Chapter ONE: § 1

The George was King George the Third, and the Crown was Queen Anne’s Crown, and they faced each other across the street of Bullockdean. The George had a face of stucco, cracked and discoloured with age and the mists of the Ouse Valley, and a parapet behind which its old roof rose rakish and wrinkled. The Crown’s face was of ruddy brick, gashed with long, deep-set windows, and topped by a huge pediment of new-painted whiteness.

So close and friendly were they that from one bar-parlour you could almost see what was going on in the other--that is, if you cared to look; but on the whole the doings in the bar of the George had very little interest for the bar of the Crown, and contrariwise. The Crown catered chiefly for sedate farmers and good class visitors from Lewes, Newhaven and Eastbourne--the George catered for the rowdier elements of all three towns, which frequented it at race-time, and the more disreputable, poaching class of farm-labourer. The only occasion when the two inns had had any manner of warfare was when Mr. Munk, the landlord of the Crown, sent over a dignified protest at the noise made by the George’s dispersing drunks at closing-time; whereat Mr. Sheather, the landlord of the George, had retorted that the sight of the Crown’s lady visitors undressing with the blind up was demoralizing his family.

On the whole the neighbourhood disapproved of the George and approved of the Crown, though both were equally frequented by different elements of local society. The stain on the George’s sign was drunkenness, and, it was whispered, betting too. Still, as everyone said, what could you expect from a man like Tom Sheather, who had gone roving in his youth and brought back a wife from foreign parts? It was his own fault if the George was but a sorry pub, while the Crown was very nearly an hotel, with visitors staying all the summer. Visitors would never stay at the George, even if there was room for them, which there was not. Tom Sheather filled the place up with his roughs, such as decent farmers would not drink with. He’d have racing-men from Lewes, a drunken, sharky lot--he’d have sailormen from Newhaven, making a night of it in a hired shay. The Oddfellows had given up meeting at the George ever since the crew of a Margate trawler had insisted on playing their piano for them; and if the Buffaloes still met there it was only because Mr. Batup, their Grand Master, had a liking for old Tom in spite of his rotten ales.

As a matter of fact, most people liked Tom Sheather, though it was agreed that you could never quite trust him, and that you felt sorry for his second boy Daniel, who was always having to play policeman to his dad. The eldest son was married, and had a sad little farm over at Brakey Bottom, beyond Telscombe, while the third boy, Christopher, was no good to anybody. His mother spoilt him, and gossip accused her of having kept him at home by disreputable means, when other women’s sons and her own elder boys had gone to the war.

The war had dealt hardly with the George. The suspension of racing, the limitation of the hours in which liquor could be sold, the no-treating order--all had been bad for the George’s particular constitution, whereas the Crown had thriven on high prices and a congested population. Also James Munk had money come to him through his wife, who at her death had left her entire fortune to his enjoyment and disposal. While Tom Sheather had none, for his parents at their death, shortly before the war, were shown not to have dealt very wisely with the landlords of streets, and of the little that they left, nothing remained after a few years’ fluency in Tom’s hands. It was obvious that he had not realized his ambition of busting the Crown. But if there was little comfort in the thought that he owed his failure largely to his own mismanagement, there was considerable alleviation in the fact that it troubled him not at all. He still thought the George was a better pub than the Crown--he would rather be in debt to his brewer and have a good crowd of boys round him, than be solvent and honourable like James Munk, and have nothing but a couple of old maids dozing in his parlour--which he had let off to them, so that he and his son Ernley had to sit in the kitchen.

Anyhow Tom was better off in his home and family than poor Munk, whose wife was dead and whose elder son had been killed in the war, leaving him with no one but Ernley, whom everybody knew was rotten--an officer and a gentleman, but rotten. Whereas Tom had a tidy little wife--even if she was growing a bit sharp-tongued these days and inclined to snap her old man’s head off--and three spanking boys: Len, who was clever as you made ’em, for all he hadn’t been educated at Lancing College like some folks’ sons; Dan, who was the stoutest, handiest chap between Lewes and the sea; and Chris, who was the handsomest.... He was glad they’d all three come safe through the war, and if ever he wished that the old George was a better paying concern, it was for their sakes.... He’d have liked to be able to buy Len some new machinery for that farm of his, which wouldn’t produce more than one quarter to the acre--and Chris had been badgering him for months because he wanted new breeches and leggings--and it wouldn’t have been a bad thing if old Dan could have had a boy to help him in the yard.... But there you were--times were bad for innkeepers, unless they were foxy like old Munk--and anyhow, it was good to have his three boys under his roof, even if he couldn’t give them all he and they wanted. He liked to see them sitting in his bar.

