Chapter II: Experimental (2)

As the evening wore on he seemed to realise what he had done, and was evidently troubled. For my part, I had decided to leave next morning, for I thought that my presence in the house was disturbing him, and would perhaps spoil the chances of tomorrow's interview. Of this I had breathed no hint to anyone, and I was therefore greatly surprised when he said to me after dinner, "I charge you to remain in this house. There is no reason for going away. I was not myself this afternoon; but it has passed and will not return. Come now, let us go out into the woods."

Mrs. Abel came with us. Her object in coming was to guide our walk in some direction where we were not likely to encounter Snarley Bob, whose haunts she knew, and whom it was not desirable that we should meet before the appointed time; for the nightingales were now in full song, and Snarley was certain to be abroad. We therefore took a path which led in an opposite direction to that in which his cottage lay.

Chandrapal had his own ways of feeling and responding to the influences of Nature--ways which are not ours. No words of admiration escaped him; but, on entering the woods where the birds were singing he said, "The sounds are harmonious with thought." There was no mistaking the hint.

Guided by the singing of the birds, we turned into an unfrequented lane, bordered by elms. The evening was dull, damp, and windless, and the air lay stagnant between the high banks of the lane. We walked on in complete silence, Chandrapal a few yards in front; none of us felt any desire to speak. Three nightingales were singing at intervals: one at some distance in the woods ahead of us, two immediately to our right. Whether it was due to the dampness in the air or the song of the birds, I cannot tell; but I felt the "drowsy numbness," of which the poet speaks, stealing upon me irresistibly. We presently crossed a stile into the fields; and as I sat for a moment on the rail the drowsiness almost overcame me, and I wondered if I could escape from my companions and find some spot whereon to lie down and go to sleep. It required some effort to proceed, and I could see that Mrs. Abel was affected in a similar manner.

By crossing the stile we had disturbed one of the birds, and we had to wait some minutes before its song again broke out much further to the right. For some reason of his own Chandrapal had found this bird the best songster of the three; and, wishing to get as near as possible, he again led the way and gave us a sign to follow. We cautiously skirted the hedge, making our way towards a point on the opposite side of the field where there was a gate, and beyond this, in the next field, a shed of some sort where we might stand concealed.

We passed the gate, turned into the shed, and were immediately confronted by Snarley Bob.

Both Mrs. Abel and I were alarmed. We knew that Snarley Bob when disturbed at such a moment was apt to be exceedingly dangerous, and we remembered that it was precisely such a disturbance as this which had brought him some years ago within measurable distance of committing murder. Nor was his demeanour reassuring. The instant he saw us, he rose from the shaft of the cart on which he had been seated, smoking his pipe, and took a dozen rapid steps out of the shed. Then he paused, just as a startled horse would do, turned half round, and eyed us sidelong with as fierce and ugly a look as any human face could wear. Then he began to stride rapidly to and fro in front of the shed, stamping his feet whenever he turned, and keeping his eyes fixed on the swarthy countenance of Chandrapal, with an expression of the utmost ferocity.

Chandrapal retained his composure. Whatever sudden shock he may have felt had passed immediately, and he was now standing in an attitude of deep attention, following the movement of Snarley Bob and meeting his glance without once lowering his eyes. His calmness was infectious. I felt that he was master of the situation, and I knew that in a few moments Snarley's paroxysm would pass.

It did pass; but in a manner we did not expect. Snarley, on his side, had begun to abate his rapid march; once or twice he hesitated, paused, turned around; and the worst was already over when Chandrapal, lifting his thin hands above his head, pronounced in slow succession four words of some strange tongue. What they meant I cannot tell; it is not likely they formed any coherent sentence: they were more like words of command addressed by an officer to troops on parade, or by a rider to his horse. Their effect on Snarley was instantaneous. Turning full round, he drew himself erect and faced us in an attitude of much dignity. Every trace of his brutal expression slowly vanished; his huge features contracted to the human size; the rents of passion softened into lines of thought; wisdom and benignity sat upon his brows; and he was calm and still as the Sphinx in the desert.

Snarley stood with his hands linked behind his back, looking straight before him into the distance; and Chandrapal, without changing his attitude, was watching him as before. As the two men stood there in silence, my impression was, and still is, that they were in communication, through filaments that lie hidden, like electric cables, in the deeps of consciousness. Each man was organically one with the other; the division between them was no greater than between two cells in a single brain; the understanding was complete. Thus it remained for some seconds; then the silence was broken by speech, and it was as though a cloud had passed over the sun. For, with the first word spoken, misunderstanding began; and, for a time at all events, they drifted far apart, each out of sight and knowledge of the other's soul. Had Snarley begun by saying something inconsequent or irrelevant, had he proposed to build three tabernacles, or cried, "Depart from me, for I am a sinful man," or quoted the words of some inapplicable Scripture that was being fulfilled--there might have been no rupture. But, as it was, he spoke to the point, and instantly the tie was snapped.

"Them words you spoke just now," he said, and paused. Then, completing the sentence--"them words was full o' _sense_."

I could see that Chandrapal was troubled. The word "sense" woke up trains of consciousness quite alien to the intention of the speaker. To his non-English mind this usage of the word, if not unknown, was at least misleading.

