Bob, Son of Battle Page 2
Chapter II. A SON OF HAGAR
It is a lonely country, that about the Wastrel-dale.
Parson Leggy Hornbut will tell you that his is the smallest church inthe biggest parish north of the Derwent, and that his cure numbers moresquare miles than parishioners. Of fells and ghylls it consists, ofbecks and lakes; with here a scattered hamlet and there a solitary hillsheep-farm. It is a country in which sheep are paramount; and everyother Dalesman is engaged in that profession which is as old as Abel.And the talk of the men of the land is of wethers and gimmers, oftup-hoggs, ewe tegs in wool, and other things which are but fearsomenames to you and me; and always of the doings or misdoings, theintelligence or stupidity, of their adjutants, the sheep-dogs.
Of all the Daleland, the country from the Black Water to Grammoch Pikeis the wildest. Above the tiny stone-built village of Wastrel-dale theMuir Pike nods its massive head. Westward, the desolate Mere Marches,from which the Sylvesters' great estate derives its name, reach away inmile on mile of sheep infested, wind-swept moorland. On the far side ofthe Marches is that twin dale where flows the gentle Silver Lea. And itis there in the paddocks at the back of the Dalesman's Daughter, that,in the late summer months, the famous sheep-dog Trials of the North areheld. There that the battle for the Dale Cup, the world-known Shepherds'Trophy, is fought out.
Past the little inn leads the turnpike road to the market-centre of thedistrict--Grammoch-town. At the bottom of the paddocks at the back ofthe inn winds the Silver Lea. Just there a plank bridge crosses thestream, and, beyond, the Murk Muir Pass crawls up the sheer side of theScaur on to the Mere Marches.
At the head of the Pass, before it debouches on to those lonelysheep-walks which divide the two dales, is that hollow, shuddering withgloomy possibilities, aptly called the Devil's Bowl. In its centre theLone Tarn, weirdly suggestive pool, lifts its still face to the sky. Itwas beside that black, frozen water, across whose cold surface the stormwas swirling in white snow-wraiths, that, many, many years ago (not inthis century), old Andrew Moore came upon the mother of the Gray Dogs ofKenmuir.
In the North, every one who has heard of the Muir Pike--and who hasnot?--has heard of the Gray Dogs of Kenmuir, every one who has heardof the Shepherd's Trophy--and who has not?--knows their fame. In thatcountry of good dogs and jealous masters the pride of place has longbeen held unchallenged. Whatever line may claim to follow the Gray Dogsalways lead the van. And there is a saying in the land: "Faithfu' as theMoores and their tykes."
* * * * *
On the top dresser to the right of the fireplace in the kitchenof Kenmuir lies the family Bible. At the end you will find a loosesheet--the pedigree of the Gray Dogs; at the beginning, pasted on theinside, an almost similar sheet, long since yellow with age--the familyregister of the Moores of Kenmuir.
Running your eye down the loose leaf, once, twice, and again it will becaught by a small red cross beneath a name, and under the cross the oneword "Cup." Lastly, opposite the name of Rex son of Rally, are two ofthose proud, tell-tale marks. The cup referred to is the renowned DaleCup--Champion Challenge Dale Cup, open to the world. Had Rex won it butonce again the Shepherds' Trophy, which many men have lived to win, anddied still striving after, would have come to rest forever in the littlegray house below the Pike.
It was not to be, however. Comparing the two sheets, you read beneaththe dog's name a date and a pathetic legend; and on the other sheet,written in his son's boyish hand, beneath the name of Andrew Moore thesame date and the same legend.
From that day James Moore, then but a boy, was master of Kenmuir.
So past Grip and Rex and Rally, and a hundred others, until at the footof the page you come to that last name--Bob, son of Battle.
* * * * *
From the very first the young dog took to his work in a manner toamaze even James Moore. For a while he watched his mother, Meg, at herbusiness, and with that seemed to have mastered the essentials of sheeptactics.
Rarely had such fiery elan been seen on the sides of the Pike; and withit the young dog combined a strange sobriety, an admirable patience,that justified, indeed, the epithet. "Owd." Silent he worked, andresolute; and even in those days had that famous trick of coaxing thesheep to do his wishes;--blending, in short, as Tammas put it, thebrains of a man with the way of a woman.
Parson Leggy, who was reckoned the best judge of a sheep or sheep-dog'twixt Tyne and Tweed, summed him up in the one word "Genius." And JamesMoore himself, cautious man, was more than pleased.
In the village, the Dalesmen, who took a personal pride in the Gray Dogsof Kenmuir, began to nod sage heads when "oor" Bob was mentioned. JimMason, the postman, whose word went as far with the villagers as ParsonLeggy's with the gentry, reckoned he'd never seen a young un as so tookhis fancy.
That winter it grew quite the recognized thing, when they had gatheredof a night round the fire in the Sylvester Arms, with Tammas in thecentre, old Jonas Maddox on his right, Rob Saunderson of the Holt on theleft, and the others radiating away toward the sides, for some one tobegin with:
"Well, and what o' oor Bob, Mr. Thornton?"
