Mockery Gap (17 page)

I
T
was fortunate for those who were clinging to the jagged edges, covered with slippery
seaweed
, of the Blind Cow Rock that the
fisherman
had his boat near.

And as there was now light enough for the man to see what to do, very little time had run through the great glass before the fisherman had his boat beside the rock.

He found there, holding on as best they could—each one for himself—Mr. James Tarr, Miss Ogle, and the Reverend Mr. Gollop; but Mr. Roddy was nowhere to be seen.

When he had helped the saved ones
carefully
into the boat, the fisherman searched the sea in the near neighbourhood of the rock for Mr. Roddy, who, Miss Ogle was good enough to say, apparently knowing that nature abhors a vacuum, ‘must be somewhere.’

The fisherman rowed round the rock three times, and then landed those whom he had saved, who were welcomed in a proper manner by Mr. and Mrs. Pattimore.

The fisherman had leaped from his boat and was looking intently at the sea, when a cry came from the rock, and he, evidently thinking that Mr. Roddy might drown before the boat reached him, sprang into the sea and swam in the direction from whence the cry for help had come.

When he was gone out of sight, for he dived as soon as he reached the rock, Mr. Pattimore, with the aid of Mr. Gollop—Mr. James Tarr was too interested in a little bone that he had found upon the beach to pay any heed to what was happening—got the boat afloat again and soon came to the rock, where they found Mr. Roddy upon it, he having climbed up out of the sea when the fisherman dived to look for him. When he was safe ashore, Mr. Roddy explained that as the boat disappeared he had found himself holding to the rock, but, realising that he had dropped his letters, he let go in the hopes of finding them, and, the tide taking him some distance away, it was some while, although he was a good swimmer, before he could reach the rock again.

It was Mrs. Pattimore who, when the
company
were safely warming themselves before the kitchen fire at Mockery vicarage,
remembered
the fisherman.

‘No doubt he is still looking for Mr. Roddy,’ suggested Mr. James Tarr.

‘Or else he may be looking for my letters,’ said Mr. Roddy, politely moving to one side so that Miss Ogle might dry her stockings.

‘We had better all go to bed,’ said Miss Ogle a ‘while our clothes are drying.’

‘Is there any one in Mockery who can carry a letter?’ asked Mr. Roddy.

‘There is Pring,’ replied Mr. Pattimore.

Mr. Pring, discovered at once by Rebecca, for he was mending the road exactly outside the vicarage gate, readily—and how could such a fine letter-bearer refuse such a request?—agreed to carry the letter to
Weyminster and deliver it safely at High Hall before breakfast.

That matter settled, Mr. Roddy and Mr. Gollop were shown to the spare bedroom, and Miss Ogle was taken by Mrs. Pattimore to her own room, where she was left to enjoy some hours of gracious sleep in the softest of beds.

Mrs. Pattimore, having arranged her guests so that they might receive the proper and fitting repose that they needed after such long hours of exposure, stood for a little while wondering where she had better go to obtain the repose that she too, after her tiring night, wished to have.

She waited for a moment uncertain, until Mr. Pattimore, to whom Rebecca had been explaining that a death was sure to follow the fall of the picture, joined her.

‘There is the attic,’ said Mr. Pattimore.

She allowed herself to be led there. Mr. Pattimore, who didn’t seem to notice the hard lumps now, watched her—himself undressed and in bed—brushing her hair before the cracked looking-glass.

Once before he had seen her lips look as red, and all of her—all made, and for one thought alone—love for him.

She looked like a woman. Mr. Pattimore sat up in bed and watched her.

She had been but a girl when, in that white frock, with her hands over her eyes to hide those blushes, she had watched him. All her fine figure—for now she had begun to plait her hair—made Mr. Pattimore wonder how it could ever have been possible for him to desert such a garden of cherries, with its soft mounds and moss flowers, all those years when he had
followed
the advice of the Dean.

It was this unnamed and most likely drowned fisherman who had brought him to her again. ‘The Nellie-bird,’ said Mr. Pattimore aloud.

He couldn’t resist an immediate desire to fondle her a little as she stood there before the glass, and to kiss her neck and throat.

Which treatment, though it did not help her much in the doing of her hair, Mrs. Pattimore only very mildly resisted, bidding him only be a little careful about a pin that she believed she might have used when she dressed so hurriedly in the night.

But what she liked better than this little rudeness was the name, that would always be hers now, that he whispered to her before they both fell asleep.

B
REAKFAST
was certainly taken late at the Mockery vicarage after the arrival of the wrecked visitors.

For it was not until three o’clock in the afternoon that those who had arrived so early were downstairs and happily eating.