He replied, "Those words have nothing to do with 'sense.' Yet you seemed to understand them."

"Not a bit," said Snarley. "But I _felt_ 'em. They burnt me like fire. Good words is allus like that. There's some words wi' meanin' in 'em, but no sense; and they're fool's words, most on 'em. You understand 'em, but you don't feel 'em. But when they comes wi' a bit of a smack, I knows they're all right. You can a'most taste 'em and smell 'em when they're the right sort--just like a drop o' drink. It's a pity you didn't hear Mrs. Abel when she give us that piece o' poetry. That's the sort o' words folks ought to use. You can feel 'em in your bones. Well, as I was a-sayin', your words was like that. They come at me smack, smack. And I sez to myself as soon as I hears 'em, 'That's a man worth talkin' to.'"

Chandrapal had listened with the utmost gravity, seeming to catch Snarley's drift. The diction must have puzzled him, but I doubt if the subtlest skill in exposition would have availed Snarley half so well in restoring the mutual comprehension which had been temporarily broken. Chandrapal was evidently relieved. For half a minute there was silence, during which he walked to and fro, deep in thought. Then he said, "Great is the power of words when the speaker is wise. But the Truth cannot be _spoken_."

"Not _all_ on it," said Snarley, "only bits here and there. That's what the bigness o' things teaches you. It's my opinion as there are two sorts o' words--shutters-in and openers-out. Them words o' yours was openers-out; but most as you hears are shutters-in. It's like puttin' a thing in a box. You shuts the lid, and then all you sees is the box. But when things gets beyond a certain bigness you can't shut 'em in--not unless you first chops 'em up, and that spoils 'em.

"Now, there's Shoemaker Hankin--a man as could talk the hind-leg off a 'oss. He goes at it like a hammer, and thinks as he's openin' things out; but all the time he's shuttin' on 'em in and nailin' on 'em up in their coffins. One day he begins talkin' about 'Life,' and sez as how he can explain it in half a shake. 'You'll have to kill it first, Tom,' I sez, 'or it'll kick the bottom out o' _your_ little box.' 'I'm going to _hannilize_ it,' he sez. 'That means you're goin' to chop it up,' I sez, 'so that it's bound to be dead before we gets hold on it. All right, Tom, fire away! Tell us all about dead Life.'

"Well, that's allus the way wi' these talkin' chaps. There was that Professor as comes tellin' me what space were--I told that gentleman" (pointing to me) "all about _him_. Why, you might as well try to cut runnin' water wi' a knife. Talkin' people like him are never satisfied till they've trampled everything into a _muck_--same as the sheep tramples the ground when you puts 'em in a pen. They seems to think as that's what things are _for_! They all wants to do the talkin' themselves. But doesn't it stand to sense that as long as you're talkin' about things you can't hear what things are sayin' to you?

"When did I learn all that? Why, you don't _learn_ them things. You just finds 'em when you're alone among the hills and the bigness o' things comes over you. Do you know anything about the stars? Well, then, you'll understand.

"All the same, I were once a talkin' man myself; ay, and it were then as I got the first lesson in leavin' things alone. It happened one day when I were a Methody--long before I knew anything about the stars. I'd been what they call 'converted'; and one day I were prayin' powerful at a meetin', and we was all excited, and shoutin' as we wouldn't go home till the answer had come. Well, it did come--at least it come to me. I were standin' up shoutin' wi' the rest, when all of a sudden I kind o' heard somebody whisperin' in my ear. 'The answer's comin',' I sez; 'I'm gettin' it,' So they all gets quiet, waitin' for me to give the answer. I suppose they expected me to say as a new heart had been given to somebody we'd been prayin' for. But instead o' that I shouts out at the top o' my voice--though I can't tell what made me do it--'Shut up, all on you! Shut up, Henry Blain! Shut up, John Scarsbrick! Shut up, Robert Dellanow--_I'm tired o' the lot on you!_' That's what made me give up bein' a Methody. I began to see from that day that when things begins to open out you've got to _shut up_."

"The voices of the world are many; and the speech of man is only one," said Chandrapal.

"You're right," said Snarley, "but I'm not sure as you ought to call 'em voices. Most on 'em's more like faces nor voices. It's true there's the thunder and the wind--'specially when it's blowin' among the trees. And then there's the animals and the birds."

"It is said in the East that once there were men who understood the language of birds."

"No, no," said Snarley, "there's no understandin' them things. But there's one bird, and that's the nightingale, as makes me kind o' remember as I understood 'em once. And there's no doubt they understand one another; and there's some sorts of animals as understands other sorts--but not all. You can take my word for it!"

* * * * *

The light had failed, and the song of the birds, driven to a distance by our voices, seemed to quicken the darkness into life. 'Darkling, we listened'--how long I know not, for the subliminal world was awake, and the measure of time was lost. Snarley was the first to speak, taking up his parable from the very point where he had left it, as though he were unconscious that a long interval had elapsed. He spoke to Chandrapal.

"I can see as you're a rememberin' sort o' gentleman," he said. "If you weren't, you wouldn't ha' come here listenin' to the birds. The animals remember a lot o' things as we've forgotten. I dare say you know it as well as I do. Now, there's the nightingale--_that's_ the bird for recollectin' and makin' you recollect; and you might say dogs and 'osses too. You can see the memory in the dog's eyes and in the 'oss's face. But you can _hear_ it in the bird's voice--and hearin' and smellin' is better nor seein' when it comes to a matter o' rememberin.'