§ 2

They were all three sitting there that evening in February, just twenty minutes before six and opening-time. Len had come over from Telscombe to an auction at Tarring Neville, and was on his way back, disappointed because of high prices. Dan had just come back from Batchelors’ Hall over by the Dicker--where he had gone ostensibly to sell a pig, but really, as everyone knew, to court Belle Shackford. Now he was helping Christopher and his mother polish glasses in readiness for six o’clock. The three young Sheathers were much of a middle-size, but they were very different in face and colouring. Leonard and Daniel were both dark, but whereas the former had his mother’s sharp nose and chin, the latter had the broad face, short nose and wide mouth of his Saxon fathers. Christopher was blue-eyed and flaxen, with a weaker version of Dan’s blunt nose, and a sulky, inviting mouth.

There was a shuffling, scurrying sound outside, followed by a rap on the door.

“Go see who that is, Dan,” said Kitty. “We aren’t open yet.”

Dan unlocked the door, and revealed an ancient shepherd in charge of some muddy tegs.

“Hullo, Mr. Gadgett! What brings you round at this time?”

“‘Tis gone six o’clock, Maas’ Sheather.”

“Not for half an hour,” called Kitty from the bar.

Mr. Gadgett consulted an elderly turnip.

“My watch says three o’clock, which means ten minutes past six,” he affirmed.

“And my clock says half-past five, which means half-past five,” said Kitty.

The old man heaved a deep sigh.

“I comed all the way from Brakey Bottom, and there’s a wunnerful lot of mud on the roads. Leastways it wur wunst on the roads--reckon it’s all on my boots now.”

“Poor old chap,” said Tom. “I can’t see any harm in serving him. It’s nearly opening time.”

“Oh no, dad, it isn’t,” said Daniel.

“Besides, if it was,” said Len--“even if it was only two minutes to six, you’d be breaking the damn law just the same. The law’s a fine thing, ain’t it, Mr. Gadgett?”

The shepherd looked confused and weary.

“Wot wud six o’clock, and two o’clock and ten o’clock, I’m wunnerful muddled.”

Dan felt sorry for him.

“Maybe we could let you have a cup of tea since it’s too early for beer,” he suggested.

“Well, you go into the kitchen and make it,” said his mother, “since you’re the only one who’s doing nothing.”

This statement was open to challenge, but Dan accepted it good-humouredly.

“I’m a fine handy one with the tea, ain’t I, mum? You come around to the kitchen door, Mr. Gadgett, and I’ll give you as good as ale.”

When he was gone, Leonard took his pipe out of his mouth.

“This is an all-fool’s game with the clock. I wonder you stick it, dad. If I was you I’d kick for my right to sell my own beer at my own time.”

“It ain’t my own beer, seeing I haven’t paid for it yet.”

“Maybe you could pay for it easy enough if they didn’t tie you hand and foot in your trade. I tell you, this sort of thing makes me sick. Us working like slaves, and getting nothing but abuse and interference ... they said ‘Come and fight for your country, and we’ll give you a country fit for heroes.’ Now they say ‘You’ve fought for your country--thanks--now get out of it.’ They tell us strong chaps to go and emigrate, and I’m----”

“Well, I’d do it for two pins.”

“Don’t you make him think of it,” cried Kitty.

“He won’t be such a fool. Besides, it isn’t the same for him as for me. He didn’t lose four years mucking about, though it wasn’t his fault, like some----”

“Now, don’t you go hitting at me,” said Chris.

“I’m not hitting at you. It wasn’t your fault, neither--and I’d never blame a young boy of eighteen for not choosing to go out and get killed. But I blame those chaps that hid in Government offices, and wore uniforms, and got a thousand a year, and call themselves major and colonel these days, and say to us poor fellows who were fools enough to get sent out to France----”

“Oh, chuck it, Len,” said Chris.

“You’re a fine chap to say ‘chuck it.’”

“You said you never blame him,” broke in his mother.

“No more I do, but he’s got to let me talk.”

And talk he did.

