Chapter IX: Jacob Comes Home

The mother of Margery believed, with Augustin, that persecution is the only solicitude the virtuous have any right to show a sinner. She held that where the least doubt of salvation might still be said to lie, it was better to torment than ignore, since this form of attention will sometimes torture the wrong-doer into grief for his wickedness, and so open the door to repentance and salvation. But she was not often in such doubt and generally separated the goats from the potential sheep without difficulty. The doomed she did not ever persecute, since any attention paid to those patently condemned was not only useless to them, but implied danger to the agent.

Of such, without the pale, was Jacob Bullstone, and now a situation had been reached where one thing must certainly have happened, save for the attitude of Judith Huxam towards him. Even despite her it might yet occur and the issue still stood in hope; but success implied that Margery would first actively oppose her mother, and her power to do so lessened fast.

The double accident of Jacob's broken thigh and his wife's indisposition delayed a possible union, and now the next step to any such event depended upon Margery. By letting her husband know that she desired to return, she might have shifted the responsibility on to his shoulders, and so ensured the achievement; but she was still anxious that he should not know, since she feared the violent steps that he might take to bring them together. Moreover she desired to be able to say afterwards to her parents that she went of her own free will back to Red House, and that her husband had no hand in the action.

Thus precious days passed, and while Jacob gradually regained his strength, thought upon his daughter's wedding and hoped the event might be the beginning of a slow and patient re-winning of his wife, she was in reality won. Long years seemed already to drag between Margery and her home; while in her failing health, the life with her parents grew more and more distasteful and afflicting. She was conscious of the change in her physical circumstances--more conscious of it than her father, or mother; but she still believed that a return to Red House would restore her strength. A situation, simple in itself, was thus complicated. The man and wife wanted to come together--because each, in a solitary heart, felt that only so was life longer to be desired at all. An instinct of self-preservation called upon Margery to return and she felt that, otherwise, her fading life forces might not be much longer preserved. It was not desire for Jacob himself, but hunger for the healthy environment of home, that fortified her to get back to it. She had forgiven her cruel ignominies and now regarded them as she regarded her anæmia--as a sickness for which evil fortune had to be blamed. Jacob similarly had suffered from a dreadful sickness, and now he was cured. Thus nothing but religion stood between them to Margery's mind. She could pity Jacob in some moods, and see nothing wrong in her desire to return to him; while, in others, she still doubted, so far as he was concerned, but did not doubt for herself. Then the conviction increased that she must go back to Red House if she were ever to recover, and when she heard, through Auna and her own brother, that Jacob actually desired her to return, the last doubt vanished.

Bullstone's attitude resembled hers in intense desire; but he was ignorant of her dangerous health and postulated a gradual ordeal--an ordeal mercifully to end in her complete forgiveness and her subsequent return. Peace might yet await them; but he was now broken into a patience he had not known, a patience willing to leave the future in his wife's hands. But there stood between them and any such consummation the figure of Margery's mother, assured that her daughter's husband was lost; that he was a man who could represent nothing but danger to the community of the faithful--a man condemned to the consequences of his unequalled sin--one who, since wickedness is both contagious and infectious, must be avoided absolutely. To approach such a man or seek communion with him was to challenge a pestilence; and when, therefore, Judith had heard her child, in a mood of melting, say that a wife's place was beside her sick husband, she took alarm and girded herself to repel the danger.

Indeed, Margery became her chief care; she neglected lesser obligations and she devoted much time to planning her child's welfare. Upon the news of Bullstone's accident, she had hoped he would not recover and, for a time, suspected that Providence had chosen this way to put Margery out of danger. But now Jacob was well again and about to return home; Avis clamoured for her delayed nuptials, and Margery held that she might, on such an occasion, be present, both in church, and afterwards, at Red House, if only for a little while.

Her mother firmly withstood the suggestion, and by her strenuous opposition convinced Jacob's wife of one thing: that only through the road of secret flight would she ever return to her husband's home. She knew now that Judith held it a choice between heaven and hell; she realised that if she returned to Jacob, her parents would regard her as eternally lost. The thought had shaken her at first, but she found, on examining it, that her attitude to religion was modified before reality. None had influenced her to this, for those whom she met were of her mother's opinion, and opportunity did not offer to learn the views of other people; but life and its present crying needs began to change her outlook. She contrasted the things she had been called to suffer and the unspeakable torments shed upon her husband out of his own weakness, with the established convention of a loving, sleepless and watchful God, who desires mercy better than sacrifice, and is all powerful to establish that happiness on earth the craving for which He implants in His creatures.