"Yes, and it's my opinion as animals, takin' 'em all round, are wiser nor men--that is, they've got more sense. You let your line out far enough, and I tell you there's some animals as can make you find a lot o' things as you've forgotten. That's what the bird does. When I listens, I seems to be rememberin' all sorts o' things, only I can't tell nobody what they are.

"Yes, but you ought to ha' been here that night when Mrs. Abel give that piece! Why, bless you, she'd got the nightingale to a T, especially the rememberin'. Eh, my word, but it were a staggerer! I _wish_ you'd been there--a rememberin' gentleman like you! You get her to give you that piece when you goes home, and it'll make you reel your line out to the very end."

Some of those allusions, I imagine, were lost on Chandrapal. But once more he showed that he caught the "sense."

"In my country," he said, "religion forbids us to take the lives of animals."

"That's a good sort o' religion," said Snarley. "There's some sense in that! Them as holds with it must ha' let their line out pretty far. Now, it wouldn't surprise me to hear as folks in your country are good at rememberin' things as other folks have forgotten."

"Yes, some of us think we can remember many things." And, after a pause, "I thought just now that I remembered you."

"And me you!" said Snarley, "blessed if I didn't. The minute you said them funny words, danged if I didn't feel as though I'd knowed you all my life! It was just like when I'm listenin' to the bird--all sorts o' things comes tumblin' back. Same with them words o' yours. It seemed as though somebody as I knowed were a-callin' of me. I must ha' travelled millions o' miles, same as when you lets your line out to the stars. And all the time I were sure that I knowed the voice, though I couldn't understand the meanin'. I tell you, it were _just_ like listenin' to the bird."

Chandrapal now turned and said something to Mrs. Abel. She promptly slipped out of the shed, giving me a sign to follow. Chandrapal and Snarley were left to themselves.

* * * * *

Late at night Chandrapal returned to the Rectory. He was more than usually silent and absorbed. Of what had passed between him and Snarley he said not a word; but, on bidding us good-night, he remarked to Mrs. Abel, "The cycle of existence returns upon itself." And Snarley, on his part, never spoke of the occurrence to any living soul. "The rest is silence."

SHEPHERD TOLLER O' CLUN DOWNS

At the age of fifty or thereabouts Shepherd Toller went mad. After due process he was handed over to the authorities and graduated as a pauper lunatic. His madness was the outcome of solicitude, and it was not surprising that, after a year amid the jovial company of the asylum, Toller began to improve. At the end of the second year he was declared to be cured, and discharged, much to his regret.

His first act on liberation was to recover his old dog, which had been left in charge of a friend. Desiring to start life again where his former insanity would be unknown, he made his way to Deadborough, the village of his birth. Arrived there, after a forty miles' walk, he refreshed himself with a glass of beer and a penn'orth of bread and cheese, and proceeded at once to Farmer Ferryman in quest of work. The farmer, who was, as usual, in want of labour, sent him to Snarley Bob to "put the measure on him." Snarley's report was favourable. "He seemed a bit queer, no doubt, and kept laughin' at nothin'; but I've knowed lots o' queer people as had more sense than them as wasn't queer, and there's no denyin' as he's knowledgeable in sheep." The result was that Toller was forthwith appointed as an understudy to Snarley Bob.

Bob's estimate of the new-comer rose steadily day by day. "He had a wonderful eye for points." "As good a sheep-doctor as ever lived." "Wanted a bit of watchin', it was true, but had a head on his shoulders for all that." "Knows how to keep his mouth shut." "Was backward in breedin', but not for want o' sense--hadn't caught him young enough." "Could ha' taught him anything, if he'd come twenty-five years back." In due course, therefore, Toller was entrusted with great responsibilities. He it was who, under Snarley's direction, presided over the generation, birth, and early upbringing of the thrice-renowned "Thunderbolt."

So it went on for three years. At the end of that time Toller had an accident. He fell through the aperture of a feeding-loft, and his spinal column received an ugly shock. Symptoms of his old malady began to return. He began to get things "terrible mixed up," and to play tricks which violated both the letter and the spirit of Snarley's notches.

One of the breeding points in Snarley's system was connected with the length of the lambs' ears. Short ears in the new-born lamb were prophetic of desirable points which would duly appear when the creature became a sheep; long ears, on the other hand, indicated that the cross had failed. A crucial experiment on these lines was being conducted by aid of a ram which had been specially imported from Spain, and the whole thing had been left to Toller's supervision. The result was a complete failure. On the critical day, when Snarley returned from his obstetric duties, his wife saw gloom and disappointment on his countenance. "Well, have them lambs come right?" "Lambs, did you say? They're not _lambs_. They're young _jackasses_. It's summat as Shepherd Toller's been up to. You'll never make me believe as the Spanish ram got any one on 'em--no, not if you was to take your dyin' oath. Blessed if I know where he found a father for 'em. It's not one o' our rams, I'll swear. You mark my word, missis, Shepherd Toller's goin' out of his mind again. I've seen it comin' on for months. Only last Tuesday he sez to me, 'Snarley, I'm gettin' cloudy on the top.'"