§ 3

Meanwhile in the kitchen Dan made tea for old Mr. Gadgett. He had none of the normal awkwardness and shame of a man making tea. The special complications of his life had taught him to be handy at most things. He blew up the dying fire into a roar, filled the kettle with fresh water, fetched tea from the caddy and a cup from the shelf just as efficiently and a good deal more graciously than his mother would have done. Old Gadgett watched him from the chair where he sat stiffly, as one unused to rest.

“You’re a wunnerful kind young chap, Maas’ Sheather, and some day if you’ll come around to my house I’ll show you what I ain’t shown nobody yet.”

“And what may that be?” asked Daniel.

“My teeth.”

“Your teeth!”

“Yes, you come around to my house and I’ll show you my teeth.”

“But I didn’t know as you had any,” said Dan, with a rather tactless stare at the thin, receding old mouth.

“No, there ain’t many as knows; there’s doctor, and there’s Miss Belle, and now there’s yourself--that’s all. I don’t go wearing them about the place. But I’ve a wunnerful fine set of teeth.”

“Got ’em at the hospital?” asked Dan, as he set the tea on the table.

Mr. Gadgett, with deliberate, shaking hands, emptied his cup into his saucer, and supped a few mouthfuls before answering impressively:

“No--not I. I made ’em myself.”

“Reckon that was smart of you. How did you do it?”

“It’s taken me nigh on ten year. They’re sheep’s teeth, wot I’ve picked up on the hill, and rubbed ’em and filed ’em till they’re a proper size. And I’ve strung ’em on two wires, and I hitch ’em around two old stumps I’ve got ... you never saw the like.”

Dan was properly impressed.

“Reckon you’re a hem clever man, Mr. Gadgett; and I bet you find ’em useful at supper time.”

Mr. Gadgett looked superior.

“Oh, I’d never use ’em for eating. They ain’t that kind of teeth--and I don’t say as I can rightly speak wud ’em. I wear ’em for the looks of things. Some day I mean to have my likeness took wud them in. But if you come around to my house I’ll show ’em to you.”

“I’ll come one day when I’m at Batchelors’. I’ll be proud.”

“Reckon it ain’t everyone I’d show ’em to. But you’ve done me a kindness to-day, Maas’ Sheather, and it ain’t the fust. I often wish as my poor Ellen cud see my teeth, for many’s the time she’s said, ‘If we cud only get you fitted for a set of teeth, maaster.’ ... Maybe it’s wot put the notion into my head, and I’m larmentable sorry she didn’t live to see wot I done. Howsumdever, they may have told her where’s she’s gone.... There’s my dog barking--reckon the sheep’s uneasy; I mun be off, or I’ll lose the moon before I get to Batchelors’. Thank you kindly for the tea, Maas’ Sheather.”

He went out, comfortable and slaked. It was now nearly six--a few more minutes would have seen him in legal enjoyment of a glass of beer; but, reflected Daniel, a cup of tea was better for these old chaps. He wished the George would provide it as a matter of course, instead of selling only brewers’ stuff. They’d never get on that way; but dad cared for nothing but messing about in the bar, and mother said she’d work enough without waiting on strangers.... Dan shrugged and whistled himself into his overcoat, then went back into the taproom.

“Where are you going, Dan?” asked Kitty.

“Just round to the Parsonage to fix that henhouse, and then I’ll go and see old Ernley for a bit.”

“You’re never at home. Is it not enough you going out all day without being out half the night as well?”

“The evening’s my best time for seeing my friends.”

“And a fine set of friends you have--a clergyman who has holes in his coat, and a young girl who already makes herself the talk of the place with your other friend; and he’s a lazy, fine, wicked, extravagant young boy, who rides about the country on a motor-bike and keeps an inn that he says is better than ours.”

“And so it is, if you go by class. I’m unaccountable fond of old Ernley, anyway. And reckon no one’s any call to say anything against Miss Shackford--for it ain’t true, and I won’t listen to it neither. And as for Mr. Marchbanks, he pays me for what I do for him, and it ain’t much.”

“Oh, you be off, then. I got Christopher to help me. Thank God I got one son who stays at home.”

“Thank God you haven’t got two,” said Daniel good-humouredly, “or the bills ’ud never get paid.”

“Now, don’t you get saucy.”

“He ain’t saucy, Kit,” put in his father; “he’s only reminding you that all his outings ain’t for pleasure. The boy’s a good boy, sure enough.”