She was no longer concerned for her soul, while her personal griefs served to show her mother's convictions in a new light. Thus, as her hold on existence grew more frail, she recoiled with increased revulsion from the dogmas of the Chosen Few. Mrs. Huxam had defeated her own object, as religious mothers are apt to do, and by drowning the wounded Margery in the billows of a melancholy and merciless faith, was indirectly responsible for creating a new vision, wherein failing nature still offered Margery some measure of promise. The very escape in spirit comforted her and she was more cheerful for a time; but she did not get stronger, save mentally, and her license of mind alarmed Mrs. Huxam, who read these symptoms in her own light. She felt that her daughter's unrest and doubt were the visible sign of an inward temptation, wholly to be expected at this crucial juncture in her affairs; and while obeying the doctor in matters of food and medicine, Judith believed that the vital encounter must be fought on other ground.

She was not as yet frightened for her child's life, but only concerned for her soul. She determined, once for all, that Margery should not go to the wedding of Avis. She now tried to wrest this matter away from Jacob, and even considered whether the ceremony might be arranged and hastened, while he was in hospital; but Barlow Huxam would not support her in this. He pointed out that to take such a step, which was possible enough, seeing that Avis and young Elvin were amenable to Judith, would be unwise and likely to create a measure of sympathy with Bullstone. For the postmaster had as yet by no means bated in his bitterness; he did not desire any weakening of public sentiment against his son-in-law. That such a weakening existed already caused him some astonishment; but his attitude promised presently to respond to a stimulus that would not have touched Judith, for a measure of humanity, from which Mrs. Huxam's sterner outlook escaped, leavened Barlow's opinions.

Thus at the crucial moment it stood, and then a first step was taken. On a day in November, Jacob Bullstone came home, and Avis and Auna and Peter met his carriage at the outer gates of Red House.

All, for different reasons, were glad that he should be back again, and Auna chronicled each little incident of his return, hoping that opportunity would occur to tell her mother about it. She hid her young heart, which throbbed painfully to see her father so lame. But he told them that was a smaller matter, which would mend yet, and, at worst, not prevent him from presently riding again.

Peter did not rest until his father had been to the kennels, where Jacob was glad to be. He gave his son praise, admired two new litters of puppies and spoke with George Middleweek. George had matter for entertainment, or so it seemed to himself.

"Old Barton Gill was poking about here yesterday week," he said. "He told me he expected to find everything wrong and that he wasn't disappointed. He thought the puppies were a terrible poor lot and better in the river than out of it; and he said the kennels didn't look so smart, by a very long way, as in his time. He took a very grave view of everything, and at last he reached a point when I said that, old though he was, I should feel called to break his neck if ever I catched him here again."

"He's a ghost from the past, George," answered the master.

"Yes; and there's a few things less useful to busy men than ghosts from the past--especially weak and silly souls like Gill," answered Mr. Middleweek. "He's a ghost easily laid, however, and I don't reckon he'll be back along in a hurry. 'Tis amazing how silly the wisdom of most old men looks, even in the light of middle-aged knowledge."

"The times move so fast," explained Jacob, "and the wisdom of the fathers is the foolishness of the children. In fact there's only one high fashion of wisdom, if you come to be an old man, George; and that is to keep your mouth shut all the time."

"There's some old fools you can forgive," declared the kennel-man, "but not old fools that bleat the past. Who has got time or patience for them?"

Then, as the evening shut down, Jacob came into tea and found that Auna and Avis had arranged a feast for him.

Now it was the turn of Avis and she led the conversation to her marriage.

"I do hope you'll see your way to it pretty soon, father," she said, and he promised her that the wedding was going to be his first care.

"Pray God your mother will be well enough to come," he hoped boldly; and Auna echoed his wish, but Avis doubted.

"I'm sure she wouldn't like Bob and me to wait any more, even though she's not very well. And I don't much think she would come, even if she could," explained Jacob's daughter. "Of course there's no getting away from the past, and granny would be a good bit put about if mother was to want to come to Red House after."

"Grandfather's rather wishful for mother to be at the church, however," said Auna, "for he told me so."

"And I'm sure Avis would wish that, too, and Bob also," declared her father. He had rather dreaded home-coming, but the ordeal proved pleasanter than he expected. Two men called together during the evening and Billy Marydrew, with Adam Winter, dropped in, that they might congratulate Jacob on his recovery.

Avis and Peter went about their own affairs, but Auna sat beside her father until he bade her leave them.

"I made this here man come in with me," explained William. "He weren't coming, but I said he'd be welcome for two reasons--firstly to wish you a friendly wish, which was in him to do, and secondly to see me home, because the night be blowing up for foul and I'm so light as a leaf nowadays; and if the wind thrust me in the river, there I should certainly bide."

They shook hands and Winter spoke.

"You know how much I've felt about this. It was a very terrible thing to fall out and----"

"Don't go back to it. Don't let it trouble you any more. How is the man? Does he understand that it was a bad thing to do? Does he understand that he and I have both been out of our minds and done bad things? Or he may argue, perhaps, that he was right to take the law into his own hands. Anyway what he did to me was a great deal less than what I did to you. I know--I know, Adam. It's one of the few blessings left that time can let me talk in this stark fashion to you. Where there's such forgiveness as yours to me, there's a great foundation for friendship. Humble enough on my side. But it would be well to know if Samuel has took your line in that matter and harbours no malice, or if I must be on my guard."