Shortly after this Toller disappeared and, though the search was diligent, he could not be found. "He's not gone far," said Snarley. "Leastways he's sure to come back. Mad-men allus comes back." And within a few months an incident happened which enabled Snarley to verify his theory. It came about in this wise.

A party of great folk from the Hall had gone up into the hills for a picnic. They had chosen their camp near the head of a long upland valley, where the ground fell suddenly into a deep gorge pierced by a torrent. A fire of sticks had been lit close to the edge of the precipice, and a kettle, made of some shining metal, had been hung over the flames. The party were standing by, waiting for the water to boil, when suddenly, crash!--a sprinkle of scalding water in your face--and--where's the kettle? An invisible force, falling like a bolt from the blue, had smitten the kettle and hurled it into space. The ladies screamed; the Captain swore; the Clergyman cried, "Good Gracious!" the Undergraduate said, "Jerusalem!" the Wit added, "_And_ Madagascar!" But what was said matters not, for the Recording Angel had dropped his pen. The whole party stood amazed, unable to place the occurrence in any sort of intelligible context, and with looks that seemed to say, "The reign of Chaos has returned, and the Inexpressible become a fact!" Some went to the edge of the gorge and saw below a mass of buckled tin, irrecoverable, and worthless. Some looked about on the hillside, but looked on nothing to the point. Some stood by the spot where the kettle had hung, and argued without premises. Some searched for the missile, some for the man; but neither was found. The whole thing was an absolute mystery. The party had lost their tea, and gained a subject for conversation at dinner. That was all.

That night Snarley, in the tap-room of the Nag's Head, heard the story from the groom who had lit the fire, hung the kettle, and seen it fly into space. Snarley said nothing, quickly finished his glass, and went home. "Missis," he said, "get my breakfast at three o'clock to-morrow morning. Shepherd Toller's come back. And mind you hold your tongue."

By five o'clock next morning Snarley had reached the scene of the picnic. He gazed about him in all directions: nothing was stirring but the peewits. Then he climbed down the gorge with some difficulty, found the kettle, and examined its riven side. Climbing back, he went some distance further up the valley, ascended a little knoll, took out his whistle, and blew a peculiar blast, tremulous and piercing. No response. Snarley blew again, and again. At the fourth attempt the distant barking of a dog was heard, and a minute later the signal was answered by the counterpart to Snarley's blast. Presently the form of a big man, followed by a yelping dog, appeared on the skyline above. Shepherd Toller was found.

* * * * *

During the week which followed these events, various members of the picnic-party had begun to recollect things they had previously forgotten, and discoveries were made, _ex post facto_, which warranted the submission of the case to the Society for the Investigation of Mysterious Phenomena. Lady Lottie Passingham had been of the party, and she it was who drew up the Report which was so much discussed a few years ago. In her own evidence Lady Lottie, whose figure was none too slim, averred that, as she climbed the hill to the place of rendezvous, she had been distinctly conscious of something pulling her back. She had attached no importance to this at the time, though she had remarked to Miss Gledhow that she wished she hadn't come. The time at which the kettle flew was 4.27 p.m.; at 4.25 Lady Lottie, had a sensation as though a cold hand were stroking her left cheek, the separate fingers being clearly distinguishable. Miss Gledhow had experienced a feeling all afternoon that she was being _watched and criticised_--a feeling which she could only compare to that of a person who is having his photograph taken. Captain Sorley's cigarettes kept going out in the most unaccountable manner; and in this connection he would mention that more than once, and especially a few minutes after the main occurrence, he could not help fancying that someone was breathing in his face. The Rev. E. F. Stark-Potter had heard, several times, a sound like "Woe, woe," which he attributed at first to some ploughman calling to his horses; subsequent inquiry had proved, however, that, on the day in question, no ploughing was being done in the neighbourhood. All the witnesses concurred in the statement that they were vividly conscious of _something wrong_, the most emphatic in this respect being the Undergraduate, who had made no secret of his feeling at the time by assuring several members of the party that he felt absolutely "rotten," Further, the Report stated, the scene had been identified with the spot where a young woman committed suicide in 1834 by casting herself down the precipice. The battered kettle was also recovered and sent in a registered parcel for examination by the experts of the Society.

After the mature deliberation due to the distinguished names at the end of the Report, the Society decided that the evidence was non-veridical, and refused to print the document in their _Proceedings_.

Snarley Bob, who knew what was going on, had his reasons for welcoming this development. He concocted various legends of his own weird experiences at the valley-head, and these, as coming from him, had considerable weight. They were communicated in the first instance to the groom. By him they were conveyed to the coachman; by him, to the coachman's wife; whence they were not long in finding their way, by the usual channels, to headquarters. Here the contributions of Snarley were combined by various hands into an artistic whole with the original occurrence, which, in this new context, at once quitted the low ground of History and began a free development of its own in the realms of the Ideal. By the time it reached the Press it had become a fiction far more imposing than any fact, and far more worthy of belief. Things that never happened filled the foreground, and the thing that did happen had fallen so far into the background as to be almost invisible. The incident of the kettle had exfoliated into a whole sequence of imposing mysteries, becoming in the process a mere germ or point of departure of no more significance in itself than are the details in Saxo Grammaticus to a first-class performance of _Hamlet_. Thus transfigured, the story was indeed a drama rather than a narrative; and those who remember reading it in that form will hardly believe that it had its origin in the humble facts which these pages relate. The excitement it caused lasted for some weeks, and it was almost a public disappointment when the Society for the Investigation of Mysterious Phenomena blew a cold blast upon the whole thing.