Mrs. Pattimore, who looked a glad bride of twenty, helped the fish; for Rebecca had bought and carefully cracked the legs of—and how she got them no one inquired—some fresh lobsters, that Mr. Tarr found so much to his taste that he ate three of them, and even Miss Ogle didn’t do amiss.

After this breakfast, no answer having come to Mr. Roddy’s letter asking his wife to send a car for them, Mr. Tarr suggested a walk, as he hoped to see the effect of the seeds he had sown—seeds to rouse the people of Mockery from the sad mud of their own thoughts to an imaginative and exciting life.

Mr. and Mrs. Pattimore asked to be excused, Mr. Pattimore remarking that he was going to make a bonfire of the portrait of a man that had happened to fall in the night, and whom he couldn’t bear to look at again because he was so disfigured.

‘I wonder where Mrs. Pattimore slept?’
Miss Ogle inquired of Mr. Gollop, with whom she walked.

‘Perhaps with the servant,’ said Mr. Gollop innocently.

Miss Ogle looked at him sharply.

‘I don’t believe it,’ she said.

Mr. James Tarr was by nature, as we have remarked before, inquisitive; he wished to see what had happened in the village since he was there last, and so he went into the churchyard.

Mr. Roddy too stepped briskly, followed by the others, through the gate; he hoped to find some Roddites there, but could only see
gravestones
, green grass, and yellow hawkweed.

Mr. James Tarr stood, his face reddened with the hot summer, and his strong square figure very much alive, beside Miss Pink’s grave, that was pointed out to the visitors by Mr. Pring the messenger, who, when Mr. Roddy asked if the car would come, replied that he never lost a letter.

‘An’ I’ve had me dinner,’ said Mr. Pring, who had been trimming the hedge.

Near to Miss Pink’s last resting-place there was the grave of Mrs. Moggs, and a little further away Mrs. Topple was laid to rest—dying, so Mr. Pring informed Mr. Tarr, as if to remind that gentleman of his own good advice, ‘by means of a clover leaf.’

Mr. James Tarr had expected, as every one does, to find some new graves, perhaps two
or three, in a country churchyard, as well as the old ones.

‘And how did Mrs. Moggs come to die?’ asked Mr. Tarr.

‘’Twere the mice,’ replied the roadman, ‘that drowned she.’

Upon Miss Pink’s grave Mr. Roddy now noticed an oddly-shaped stone, that he took up in order to examine more closely. On lifting the stone he discovered a letter
underneath
it, the very letter that he had handed to Mr. Pring to take to Weyminster.

All the company looked at Mr. Pring, who in his turn looked at his own trousers.

‘They be me Sunday ones,’ said Mr. Pring, ‘for t’ others be broke, an’ there bain’t no pocket in these.’

‘T’ other letter,’ he said, ‘that Miss Pink did give to I for wold Gulliver, I did hand back to she again, for I did put en in grave; but thik’—and Mr. Pring held up Mr. Roddy’s—‘I were only given this morning, and I don’t never go nowhere only on Sundays.’

Mr. Roddy looked at Mr. Pring as if he were but another odd symbol, like the stone that had fallen from the church roof that he now held in his hand.

‘You didn’t think, did you,’ inquired Mr. Roddy, addressing Mr. Pring, ‘that I really meant you to carry away my letter and to hide it?’

‘I be one,’ said Mr. Pring proudly, ‘who have never lost a letter, but t’ other be thik that I’ve kept the longest. An’ now ’tis buried, for Caddy do say that they grave beds be best and safest.’

‘Mr. Caddy,’ said Squire Roddy; ‘I
remember
the name, for poor Pink paid Gulliver for his new gate, and I ought to show Miss Ogle how gates are made if she is to be agent here.’

Mr. Roddy and Mr. Tarr reached the hedge—through which the rude children had watched Esther—some while before Mr. Gollop and Miss Ogle had left the churchyard, for while waiting there they had decided to be married in four weeks’ time.

Mr. Caddy was telling his ducks a story, and the squire and Mr. Tarr listened unnoticed.

‘’Tis best,’ said Mr. Caddy, watching his ducks, who were fast asleep with their heads under their wings, ‘to do nothing, only sleep.

‘And there be a bed where nothing bain’t done worser than thik.

‘I did think,’ said Mr. Caddy a little louder, ‘that if Postmaster Hunt were hanged for murder ’twould be a punishment, but now I do wish ’e to live.

‘A bed that be silent an’ that don’t never creak be too good for ’e.

‘They ducks,’ said Mr. Caddy, ‘do bury their heads for to show we how best ’tis to lie; they don’t listen to no Mr. Tarr nor to no
Squire Roddy when rent time do come. Miss Pink’s bed be the best.’

Mr. Tarr whispered to Squire Roddy that perhaps, instead of waiting for Miss Ogle to come, they had better go and visit Farmer Gulliver.