To which Tammas would always make reply:
"Oh, yo' ask Sam'l there. He'll tell yo' better'n me, "--and wouldforthwith plunge, himself, into a yarn.
And the way in which, as the story proceeded, Tupper of Swinsthwaitewinked at Ned Hoppin of Fellsgarth, and Long Kirby, the smith, poked JemBurton, the publican, in the ribs, and Sexton Ross said, "Ma word, lad!"spoke more eloquently than many words.
One man only never joined in the chorus of admiration. Sitting alwaysalone in the background, little M'Adam would listen with an incredulousgrin on his sallow face.
"Oh, ma certes! The devil's in the dog! It's no cannie ava!" he wouldcontinually exclaim, as Tammas told his tale.
* * * * *
In the Daleland you rarely see a stranger's face. Wandering in the wildcountry about the twin dales at the time of this story, you might havemet Parson Leggy, striding along with a couple of varmint terriers athis heels, and young Cyril Gilbraith, whom he was teaching to tie fliesand fear God, beside him; or Jim Mason, postman by profession, poacherby predilection, honest man and sportsman by nature, hurrying along withthe mail-bags on his shoulder, a rabbit in his pocket, and the faithfulBetsy a yard behind. Besides these you might have hit upon a quietshepherd and a wise-faced dog; Squire Sylvester, going his rounds upona sturdy cob; or, had you been lucky, sweet Lady Eleanour bent upon someerrand of mercy to one of the many tenants.
It was while the Squire's lady was driving through the village on avisit* to Tammas's slobbering grandson--it was shortly after BillyThornton's advent into the world--that little M'Adam, standing in thedoor of the Sylvester Arms, with a twig in his mouth and a sneer fadingfrom his lips, made his ever-memorable remark:
"Sall!" he said, speaking in low, earnest voice; "'tis a muckle wumman."
Note:* It was this visit which figured in the Grammoch-town _Argus_ (local and radical) under the heading of "Alleged Wholesale Corruption by Tory Agents." And that is why, on the following market day, Herbert Trotter, journalist, erstwhile gentleman, and Secretary of the Dale Trials, found himself trying to swim in the public horse-trough.
"What? What be sayin', mon?" cried old Jonas, startled out of his usualapathy.
M'Adam turned sharply on the old man.
"I said the wumman wears a muckle hat!" he snapped.
Blotted out as it was, the observation still remains--a tribute ofhonest admiration. Doubtless the Recording Angel did not pass it by.That one statement anent the gentle lady of the manor is the onlypersonal remark ever credited to little M'Adam not born of malice andall uncharitableness. And that is why it is ever memorable.
The little Scotsman with the sardonic face had been the tenant of theGrange these many years; yet he had never grown acclimatized to theland of the Southron. With his shrivelled body and weakly le
gs he lookedamong the sturdy, straight-limbed sons of the hill-country like somebrown, wrinkled leaf holding its place midst a galaxy of green. And ashe differed from them physically, so he did morally.
He neither understood them nor attempted to. The North-country characterwas an unsolved mystery to him, and that after ten years' study."One-half o' what ye say they doot, and they let ye see it; t'ither halfthey disbelieve, and they tell ye so," he once said. And that explainedhis attitude toward them, and consequently theirs toward him.
He stood entirely alone; a son of Hagar, mocking. His sharp, ill tonguewas rarely still, and always bitter. There was hardly a man in the land,from Langholm How to the market-cross in Grammoch-town, but had atone time known its sting, endured it in silence--for they are slow ofspeech, these men of the fells and meres--and was nursing his resentmenttill a day should bring that chance which always comes. And when atthe Sylvester Arms, on one of those rare occasions when M'Adam was notpresent, Tammas summed up the little man in that historic phrase of his,"When he's drunk he's wi'lent, and when he bain't he's wicious," therewas an applause to gratify the blase heart of even Tammas Thornton.
Yet it had not been till his wife's death that the little man hadallowed loose rein to his ill-nature. With her firmly gentle hand nolonger on the tiller of his life, it burst into fresh being. And alonein the world with David, the whole venom of his vicious temperament wasever directed against the boy's head. It was as though he saw in hisfair-haired son the unconscious cause of his ever-living sorrow. Allthe more strange this, seeing that, during her life, the boy had beento poor Flora M'Adam as her heart's core. And the lad was growing up thevery antithesis of his father. Big and hearty, with never an ache or illin the whole of his sturdy young body; of frank, open countenance; whileeven his speech was slow and burring like any Dale-bred boy's. Andthe fact of it all, and that the lad was palpably more Englishman thanScot--ay, and gloried in it--exasperated the little man, a patriotbefore everything, to blows. While, on top of it, David evinced anamazing pertness fit to have tried a better man than Adam M'Adam.