Dan looked deprecatingly at his mother. He wondered what she would do if he took her in his arms and cuddled her. He had often wanted to, but something about her made him shy. She would not like it from him as she would from Chris. He had often seen Chris put his arms round his mother and lay his cheek against her shoulder.... He wanted to do that. But--well, he didn’t like to, somehow. He pulled his cap over the thick, shiny, black hair which was brushed back undivided from his forehead, and went out with rather a sheepish look in her direction.

“You’ll be back before closing time,” his father called after him.

“Yes, I’ll be back.”

His voice came to them with the chiming of the church clock as it struck six.

“Open the bar!” cried Tom Sheather.

§ 4

It was nearly dark when Daniel went out. A sheet of lingering red in the west showed up the masses of Fore Hill and Bullock Down, but the rest of the sky was a dim, lightless grey, pricked with a few stars, and the valley beneath was grey, with the river dark among the mists, save where its waters held one faint glimmer at the Shine.

Dan blew on his hands, for he was cold; but his work at the Parsonage would soon warm him. He must get on with that henhouse ... and if the bulbs were to go in, they’d better go in now. He wanted the garden to look nice by springtime.... It would want a bit of manure; he would see if he couldn’t get some from Place....

Bullockdean Parsonage was a big, ramshackle house, where the unmarried rector camped like some squatter in the vastness of the prairie. Its few tokens of care and ornament--that is to say, a bright blue gate and windows and doors in the piecemeal process of becoming blue, also an artistic flower-bed border of bottle glass and scallop shells--were the fruits of Daniel’s industry. Daniel “had an arrangement” with Mr. Marchbanks; that is to say, he had quasi-sole charge of the house and the garden for ten shillings a week. This worked out to the rector’s advantage in that he would never have found anyone else to do half the work for twice the money; so he was willing to put up with a certain growing eccentricity in the appearance of his domain. It also worked out to Daniel’s advantage, for he could come and go as he pleased, suiting his hours to the demands of the George. At the same time it helped lighten that house’s financial burden, for ten shillings a week, he knew, went far in his mother’s thrifty housekeeping.

To-night he stood for a moment at the gate, contemplating his handiwork with a satisfied smile. One of the lower windows was lighted, and he could see through its uncurtained panes a young man stooping over a writing-table covered with books and papers. Mr. Marchbanks was busy, and Dan had better get on with his jobs without troubling him.

Dan had an almost maternal feeling for Mr. Marchbanks, who had not been in Bullockdean more than two years. He came from a big church in Oxford, where, by report, he had spent his time in study and in writing books. Why he had chosen to leave it for the care of an obscure Sussex parish was his own private adventure. He was still, after two years’ residence, inclined to be shy of his country parishioners, whose ways were so unlike the ways of Oxford; and they, on their side, were inclined to look down on him for his lack of clerical state. Also, immediately after his arrival, he had made an almost fatal mistake. He had failed to see the devotional aspect of a composition known as White-Wilcox in C, which had been sung at harvest festivals in Bullockdean from the days they were first started. All unknowing the enormity he was contemplating, and having already made, without outcry, several small changes in the direction of simplicity, he abolished White-Wilcox’s crashes and quavers, and substituted plainsong. The earth shook, the skies roared, the heavens fell. More literally, the choir went on strike, the people’s warden joined the Wesleyans, and a protest was drawn up by the Oddfellows in the bar of the Crown, and then taken across to be signed by the Buffaloes in the bar of the George, providing yet another instance of the Odium Gregorianum.

Then Mr. Marchbanks made a still worse blunder. He retracted. Moved with pity for the simple souls he had offended, and realizing that he had really dethroned the local god, whose identity he had at first been at some loss to discover, he restored White-Wilcox in C to all his former glory. As he confined himself almost entirely to the repeated statement that “Lebanon skips like a calf, Sirion also like a young unicorn,” there was nothing that made him unfit for Christmas, Easter or Whitsun or other occasions of rejoicing. Once more his familiar arpeggios wheezed forth on the organ, once more Mr. Pilbeam’s alto took, even though it could not hold, notes above the stave, while cantori and decani became antiphonally calves and unicorns, and old Auntie Harman “joined in” as usual from her pew, and you heard, as usual, her nieces Jess and Maudie “shushing her down.” Mr. Marchbanks thought he had re-established himself. But, on the contrary, he had only doubled his error. His congregation would now more than ever talk regretfully of “the old days” which had been before he came. The “old reverend” would never have taken away White-Wilcox in C, but if he had, he would most certainly never have put him back again; he’d have seen the entire congregation Wesleyans first.