M
ISS
O
GLE
and Mr. Gollop were standing silent upon the Mockery green when Mr. Roddy and Mr. Tarr came to them. Mr. Gollop was looking at the cottage shadows in a meditative manner, and for a good reason, because he was calculating the exact sum that Miss Ogle would be likely to spend from her own money for scented soap and face powder.

The evening was still and sultry, and the shadows that Mr. Gollop was looking at were slowly lengthening. The Mockery meadows that reached to the sea were decorated with gossamer, created by billions of minute spiders, who for reasons of their own clothed the lovely maiden earth with a delicate garment.

The gossamer floated in the air and twined itself in silky ribbons about any who walked in the fields.

Mr. Gulliver’s cottage, one of the prettiest in the village, stood a little way back from the lane.

A pleasant path led to it through a field now yellow with ragwort, while the cottage windows peeped from under the thatch and eyed the approaching visitors with inquisitive interest.

Coming nearer to Mr. Gulliver’s, it was easy to see that something had happened that drew the attention of Mockery to the little cottage.
Here were all the Mockery children collected, who of late had become more modest, with the fisherman to play with, but were now, alas! behaving as the poor man did who took to himself seven devils instead of one.

The pack of little wolves, merry again in their old manner, were shouting out to each other that the other Mary had given birth to a monster with horns and a tail, and, indeed, the very beast that Miss Pink had at first been afraid of.

As soon as Mr. Roddy approached them, they ran further into the fields, kicking up their legs and making faces as if to show what the monster was like.

At the door of the cottage Mr. Tarr, who arrived the first, found Mr. Gulliver, who whispered to him in a voice of mystery that ‘a siren had been discovered that very morning in bed with his daughter.’

After communicating this strange
intelligence
, Mr. Gulliver had at once gone upstairs, leaving Mrs. Pottle, who was clad in a matronly apron, to explain the matter further.

‘Do ’ee come upstairs and see what ’tis,’ said Mrs. Pottle, inviting Miss Ogle to follow Mr. Gulliver.

Miss Ogle went to the bedroom, but in a moment she returned again and invited her friends to ascend too to see the monster.

In a pretty bedroom, such an one as a
modest country-girl with a nice dislike of all that is naked would have to sleep in—with her dolls, that she still petted, with all their
garments
on, and the windows near hidden with curtains—they found the other Mary. She was in bed, a little pale, perhaps, but holding very near to her, and looking at it as only a mother can, a tiny creature with a fine show of hair, who was asleep and happy.

Near to Mary sat her father, who was regarding the little one who lay upon his daughter’s breast with the rapt attention of one who views for the first time in his life something that is mentioned in a picture, but is to him entirely new and strange.

Mr. Gulliver now left his place beside her, and came to Mr. Roddy and whispered to him so that he wouldn’t disturb the sleeping babe, but with all the excitement of one who has received what he wished for:

‘’Tis well ’tis only a siren, and not one of they fire-drakes, that be come to our Mary.’

‘I should like,’ Mr. Roddy whispered back in return, ‘to be the siren’s godfather.’

‘And I will be her godmother,’ said Miss Ogle.

Mr. Gollop frowned.

Returning to the green, Mr. Roddy and his friends found Mr. Pring, who was trimming the grassy sides and paused when they reached him to address the weather. ‘I do know now
that she be a woman,’ said Mr. Pring, ‘who be good-tempered at night time. But ’tis in the morning that she do burst into a tempest and thunder and rain.’

Mr. Pring raised his hand and pointed to the sky.

‘When thee do bide most quiet, wold ’oman,’ he called out, ‘thee be only breeding bad weather.’

Mr. Roddy and his friends moved away, but not so fast as to prevent them hearing Mr. Pring repeating over to himself that ‘there wasn’t any one in the whole world who could carry a letter or a message so carefully as he could.’

Mr. Roddy took tea at the vicarage, and was upon the point of settling an important matter, whether or no to return home in the most simple manner possible, that of walking there on his own legs, when Miss Ogle and Mr. Gollop came in to say that the ill-mannered children of Mockery had informed Rebecca that a large car had been seen upon the cliff.

This news had been communicated to Miss Ogle and Mr. Gollop, who were walking in the vicarage garden and talking about
furniture
in a manner that would have pleased Mr. Caddy.

Rebecca had heard the word they
mentioned
, and when she pointed out the car to Mr. Gollop she blushed prettily.

Mr. Gollop, who didn’t seem to mind taking away another gentleman’s maid, and as it wasn’t in his nature to refuse a blush, at once invited Rebecca to come to them in a month’s time, when they would be married.

Rebecca replied in a friendly manner that ‘she would very much like to,’ for ever since the portrait had fallen she had been most mournful. ‘You will be a dean one day, I hope, Mr. Gollop,’ she said, ‘for deans are so knowing.’