On the death of his wife, kindly Elizabeth Moore had, more than once,offered such help to the lonely little man as a woman only can give ina house that knows no mistress. On the last of these occasions, aftercrossing the Stony Bottom, which divides the two farms, and toiling upthe hill to the Grange, she had met M'Adam in the door.
"Yo' maun let me put yo' bit things straight for yo', mister," she hadsaid shyly; for she feared the little man.
"Thank ye, Mrs. Moore," he had answered with the sour smile the Dalesmenknew so well, "but ye maun think I'm a waefu' cripple." And there he hadstood, grinning sardonically, opposing his small bulk in the very centreof the door.
Mrs. Moore had turned down the hill, abashed and hurt at the receptionof her offer; and her husband, proud to a fault, had forbidden herto repeat it. Nevertheless her motherly heart went out in a greattenderness for the little orphan David. She knew well the desolatenessof his life; his father's aversion from him, and its inevitableconsequences.
It became an institution for the boy to call every morning at Kenmuir,and trot off to the village school with Maggie Moore. And soon the ladcame to look on Kenmuir as his true home, and James and Elizabeth Mooreas his real parents. His greatest happiness was to be away from theGrange. And the ferret-eyed little man there noted the fact, bitterlyresented it, and vented his ill-humor accordingly.
It was this, as he deemed it, uncalled-for trespassing on his authoritywhich was the chief cause of his animosity against James Moore. TheMaster of Kenmuir it was at whom he was aiming when he remarked oneday at the Arms: "Masel', I aye prefaire the good man who does no go tochurch, to the bad man who does. But then, as ye say, Mr. Burton, I'mpeculiar."
The little man's treatment of David, exaggerated as it was by eagercredulity, became at length such a scandal to the Dale that Parson Leggydetermined to bring him to task on the matter.
Now M'Adam was the parson's pet antipathy. The bluff old minister, withhis brusque manner and big heart, would have no truck with the man whonever went to church, was perpetually in liquor, and never spoke good ofhis neighbors. Yet he entered upon the interview fully resolved not tobe betrayed into an unworthy expression of feeling; rather to appeal tothe little man's better nature.
The conversation had not been in progress two minutes, however, beforehe knew that, where he had meant to be calmly persuasive, he was fastbecome hotly abusive.
"You, Mr. Hornbut, wi' James Moore to help ye, look after the lad'ssoul, I'll see to his body," the little man was saying.
The parson's thick gray eyebrows lowered threateningly over his eyes.
"You ought to be ashamed of yourself to talk like that. Which d'youthink the more important, soul or body? Oughtn't you, his father, to bethe very first to care for the boy's soul? If not, who should? Answerme, sir."
The little man stood smirking and sucking his eternal twig, entirelyunmoved by the other's heat.
"Ye're right, Mr. Hornbut, as ye aye are. But my argiment is this: thatI get at his soul best through his leetle carcase."
The honest parson brought down his stick with an angry thud.
"M'Adam, you're a brute--a brute!" he shouted. At which outburst thelittle man was seized with a spasm of silent merriment.
"A fond dad first, a brute afterward, aiblins--he! he! Ah, Mr. Hornbut!ye 'ford me vast diversion, ye do indeed, 'my loved, my honored,much-respected friend."
"If you paid as much heed to your boy's welfare as you do to the badpoetry of that profligate ploughman--"
An angry gleam shot into the other's eyes. "D'ye ken what blasphemy is,Mr. Hornbut?" he asked, shouldering a pace forward.
For the first time in the dispute the parson thought he was about toscore a point, and was calm accordingly.
"I should do; I fancy I've a specimen of the breed before me now. Andd'you know what impertinence is?"
"I should do; I fancy I've--I awd say it's what gentlemen aften areunless their mammies whipped 'em as lads."
For a moment the parson looked as if about to seize his opponent andshake him.
"M'Adam," he roared, "I'll not stand your insolences!"
The little man turned, scuttled indoors, and came running back with achair.
"Permit me!" he said blandly, holding it before him like a haircutterfor a customer.
The parson turned away. At the gap in the hedge he paused.
"I'll only say one thing more," he called slowly. "When your wife, whomI think we all loved, lay dying in that room above you, she said to youin my presence--"
It was M'Adam's turn to be angry. He made a step forward with burningface.
"Aince and for a', Mr. Hornbut," he cried passionately, "onderstand I'llnot ha' you and yer likes lay yer tongues on ma wife's memory wheneverit suits ye. You can say what ye like aboot me--lies, sneers, snash--andI'll say naethin'. I dinna ask ye to respect me; I think ye might do saemuckle by her, puir lass. She never harmed ye. Gin ye canna let her bidein peace where she lies doon yonder"--he waved in the direction of thechurchyard--"ye'll no come on ma land. Though she is dead she's mine."
Standing in front of his house, with flushed face and big eyes, thelittle man looked almost noble in his indignation. And the parson,striding away down the hill, was uneasily conscious that with him wasnot the victory.