It was during these months of crisis that the rector and Daniel Sheather became friends. Dan had no special devotion to White-Wilcox, and he had never loved the “old reverend,” who had once thrashed him for putting a firework in the hinge of the parsonage gate. He was sorry for Mr. Marchbanks, who so obviously didn’t know his job, and so obviously wanted looking after by a sensible chap. There being no mistress at the rectory made him particularly vulnerable to the form of attack which Dan called “helping around.” He had soon obtained control of all the outside of the house and of the parson’s boots as well.

This evening he used the last of the fading light for planting bulbs--hyacinths and tulips, whose origin in the borders of Place Farm might have distressed the rector had he known of it. Then when it grew too dark to see he went into the shed, and, lighting a candle, tinkered away at the henhouse he was making. He had decided that Mr. Marchbanks was going to keep fowls, and had arranged with the chicken boy at Upper Barndean to supply him with one or two good pullets for a start.

§ 5

At eight o’clock he stopped work, put away his tools, locked up the shed and went quietly off. It was now very cold indeed. A snap of frost made the stars shiver above the black ridges of the Downs, and Daniel walked quickly, with his hands thrust deep into the pockets of his overcoat, and his collar turned up to his red ears. It was bad luck never having quite enough clothes to keep you warm.... However, it would be warm enough at the Crown. Ernley always had a good fire, and often a good drink of something hot as well.

The bar of the Crown was altogether a superior affair to the bar of the George. The sawdust on the floor was thicker, the windows were covered with cosy, bright red curtains, and there were one or two comfortable chairs about. Moreover, behind the counter stood pleasant Maudie Harman, with her slow, pretty ways and welcoming smile.

“Good evening, Mr. Sheather,” she greeted him. “It’s some days since you’ve been in.”

“Good evening, Miss Harman. How are you? And how’s auntie and your sister Jess?”

“Oh, we’re all fine. Jess is looking after Doctor Penny’s children now. She gets six bob a week and her dinner.”

“Say, that’s good! I bet your auntie’s pleased, with the two of you doing so well.”

“Oh, she’s pleased inside, I reckon, though she don’t say much out, ’cept that we’re hussies, for we both bought lace collars last week.”

“And uncommon smart you look in them. I saw them in church on Sunday.”

“Well, I tell auntie that we must dress a bit, seeing as everybody knows us.... Yes, Mr. Luck, two sherries in a minute.”

She hastily took her elbows off the counter and became professional. Dan saw that James Munk had come into the bar.

“Evening,” he said glumly. “Is Ernley in?”

He hated James Munk for a variety of reasons, the chief one of which was that he wielded a weapon against which Daniel Sheather, like most of his class, stood helpless--the weapon of sarcasm. He never knew whether or not the landlord of the Crown was “getting at him”; his simplest remarks were full of danger, his praise was barbed, his blame two-edged. Dan in his presence became a mumbling oaf.

“Evening,” repeated Munk, in tones of courtesy. “Ernley is in his room.”

“Well, I’d better go upstairs.”

“Yes, I think that would be the best way to get there.”

Munk did not like having the young Sheathers in his bar; his comfort was that they never stayed there long. Daniel was now half-way up the stairs, stumbling in the darkness, and wondering exactly where he had been stung. The Crown people were almost like gentry with their talk and their ways. The queer thing was that he didn’t in the least mind old Ernley’s imitation of a gentleman, though he hated his father’s.

He knocked at Ernley’s door. It was merely a consoling fiction of Tom Sheather’s that James and his son had to sit in the kitchen because their parlour was let to visitors. It was often so let, it is true, but Ernley would never have sat in it. He had a room of his own, a long, low, comfortable room that ran along the frontage of the Crown, and looked out over its sign at the village street. A bright wood fire burned luxuriously in the grate, showing the thick carpet and comfortable chairs, and Ernley’s bed with its warm quilt--lighting up his pictures and dancing on the covers of his books.

“Hallo, Dan! That you?”

“Hallo, Ernley!”

Dan came in and sat down on the other side of the fire.

“What’ll you have to drink?”

“Oh, I dunno.”

“May as well have the port out--you look cold.”

“It’s turned cold.”