Mr. Gollop smiled.

Miss Ogle frowned. But Rebecca, who thought a clergyman’s smile who was rich enough to become high one day was something a great deal grander and better than the simple ways of a common fisherman, agreed willingly to go.

The car seen upon the cliff, the very same that appears at the beginning of our story, has now come to end it.

It had indeed taken but a few hours for the remaining members of the club, after the news that Mr. Roddy was wrecked at Mockery reached them—for all messages (and would that they were!) are not always handed to Mr. Pring to take care of—to assemble together and mount the car, hoping at least to find the bodies.

The gentleman and ladies, consisting for the most part of the very salt—or better still, pepper—of the earth, the county families,
had with them their umbrellas and overcoats—for one old gentleman, who looked at the weather just as queerly as Mr. Pring,
expected
a hard frost that evening; while a lady believed a thunderstorm was brewing.

Mr. Roddy, who climbed the hill first, was received with proper and fitting acclamations of joy; and Mr. Tarr at once mounted the tumulus and was about to commence a lecture upon the exact shape of the concubine’s
earrings
—that had never been found—when a sad groan interrupted him, that appeared to come from the very bottom of a deep hole that was dug in the mound.

Mr. Tarr looked down into the hole, and saw at the bottom Farmer Cheney himself, who had spent all that summer in digging in the mound for the earrings that, once discovered, would bring him, he believed, enormous wealth and, as Mrs. Cheney was always repeating, would enable Master Simon to go out at night time with real ladies instead of mere servant maids whose clothes every one knew about.

And so here, this very afternoon, when he began to descend into the hole, Mr. Cheney had fallen, and had already lain for some hours with a broken leg, with his skull beside another human skull, though prehistoric, that he
unearthed
with his fall and which fell with him.

Mr. Tarr climbed into the pit and took the older skull into his hands, telling Mr. Cheney
that he had made a most important discovery; and ascended to the mound again, where he explained to the company that the skull was the very thing that he had wanted so that he might complete his discourse about the earrings.

Mr. James Tarr was holding the skull in his hand, and was pointing out where the
earrings
should have been—for he believed the skull to be a woman’s, and a naughty woman’s, too—when Miss Ogle, whose rude manners knew no bounds, suggested that Mr. Cheney might be lifted into the car, laid at the bottom amongst the coats and umbrellas, and so be carried to the hospital.

Mr. Tarr watched this being done with the same expression of disgust that a preacher would wear who, enlarging upon his theme, ‘that there is no such thing as death, and that only the most stupid believe there is,’ sees at his very feet one of his hearers die of heart failure, and is obliged to wait until the corpse is carried off before he can expose the fallacy any further.

Mr. Cheney safely laid in the car, Mr. Tarr was beginning again, though in a louder tone, because Mr. Roddy had three times set foot upon the mound as though meaning to begin to talk too, when the rude Mockery children, who had climbed the hill to see the car depart, raised a sudden cry that something was moving in the bushes.

‘’Tis what Mr. Caddy do tell of what they be doing,’ shouted the children, who gave place to the ladies, who crowded to look too, but were, alas! only in time to see God Simon and Dinah Pottle rising from the mossy ground and crawling out from under the gorse.

Miss Ogle, the first lady to arrive, helped to arrange the blushing Dinah a little more properly, and to do up her hair that was fallen down; while Mr. Roddy, who was a just as well as a wise magistrate, commanded Simon to have his and Dinah’s banns published the very next Sunday, or else to incur his anger.

The car was now ready for departure, while the sun, like the fiery head of a huge giant, was about to sink into the sea.

The car was turned, but it couldn’t at that moment take the road, because a farm cart was passing.

In the cart there was a weeping girl, Esther Pottle, and the fisherman—the Nellie-bird.

The fisherman was now leaving the village with the few goods that he possessed, and was returning to those same islands from whence he came. He was not drowned. He had merely swum across the bay, when he knew Mr. Roddy was safe, and entered his hut unobserved; and that same day, feeling that fishing at Mockery could never be really a success, he decided to leave the hamlet.

The fisherman now kissed Esther, and told
her to dismount, for he couldn’t take her to his home then, but promised, kissing her lips again, to send for her later.

As soon as the fisherman had gone over the hill, never looking back at the girl, the car proceeded on its way too, while the children of Mockery Gap shouted after Esther Pottle, who hurried home:

‘The Nellie-bird! the Nellie-bird!’

But Esther, who was near caught up by the rude children, was lucky enough to come upon Mrs. Pottle, who was beating the bushes in the lane and scattering the leaves, and at the same time was shouting out that she wished the leaves were so many Prings, because she had quarrelled with her neighbour again now that the fisherman was gone, and with him the chance of buying cheap mackerel.