* * * * *

When Snarley Bob met Shepherd Toller at Valley Head, he found him accoutred in a manner which verified his private theory as to the levitation of the kettle. Coiled round Toller's left arm were three slings, made from strips of raw oxhide, with pouches, large and small, for hurling stones of various size. Slung over his back was a big bag, also of leather, which contained his ammunition--smooth pebbles gathered from the torrent bed, the largest being the size of a man's fist. Strapped round his waist was a flint axe, the head being a beautiful celt, which Toller had discovered long ago on Clun Downs, and skilfully fixed in a handle bound with thongs.

In the days of Toller's first madness, it had been his habit to wander over Clun Downs, equipped in this manner, He had lived in some fastness of his own devising, and supplied his larder by the occasional slaughter of a stolen sheep, whose skull he would split with a blow from the flint axe. The slings were rather for amusement than hunting, though his markmanship was excellent, and he was said to be able at any time to bring down a rabbit, or even a bird. All day long he would wander in unfrequented uplands, slinging stones at every object that tempted his eye, and roaring and dancing with delight whenever he hit the mark. He was inoffensive enough and had never been known to deliberately aim at a human being, though more than one shooting party had been considerably alarmed by the crash of Toller's stones among the branches, or by his long-range sniping of the white-clothed luncheon-table. On one occasion Toller had landed a huge pebble, the size of an eight-pounder shot, into the very bull's-eye of the feast--to wit, a basket containing six bottles of Heidsieck's Special Reserve. It was this performance which led Sir George to report the case to the authorities and insist on Toller being put under restraint.

* * * * *

By the evening of the day when Toller disappeared from the Perryman sheepfolds he had completed the long walk to his former haunts, and recovered his weapons from under the cairn where he had carefully hidden them six years before. The axe, of course, was uninjured; but the slings were rotten. As soon as it was dark, therefore, Toller stole down to the pastures, captured a steer, brained it with the flint axe, stripped off the skin, made a fire, roasted a piece of the warm flesh, covered his tracks, and before the sun was up had made twenty miles of the return journey, with half a dozen fine new slings concealed beneath his coat. He arrived at Deadborough at nightfall the day but one following, having taken a circuitous route far from the highroad. He at once made his way into the hills.

Beyond the furthest outposts of the Perryman farm lie extensive wolds rising rapidly into desolate regions where sheep can scarcely find pasture. In this region Toller concealed himself. About two miles beyond the old quarry, on a slaty hillside, he found a deep pit, which had probably been used as a water-hole in prehistoric times; and here he built himself a hut. He made the walls out of the stones of a ruined sheep-fold; he roofed them with a sheet of corrugated iron, stolen from the outbuildings of a neighbouring farm, and covered the iron with sods; he built a fire-place with a flue, but no chimney; he caused water from a spring to flow into a hollow beside the door. Then he collected slate, loose stones, and earth; and, by heaping these against the walls of the hut, he gave the whole structure the appearance of a mound of rubbish. Human eyes rarely came within sight of the spot; but even a keen observer of casual objects would not have suspected that the mound represented any sort of human dwelling. It was a masterpiece of protective imitation, an exact replica of Toller's previous abode on Clun Downs. His fire burned only by night.

The furnishing of this simple establishment consisted of a feather bed, which rested on slabs of slate supported by stones,--whence obtained was never known, but undoubtedly stolen. The coverlet was three sheepskins sewn together, the pillow also a sheepskin, coiled round a cylinder of elastic twigs. The table was a deal box, once the property of Messrs. Tate, the famous refiners of sugar. The chair was a duplicate of the table. The implements were all of flint, neatly bound in their handles with strips of hide. There was the axe for slaughter, a dagger for cutting meat, a hammer for breaking bones, a saw and scrapers of various size--the plunder of some barrow on Clun Downs. Under the slates of the bed lay a collection of slings.

In this place Toller lived undiscovered for several months, issuing thence as occasion required in quest of food. This he obtained by night forays upon distant farms, bringing back mutton or beef, lamb or sucking pig, a turkey, a goose, a couple of chickens, according to the changes of his appetite or the seasonableness of the dish. Fruit, vegetables, and potatoes were obtained in the same manner. In addition, all the game of the hills was at his mercy, and he had fish from the stream. It was characteristic of Toller's cunning that his plunder was all obtained from afar, and seldom twice from the same place. He would go ten miles to the north to steal a lamb; next time, as far to the south to steal a goose. The plundered area lay along the circumference of great circles, with radii of ten, fifteen, twenty miles, of which his abode was the centre. This put pursuers off the track, and caused them to look for him everywhere but where he was. The police were convinced, for example, that he was hiding in Clun Downs. The steer he had slaughtered on his first return had been discovered, as Toller intended it to be; and, in order to keep up the fiction of his presence in that neighbourhood, he repeated his exploit a month later, and slaughtered a second steer in the very pasture where he had killed the first.