Ernley fetched a bottle and glasses out of the cupboard. He was a tall, well-made, well-dressed young man, with a dark complexion and queer, restless eyes. He and Daniel had been in the same battalion of the Sussex Regiment. They had joined up about the same time, and they had been together in the second battle of Ypres, where Ernley had been wounded and gassed. Soon afterwards he had been given a commission, and his way and Dan’s had parted, but their friendshi--psuperseding a mere distrustful acquaintanceship--had remained. There was a world of difference between them--difference in birth, for Ernley’s mother at least had been well-born; in education, for Ernley had been to Lancing College and Daniel to the council school; and in character, for Ernley had queer, dark, hidden ways and moody adventures in which Dan could not share. But the friendship stood firm, built on a double set of memories--memories of childhood spent in the same village, of games and jealousies and quests, and memories of the black and ravaged soil of Flanders, of horrors and dangers and terrors and squalors, lit up by queer gleams of human laughter ... it was strange, thought Daniel, that he should have remembered all the jokes he and Ernley used to have together, about rats and dud crumps and the corporal and plum-and-apple jam, and should have forgotten all the rest--except at the distressed end of sleep.... He did not think Ernley had forgotten so much, and that was perhaps why he was often difficult and mood-ridden, requiring the whole of his friend’s toleration.

“Why didn’t you come yesterday?” asked Ernley. “I was expecting you.”

“I went over to Brakey Bottom. Len was that done over his pigs, and Em having a headache and all----”

“Which did you look after, Em or the pigs?”

“Both,” said Dan innocently. “I give Em her mixture, seeing old Len’s in a terrification, and heated her a brick, to draw it out of her feet; and as for the pigs, I tell Len straight they’ve got pneumonia, and he may as well kill ’em quick before they die.”

“Then there’s no use strafing you because you didn’t come to me, but I wish you hadn’t quite so many people to look after, or that you’d count me in as one of them.”

“I do count you in--not that you want looking after as much as some.”

“But I do. That’s where you make a mistake--you put too much stress on physical comfort. If a chap’s got good boots you never think there’s anything more he can want.”

“Well, you seem to have a lot besides boots. Howsumever, Emley, you can’t say I haven’t done my bit to help in other ways--it’s only that things being so muddled up these times----”

“I know--I know. I’ll never forget, old chap, how you worked through that awful business. By the way”--carelessly--“have you seen her at all of late?”

“I saw her this afternoon.”

“The devil you did--and how is she?”

“Oh, she looked fine.”

“Oh--I say, do you think she’s heard anything about me and Pearl?”

“I don’t think she has. Anyway, she didn’t speak of it.”

There was a moment’s silence. Dan broke it first.

“Are you still so keen on Pearl?”

“Of course, I am. The affair’s only just starting.”

“And she on you?”

Ernley smiled reminiscently. “She seems willing enough.”

“Going to see her again soon?”

“I’m taking her to a _thé-dansant_ in Eastbourne to-morrow.”

“Lor!” Dan was impressed by this aristocratic wooing. Then he gulped a little, and turned red.

“Then you aren’t sweet on Belle any more, Ernley?”

“Good lord, man, no. I’ve cut that off clean. It’s over and done with, thank God!”

He got up and took a turn across the room, passing into the shadows beyond the firelight.

“She hasn’t sent a message--said anything to you, has she?” he asked, “because I tell you I’m through with with it all. I’ve had enough of kissing and making it up. I tell you it’s done with now. There’s no good her trying to whistle me back again.”

“She ain’t trying, Ernley. She never spoke of you. It’s only I’m thinking that if you’ve really stopped caring and have got someone else, I--I’d have a shot at courting her myself.”

Ernley suddenly stopped his pacing. He turned and faced Daniel, but as he was still in the shadow, young Sheather could not read his face.

“I’ve been sweet on her for months,” continued the boy, “but I wouldn’t speak a word, seeing as you hadn’t got properly shut of each other. It’s only when you started courting Pearl I thought it really must be the end.”

“It is the end. But you’re a fool, Daniel, if you think Belle Shackford will have you.”

His voice came cruelly at Dan. Ernley could sometimes speak like that--all fierce and cruel--but it was better than being sarcastic.

“Why shouldn’t she have me?” asked Daniel, much hurt. “I’ve got as much chance as anyone else, haven’t I?”

“I’m sorry, old chap. I didn’t mean to be offensive. What I meant to say is this--that we’re so different; it’s hardly reasonable to expect a girl who’s liked me to like you, and t’other way round. And anyhow, it’s only three weeks since our break. You’re a much more cynical fellow than I thought if you can expect any girl to console herself so soon.”