"He's long since forgotten all about it. He remembers no more than my bull remembers. He'll wonder to see you lame and treat you respectful, same as he did before."

"That's good then. There's compensations for a weak mind if it carries a weak memory, Adam. And yet, without memory, we can't mourn our sins and better our behaviour."

"That's why the beasts that perish don't get any forwarder, Jacob," explained William. "Memory be left out of them, save in small particulars. And so they just live, and their sorrow is a passing matter and their happiness not much more than a sense of comfort. And Sammy's terrible lucky in one thing, like all other lunies, that, though he pays the price of his wits in this world, he's a dead certainty for salvation in the next. You may be born without a mind, you see, but if you're a human, you can't be born without a soul; and though this world's blank for Samuel, in any high sense, his number's up for the Kingdom of Heaven, since he's so sinless as a jackdaw, for all his mischief."

"A deep subject," admitted Adam, "and I don't know as ever I looked at it like that, Billy; but comforting for certain to them that care for the soft, unfinished ones."

"Oh, yes," promised Mr. Marydrew cheerfully, "our maniacs will all be there to welcome us; and in the light that pours out of the Throne, my dears, 'tis very likely indeed we shall find that the softies were often a damn sight saner than some of us, who prided ourselves on our wits."

"That's true for certain," said Jacob. "I can confess before such as you, though to some sort of men I never shall. But I can tell you that I've been mad and am sane again--sane enough, at any rate, never to trust my sanity any more. I was a very proud man, William, but pride has left me. I shall never be proud again, nor proud of anything that belongs to me."

"You never were that," answered Winter. "In fact, where you had the right to be proud, you were not, Bullstone."

They talked together, and Auna, who had been sent away soon after their arrival, now returned and poured drink for them. Jacob felt no objection to saying things before her that he would not have said before his other children.

"It is a good thing in my life to know that you can sit in this room as a friend," he said to Adam Winter. "There's a sort of sorrow that is not all pain; and though I shall never look upon you without sorrow, I shall always welcome the sight of you."

"I understand. And may the welcome never grow less and the sorrow dwindle," answered the other. "We've gone through a deep place; and I've lived to gather from you that you were possessed, as many good men have had the ill luck to be; and please God others, that matter a very great deal more than I do, may live to understand the same."

Thus, upon his home-coming, there fell a fitful ray of peace into the outer regions of Bullstone's mind; and, content for a brief hour to live in the present and trust this Indian summer, he took heart for a little while.

He thanked them for their visit and declared, presently, that his physical wounds had been a good thing.

"To go short on your leg is a trifle, if it helps you to go longer in your heart, and take wider views and rise up into patience," he said. "I'm the wickedest of men, and yet I have got good friends who are wishful for my betterment. And I never shall forget it--never."

"You're not a wicked man, father. Tell him he's not a wicked man, Mr. Marydrew," urged Auna.

"Nobody's very wicked, my dear," answered Billy; "and nobody's any too good. We're all much of a muchness, and good and evil be like the berries on the trees---all stomachable to somebody. Good's bad and bad's good according to the point of view, and only through being bad, some folks reach to being good. To some nice people being good is as easy as falling off a log--same as it is to you, Auna, because you can't be any other; and to some equally nice sort of people, 'tis a lot more difficult. The point ain't so much whether you be good, as what you be good for. Some folk be so good as gold, and yet good for nought; and some are so wicked as the devil, and yet good for a lot. In fact 'tis a very wonderful world, my dear."

Auna laughed and presently the men rose to go home. Adam promised to send Samuel to see Jacob on the following day. Margery had not been named, but William alluded to her as he departed.

"There's always hope," he said. "I'll come along to-morrow and eat my dinner with you, and us'll have a tell. And don't you get too busy. You'll be a sick man yet, and your maiden here must look after you so well as she can."

Auna promised to do so, and when Avis and Peter had eaten their suppers and gone to bed, she waited on her father.

"I do all the things you do," she told him. "I lock up and put out the lamps and everything, because Avis is too busy with her wedding, and Peter don't remember little things."

She helped him to his own room presently and he found it prepared for him in every particular. Then she aided him to undress, and he bade her return, when she was ready to go to bed, and say good night. She came, in her grey flannel night-gown, and jumped in beside him for a little while.

He was very silent now and very tired. But he liked to listen to her. It seemed as though the years had rolled away and Margery, young again, was lying beside him. The very inflection of Auna's voice was hers.

And while she talked, the girl was thinking of her mother, too, for she knew what was in Jacob's mind.

"Go now," he said, for her presence became too poignant. "Good night, my dinky treasure, and God bless you."

She kissed him.

"And I hope--oh, how I hope mother will soon be here beside you, father dear."

He squeezed her hand.

"Dout the candle and go on hoping--go on hoping, my pretty bird."

Then she slipped away and the man lay awake for many hours before the circumstance of his home-coming. Its goodness was precious; but the loneliness and doubt tormented him.