Nor was his favourite amusement denied him. He knew the movements of every shepherd on the uplands, and, by choosing his routes, could wander for miles, slinging stones as he went, without risk of discovery. Whether during these months he saw any human beings is unknown; certainly no human being recognised him. His power of self-concealment amounted to genius.

Such was the second madness of Shepherd Toller. Things from the abyss of Time that float upwards into dreams--sleeping things whose breath sometimes breaks the surface of our waking consciousness, like bubbles rising from the depths of Lethe--these had become the sober certainties of Toller's life. The superincumbent waters had parted asunder, and the children of the deep were all astir. Toller had awakened into a past which lies beyond the graves of buried races and had joined his fathers in the morning of the world.

* * * * *

Towards the end of the summer Toller's health began to decline. He was attacked by fierce paroxysms of internal pain, which left him weak and helpless. The distant forays had to be abandoned; there was no more slinging of stones; he had great difficulty in obtaining food. He craved most for milk, and this he procured at considerable risk of discovery by descending before dawn into the lowlands and milking, or partially milking, one of the Perryman cows; for the animals knew his voice and were accustomed to his touch.

This was the posture of his affairs when one day he became apprised of the presence in the neighbourhood of the picnic-party aforesaid. He stalked them with care, saw the preparation of their meal, eyed the large basket carried by the grooms, and thought with longing of the tea it was sure to contain, and of the brandy that might be there also. To be possessed of one or both of these things would at that moment have satisfied the all-inclusive desire of the sick man's soul, and he thought of every possible device and contrivance by which he could get them into his hands. None promised well. At last he half resolved on the desperate plan of scaring the pleasure-seekers from their camp by bombarding the ground with stones--a plan which he remembered to have proved effective with a party of ladies on Clun Downs. But he doubted his strength for such a sustained effort, and reflected that a party which contained so many men, even if forced to retreat, would be sure to take their provender with them. While he was thus reflecting he saw the kettle hoisted on the tripod, shining and glinting in the sun. Never had Toller beheld a more tempting mark. The range was easy; his station was well hidden; and the kettle was the hated symbol of his disappointed hopes. "One more, and then I've done," I sez to myself--thus he reported to Snarley Bob--"and I went back for the old sling, feelin' better than I'd done for weeks. I picks the best stone I could find, and kep' on whirlin' her round my head all the way back. Then I slaps her in, and blessed if I didn't take the kettle first shot!"

* * * * *

On the evening of the day when he discovered Toller, Snarley came home with a countenance of sorrow. "I've found him, missis," he said; "but he's a dyin' man. Worn to a shadder, and him the biggest man in the parish. It would ha' scared you to see him. As sane as ever he was in his life. 'Shepherd,' he sez, 'I'm starvin'. Can you get me a bit of summat as I can eat?' 'What would you like?' I sez. He sez, 'I want baccy and buttermilk. For God's sake, get me some buttermilk. It's the only thing as I feel 'ud keep down; and the pain's that awful it a'most tears me to shreds. And may be you can find a pinch o' tea and a spot or two of something short.' I sez, 'You shall have it all this very night. But how's your head?' 'Terrible heavy at the back,' he sez, 'but clear on the top. I've a'most done wi' slingin' and stealin'. The police is after me, and I'm too weak to dodge 'em much longer; they're bound to catch me soon. But they'll get nowt but a bag o' bones, and they'll have to be quick if they want 'em alive. Shepherd, I'm a dyin' man, and there's not a soul to stand by me or bury me.' 'Yes, there is,' I sez; 'you've got me. I'll stand by you, and bury you, too. If the police catches you, it'll be through no tellin' o' mine. You go back to your hut, and we'll keep you snug enough, and get you all the baccy and buttermilk as you wants.' 'Thank God!' he sez; and then the pain took him, and he fair rolled on the ground."

* * * * *

"Yes, sir," continued the widow of Snarley, "my 'usband had been failin' for two years afore he died. But it was that affair wi' Shepherd Toller as broke what bit o' strength he'd got left. I wanted him to tell the doctor as he'd found him; but you might as well ha' tried to turn the church round as move my 'usband when once he'd made up his mind. 'Nivver, Polly!' he sez. 'I've given Shepherd Toller my word. Besides, he's too far gone for doctors to do him any good. He'll not last many days. And I knows a way o' sendin' him to sleep as beats all the doctors' bottles. You leave him to me.'

"Well, you see, sir, I knowed very well as he were doing wrong. But then he didn't look at it that way. And he mostly knowed what he were doin', my 'usband did.

"He never missed goin' to Shepherd Toller's hut mornin' nor night. He took him buttermilk a'most every day; and oh, my word, the lies as he told about what he wanted it for! I've known him walk miles to get it. And then he'd sometimes sit up wi' him half the night tryin' to get him to sleep, rubbin' his back and his head. And the things my 'usband used to tell me about his sufferin's--oh, sir, it were somethin' awful!... Once my 'usband asked him if he'd let him tell the doctor, and Shepherd Toller a'most went out o' his mind with fright. 'I've got to see it through, Polly,' he sez to me; 'but I doubt if it won't be the death o' me.'