“But that’s just it,” said Dan sagely. “It’s the rebound. They’re more likely to take up with someone else in the first month than afterwards. Look at Mrs. Light, look at Letty Pilbeam--look at yourself, Ernley.”

Ernley flushed.

“I’ve had a sickener. It’s a relief to turn to a girl who’s not always tearing passion to tatters, who knows how to keep cool, and doesn’t always want to get more than she gives.”

“Come, Ernley, that ain’t fair on Belle. Reckon she gave a lot. She ain’t the sort of girl for you, that’s all, and I’m glad you’ve got a different. She couldn’t understand your ways--she’d no notion of putting up with you.”

“Thanks,” said Ernley.

“Well, reckon folks have always got to put up with each other. I’m not saying there weren’t faults on both sides. But I’m quite a different sort of chap--more comfortable like--more easy going--you understand what I mean. I’m as different from you as your Pearl is different from her--and if you like the change I don’t see why she shouldn’t.”

“Is there anything--anything in her manner to make you think she’d take you?”

“Yes,” said Dan confidently, “there is.”

“Oh ... it’s easy-come easy-go, is it?”

“No, Ernley, you misjudge her. It’s simply as she’s worn out, and I’m a comfortable chap. Reckon she don’t want no more passions, just a homely sort of affair as this ud be.”

“Are you able to marry her?”

“If she don’t mind putting up with the George, I am. Dad and mum ud have her and welcome if she’d help with the place--and though it ain’t fine, it won’t be any worse than Batchelors’ these days. And maybe some time we’ll do better--with Belle to help, mum wouldn’t be so set against us having a tea-place and apartments and all.”

“A damn fine life for her,” sneered Ernley.

“Well, leastways, I’ll be marrying her and treating her proper.”

“Now don’t start getting at me. You know why I couldn’t marry her--you know the way dad treats me--that I haven’t a bean of my own, and my only hope is to work round dad so that he takes me into the business. If Belle ud have waited we could have done it some day.”

“She’s not the sort as waits.”

“Evidently not.”

He came out of the shadows, and sat down opposite Daniel beside the fire.

“I tell you, Dan, being in love is hell--it’s like having your skin off--it’s damned--it’s--well, thank God, I’m out of it, and you think twice before you go in.”

“Ain’t you in love with Pearl, then?”

“Not in that way--never again in that way--my God, no!”

“Well, then, maybe I shan’t be in that way. I hope not, I’m sure.”

He stuck out his legs to the fire, and stared into it, silent and satisfied. He was glad he had told Ernley about his feelings, for until then he had had an uneasy suspicion that his friend still cared, and while there was a chance of that he would not speak to Belle. But now Ernley had practically said “go in and win”; he had also implied: “You’ll be likelier and luckier to lose.” Well, time would show that. Anyhow, Dan was not afraid of love. He did not expect it to burn him up as it had burnt up Belle and Ernley. He wasn’t such a combustible sort of chap. Maybe some people would say that what he felt wasn’t love at all. But it did well enough for him, and he hoped it would do well enough for Belle.

The clock in the tap-room below struck ten. Daniel sprang out of his dream.

“Losh! I must be getting back. I promised dad I’d be back by closing-time. It’s awkward for him if there’s anyone drunk and won’t go. Mother won’t have Chris chuck ’em out, and I ain’t so bad at it.”

He began buttoning up his coat.

“So you’re still wearing your army coat,” said Ernley. “I thought it would have been done by now.”

“So it is--done in, as you might say. I’d meant to get myself a new one this fall--seen it in Lewes--but mum wanted parlour curtains, and reckon her old curtains were worse than my old coat.”

“Would you like my British warm? Dad’s giving me a new one this season.”

“Ernley, old chap, you don’t mean it!”

“Of course I do--it’s not new, but there’s a lot of comfort in it yet, and if you like to have it, it’s yours.”

“Would I like to have it?” asked Dan. “Oh, no, of course not!”

He went home muffled in Ernley’s British warm. His humility in receiving gifts was one of the things that made their friendship delightful to both of them. But some people thought Dan Sheather was too ready to accept Ernley Munk’s cast-off possessions.

§ 6

The next day broke as cold as the night had been. An early frost had touched the Downs and given a faint bite to their pale colours, and the sun that rose behind Mount Caburn raked long orange beams across the Brooks.

