the bundle, and John could not help taking it; to feel it in his arms was so delicious. He carried it close to the fire again. Chuckers followed, and with a fresh impulse John laid the little one back into his arms. Something in the old, hard, withered face before him moved his good heart. He remembered hearing of that babe that died.

Chuckers took the light burden in silence, but with a little furtive pressure that John saw; it brought tears to his happy eyes.

'Which is it?' asked Chuckers.

'A boy,' said the proud father. 'Shall we call him Timothy? eh, uncle? Timothy John; that doesn't sound bad. Hey, auntie!'

For Mrs. Chuckers emerged, and stood transfixed to see the baby in her husband's arms.

'Shall we name the brat for uncle? eh?' said John, and began to laugh so audibly that Mrs. Harkiss hastily interposed, and dismissed the assembly. Mrs. Wren had been going about with forefingers uplifted, lest anyone should try to speak loud enough for her. She saw the dismissal without any need to hear.

'"Stand not upon the order of our going, but page 132go at once,"' she exclaimed. 'Good-night, Mrs. Chuckers. You're staying, I suppose?'

Mrs. Chuckers looked at her husband, and he said, 'Stop, if you like.'

'Thank you, uncle. We were up all last night, so it will be really a help,' said John heartily. 'I'll see she gets some rest. How will Mrs. Wren get home?' he added, discovering that she was gone already.

'I'll see to that,' said Chuckers.

A few minutes later, Cherry, looking out for the hundredth time, beheld, to her amazement, Mr. Chuckers bringing home a lady to supper. She had heard the news. Hugh had been watching for the doctor, and came to tell her; but Mrs. Wren's second edition quite surpassed the first. She poured it all out, too much excited to eat, having seen more than most people with ears would have heard. Chuckers had no need to speak well of himself, for in her narrative he figured admirably. He listened with a vague sense of having had a great escape. He had gone out resolved on evil, and 'o'ermastered yet by high behest,' he had had to be good after all.

And Cherry was so pleased with him! If he had had any power to analyse his own feelings, he would have discovered that he had grown very fond of her. When he thought he hated her, it was really her disapproval that he disliked.

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Mrs. Wren's family were all away at a meeting nine miles off, so that she was indifferent about getting home any time before midnight; but Chuckers insisted on going out before he had eaten half a supper, to harness the horse and drive her home.

He could not help driving back rather slowly. It was so many, many years since he had felt happy—since he had felt anything very keenly, except anger and covetousness—he was not in haste to go to sleep and forget it all. The hard crust upon his heart was pierced at last, and he felt the flowing of sweet waters underneath. Pain was there, indeed, and regret and shame, but love triumphed over all. Love, new-wakened, reached out to the little babe, and to all the rest, who were so ready to love him. He did not realise yet how generous it was of them; the moral sense was but half awake, even now; but the faculty it lives by was stirred. He who has never practised the power of loving on his brother whom he hath seen, cannot love God whom he hath not seen; he has no faculty alive to do it; and it is only in loving that we see Him, and learn the meaning of righteousness and sin.

Shearing and harvest were over. Chuckers had hired a strong boy, who did a good deal of the page 134work which used to make the women's lives so burdensome. Cherry's year was up, but she was staying on a little longer, just till they should all see what was best to do.

John and Sallie, looking the very picture of a happy young couple, stood in the front garden, where the portulaccas under the window were a perfect blaze of beauty in the sun. Chuckers was walking about with the baby crowing in his arms, and Sallie went after them.

'You've made your conquest, Cherry,' said John.

'No, it wasn't me,' she answered softly. 'God did it, John—and little Tim.'