"Shepherd Toller took to his bed the very day as my 'usband met him, and never left it, leastways he never went outside the hut again. I wanted to go myself and look after him a bit in the daytime. But my 'usband wouldn't let me go. 'He's no sight for you to look at, missis,' he sez. 'Except for the pain, his mind's at rest. Besides, there's nobody but me knows how to talk to him, and there's nobody but me as he wants to see. You can't make him no comfortabler than he is.'

"But it were a terrible strain on my poor 'usband, and there's not a doubt that it would ha' killed him there and then if it had lasted much longer. It were about three weeks before the end come, and nivver shall I forget that night--no, not if I was to live to be a thousand years old.

"My master come home about ten o'clock, lookin' just like a man as were walkin' in his sleep. I couldn't get him to take notice o' nothin', and when I put his supper on the table he seemed as though he hardly knowed what it were for. He didn't eat more than two mouthfuls, and then he turned his chair round to the fire, tremblin' all over.

"After a bit I sees him drop asleep like. So I sez to myself, 'I'll just go upstairs to warm his bed for him, and then I'll come down and wake him up,' and I begins to get the warmin'-pan ready. He were mutterin' all sorts of things; but I didn't take much notice o' that, because that's what he allus did when he went to sleep in his chair. However, I did notice that he kep' mutterin' something about a dog.

"Soon he wakes up, kind o' startled, and sez, 'Missis, let that dog in; he won't let me get a wink o' sleep.' 'You silly man,' I sez, 'you've been fast asleep for three-quarters of a' hour.' 'Why,' he sez, 'I've been wide awake all the time, listenin' to the dog whinin' and scratchin' at the door, and I was too tired to get up and let him in. Open the door quick; I'm fair sick on it.' I sez, 'What nonsense you're talkin'! Why, Boxer's been lyin' under the table ever since you come home at ten o'clock. He's there now.' So he looks under the table, and there sure enough were Boxer fast asleep. 'Well,' he sez, 'it must be another dog. Open the door, as I tell you, and see what it is.' So I opens the door; and, of course, there were no sign of a dog. 'Are you satisfied now?' I sez. 'I can't make it out,' he sez; 'it's something funny. I'd take my dyin' oath as there were a dog scratchin'. But maybe as I'll go to sleep now.' So he shuts his eyes, and were soon off, mutterin' as before.

"Well, I was just goin' upstairs when all of a sudden he give a scream as a'most made me drop the warmin' pan. 'What's up?' I sez. 'I've burnt my hand awful,' he sez. 'Burnt your hand?' I sez. 'How did you manage to do that? Have you been tumblin' into the fire?' 'I don't know,' he sez; 'but the funny thing is there's no mark of burnin' as I can see.' 'Why,' I sez, 'it must be the rheumatiz in yer knuckles. I'll get a drop o' turpentine, and rub 'em,' So I gets the turpentine, and begins rubbin' his hand, and his arm as well. He sez, 'It's just like a red-hot nail driven slap through the palm o' my hand.' Well, it got better after a bit, and I made him go to bed, though he were that hot and excited I knowed we were going to have a wild night.

"The minute he lay down he went to sleep and slep' quietly for about half an hour. Then he starts groanin' and tossin'. 'It's beginnin',' I sez to myself; 'I'd better light the candle so as to be ready.' The minute I struck the match he jumps out o' bed like a madman, catches hold of the bedpost, and begins pullin' the bed across the room. 'What are you doin'?' I sez. 'I'm pullin' the bed out o' the fire,' he sez. 'Don't you see the room's burnin'?' 'Come, master,' I sez, 'you've got the nightmare. Get back into bed again, and keep quiet.'

"He let go o' the bedpost and began starin' in front of him with the most awful eyes you ever see. 'Are you blind?' he sez. 'Don't you see what's 'appenin'?' 'Nothing's 'appenin',' I sez; 'get back into bed.' 'Look! he sez, 'look at the top o' that hill! Can't you see they're crucifying Shepherd Toller on a red-hot cross? I can hear him screamin' wi' pain.' 'Get out,' I sez; 'Shepherd Toller's all right. Now just you lie down, and think no more about it.' But, oh dear, you might as well ha' talked to thunder and lightnin'. He kep' on as how he could hear Shepherd Toller screamin' and callin' for him, until I thought I should ha' gone out o' my mind.

"Just then a' idea come to me. We'd got a bottle o' stuff as the doctor give him to make him sleep when the rheumatiz come on bad. So I pours out half a cupful, and I sez, 'Here, you drink that, and it'll stop 'em crucifying Shepherd Toller.' He drinks it down at a gulp, and then he sez, 'They've took him down. But I'm afraid he's terrible burnt.' He soon got quiet and lay down and went to sleep.

"He must ha' slep' till six in the mornin', when he got up. 'My head's achin' awful,' he sez. 'I've been dreamin' about Shepherd Toller all night. I believe as summat's gone wrong wi' him. Make me a cup o' strong tea, and I'll go and see what's up.'

"When my 'usband got to the hut the first thing he sees were Shepherd Toller lyin' all of a heap on the floor wi' his clothes half burnt off him and his left arm lyin' right on the top o' where the fire had been. His hand were like a cinder, and he were burnt all over his body. He were still livin' and able to speak. 'How's this happened--what have you been doin'?' sez my 'usband. 'It were the cold,' he sez, 'and I wanted a drop o' brandy. And the dog were tryin' to get in. You shut him out when you went away.'