Daniel was up before the sun, lighting the kitchen fire. This was his daily task, as his mother did not care these days for early rising, and the nondescript assistance known as “the girl” did not arrive till eight o’clock. So Daniel lit the fire, put the kettle on to boil, gave the cat its breakfast and went out to feed the fowls and the pony, by which time the house was astir, noisily shaking itself into activity. First Tom Sheather came thundering down the stairs, yelling after Daniel to ask if he’d remembered to order the sherry, as if not he’d have to drive into Lewes and fetch it; then Kitty Sheather shouted to her husband that she wasn’t going to fold his night-shirt, and he could come back and do it himself; and, last of all, Chris Sheather came yawning and stretching his supple limbs and laughing at Dan because his face was dirty.

“And I’d like to know what yours ud be if you’d been down raking out the fire instead of laying in bed like a lady.”

“Well, Daniel, if you grudge helping me, I know Chris will do it,” said his mother.

“I reckon he won’t. Nothing ull get Chris out of bed before half-past seven. He’s Miss Flossie Fluff of the Pinktights Theatre, I reckon.”

“D’you want to have your head punched?” asked Christopher.

“Yes,” said Daniel. “You come on and do it.”

Two hours’ hard work on an empty stomach had not improved his temper; besides, it always did him good to knock Chris about.

But the battle was not to be. At the mere thought of it Kitty Sheather threw her arms round her darling’s neck and burst into tears. She would not let him fight Dan any more than she had let him fight the Germans. So Daniel had to sit down unrelieved, and eat his bread and cold bacon to the accompaniment of his mother’s scolding.

“Whew!” said his father, after breakfast, as he followed him into the stable.

When the family “took sides,” it was always Dan and Tom on one side and Chris and Kitty on the other, though in his heart Dan would rather have had a different alliance.

“I sometimes think,” continued Tom, “that I shall have to leg it.”

“Leg it! What do you mean?”

“Beat it--sling my hook. I can’t stand being treated like this.”

“But you aren’t treated like anything, dad. We all have to mind mother. It’s I who got it in the neck this morning.”

“Well, I don’t see why you should, for you’re as good a boy as ever breathed.”

“I ain’t. And, anyways, it won’t help me much if you clear out. It’ll be worse having to stick it alone.”

“But I shan’t have to watch you sitting there being wigged for what ain’t your fault--me the master of my own house and not able to say a word.”

“It’s because you’re scared.”

“That’s just it--I’m scared--scared in my own house; and I won’t put up with it. I’m beginning to think I was a fool to leave the sea.”

“The sea! But, father, you’ve left the sea almost a lifetime ago. You’d never go back to it.”

“A lifetime! I like your cheek. Your lifetime, maybe, but not a man’s, not mine. I’m only forty-six, and as strong as a dromedary. I tell you I’m wasted here, having to sit and listen to my boy being slated, when I’m not being slated myself. I’m not master in my own house.”

“And would you be master on board a ship?”

“No, I shouldn’t. But I shouldn’t have a woman over me. It’s that what stings, having a woman ordering you about all day. It ain’t right. God made man the head of the woman. It says so in the Bible--and look at me. Am I your mother’s head? And she promised to obey me, too--and though she said it in French it’s just as good as if she’d said it in English. I asked the minister and he told me.”

“Father, I think you shouldn’t ought to speak so of mother before me.”

“Well, I can’t help it. I must let out before someone or I’ll bust. And it’s better than letting out before the chaps in the bar. You’re a good boy, Daniel. I say, what if you and me was to go away together and get a sea job? Then you wouldn’t have to stick it alone--and you’d like the sea, I know, for you’re handy as they make ’em.”

“Father! Have done, do!” Dan was aghast at such treason.

“Well, and why not?”

“You should ought to be ashamed of yourself. How’s poor mother to get on without us? and us leaving her in debt to the brewers and all--and Chris no good, and no woman ever fit to manage a pub. Father, you shouldn’t ought to speak so. I’m ashamed of you.”

“Lor! you’ve got your mother’s own tongue. You take after her in that way if you don’t in no other. Reckon I’m to be pitied. Howsumever, I shan’t ask you for any more sympathy.”

“Oh, father, I’m ready enough if it’s only sympathy you’re wanting. But when you talk like that about going away, all I can say is that it’s wicked.”

“Well, I won’t talk about it any more, since you feel bad about it.”

“And you won’t do anything, neither?”

“Not I. What should I do now after twenty-five years ashore? I was only joking, and wishing I hadn’t been such a mortal fool as to--howsumever, you’d say that was wicked too.”