"Well, my 'usband gave him brandy and managed to lift him on to the bed. 'I never thought as I should die like this,' he sez. 'Bury the old dog wi' me, shepherd, and put the slings alongside o' me and the little axe in my hand. And see there's plenty o' stones.' That was the last he said, though he kep' repeatin' it as long as he could speak. It were not more than an hour after my master found him before he were gone.

"My 'usband dug his grave wi' his own hands, close beside the hut, and buried him next day. He put the axe and slings just as he told him, wi' the stones and all the bits of flint things as he found in the hut. What went most to his heart were shootin' the old dog. He telled me as he were sure the dog knowed he were goin' to kill him, and stood as quiet as a lamb beside the grave when he pointed the gun. 'It were worse than murder,' he said, 'and I shall see him to my dyin' day. But I'd given my word, and I had to do it.

"No, sir, not a livin' soul, exceptin' me, knew what had happened till my 'usband told Mrs. Abel and you three days before he died. That were eighteen months after he'd buried Shepherd Toller. Of course, he'd ha' got into trouble if they'd knowed what he'd done. But he weren't afraid, and he used to say to me, 'Don't you bother, missis. They can't do nothing to you when I'm gone. Let 'em say what they like; you and me knows as I've done no wrong. There's only one thing as I can't bear to think on. And that's shootin' the old dog.'"

SNARLEY BOB'S INVISIBLE COMPANION

Whether Snarley Bob was mad or sane is a question which the reader, ere now, has probably answered for himself. If he thinks him mad, his conclusion will repeat the view held, during his lifetime, by many of Snarley's equals and by some of his betters. In support of the opposite opinion, I will only say that he was sane enough to hold his tongue in general about certain matters, which, had he freely talked of them, would have been regarded as strong evidence of insanity.

The chief of these was his intercourse with the Invisible Companion--invisible to all save Snarley Bob. That designation, however, is not Snarley's, but my own; and I use it because I do not wish to commit myself to the identification of this personage with any individual, historical or imaginary. Snarley generally called him "the Shepherd"; sometimes, "the Master"; and he used no other name.

With this "Master" Snarley claimed to be on terms of intimacy which go beyond the utmost reaches of authentic mysticism. Whether the being in question was a figment of the brain or a real inhabitant of time and space, let the reader, once more, decide for himself. Some being there was, at all events, of whose companionship Snarley was aware under circumstances which are not usually associated with such matters.

There is much in this connection that must needs remain obscure. The only witness who could have cleared those obscurities away has long been beyond the reach of summons. To none else than Mrs. Abel was Snarley ever known to open free communication on the subject.

He spoke now and then of a dim, far-off time when he had been a "Methody." But he had shown scant perseverance in the road which, strait and narrow though it be, has now become easy to trace, being well marked by the tread of countless bleeding feet. Instead of continuing therein, he had "leapt over the wall" into the surrounding waste, and struck out, by a path of his own devising, for the land of Beulah. By all recognised precedent he ought to have failed in arriving. I will not say he succeeded; but he himself was well content with the result. It is true that in all his desert-wanderings he never lost the chart and compass with which Methodism had once provided him; but he filled in the chart at points where Methodism had left it blank, and put the compass to uses which were not contemplated by the original makers.

For many years before his death Snarley entered neither the church nor the chapel; and, I regret to say, he had a very low opinion of both. This was one of the few matters on which he and Hankin were agreed, though for opposite reasons. Hankin objected to these institutions because they went too far; Snarley because they went not nearly far enough. It may, however, be noted that in the tap-room of the Nag's Head, where the blasphemy of the Divine name was a normal occurrence, Snarley, of whose displeasure everybody went in fear, would never allow the name of Christ to be so much as mentioned, not even argumentatively by Hankin; and once when a foul-mouthed navvy had used the name as part of some filthy oath, Snarley instantly challenged the man to fight, struck him a fearful blow between the eyes and pitched him headlong, with a shattered face, into the village street. But in the matter of contempt for the religious practice of his neighbours, his attitude was, if possible, more extreme than Hankin's. I need not quote his utterances on these matters; except for their unusual violence, they were sufficiently commonplace. Had Snarley been more highly developed as "a social being" he would, no doubt, have been less intolerant; but solitude had made him blind on that side of his nature; for his fellow-men in general he had little sympathy and less admiration, his soul being as lonely as his body when wandering before the dawn on some upland waste.

Lonely, save for the frequent presence, by day and night, of his ghostly monitor and friend. To understand the nature of this companionship we must remember that devotion to the shepherd's craft was the controlling principle of Snarley's being. Had he been able to philosophise on the basis of his experience, he would have found it impossible to represent perfection as grounded otherwise than on a supreme skill in the breeding and management of sheep. No being, in his view of things, could wear the title of "good Shepherd" for any other reason. Taking Snarley all round, I dare say he was not a bad man; but I doubt if there was any sin which smelt so rank in his nostrils as the loss of a lamb through carelessness, nor any virtue he rated so high as that which was rewarded by a first prize at the agricultural show. The form of his ideal, and the direction of his hero-worship, were determined accordingly.