Shining Ferry

When at length he stood on the ferry slipway, with but a furlong or two of water between him and home, the very tranquillity of the scene irritated hi

Nicky Vro, who came rowing across deliberately as ever, working his boat down the

and I hope that you've enjoyed your holiday-not

ok one, then," Ro

one time, to marry my old woman, and another to bury her, and that's all in

himself, "and this is the sort of thing I allow!" His gaze travelled from the oar to the oar

E

the grave opens at their feet, and in they go. With you 'tis more like the crumbling of rotten timber

of mine about Him. One day He'll come down to the slip calling 'Over!' and whiles I put Him across-scores of times I've a-seen myself doing it, and 'tis always in the cool of the evening after a spell of summer weather-He'll speak up like a gentleman, and ask, 'Nicholas Vro, how long have you been a-working this here boat?' 'Lord,' I'll answer, 'for maybe a matter of fifty year, calm or blow, week-days and Sabbaths alike; and that's the reason your Honour

ugh by this time!" he interrupted, his irritation again overcom

moment. As if Rosewarne or any man alive could tea

uous Lady arrived yesterday, and began to unload this morning

ster, who had married a merchant skipper and sailed with him ever sinc

ty of folk have been inquiring for 'ee. There's the parson for one. To my knowledge he've been down three times to ask when you'd be back, and if you'd forgotten the School Managers' meeting, that's fixed for to-morrow." U

n on a sudden his brain harked backward to Uncle Nicky's talk, to which a minute before he had listened so inattentively. In his hurry he had let an opportunity pass. The old man had talked of death; h

back, and resumed his wa

new one, dropped the pair with a clatter. In all his exp

work the ferry!" the old man muttered, st

as he mounted the hill. Only, as a dreamer may suffer the horror of nightmare, yet know all the while that it is a dream, he felt the impatience and k

ept him-Aunt Butson, the village schoolmistress. She was a spinster well over six

way sat a young sailor, with a cage on the ground beside him and a parrot perched on his forefinger close against his cheek

r. Rosewarne, and glad to see you back and in health!" She

c voyage in the Virtuous Lady. Yes, it was Tom Trevarthen, now a man grown. Rosewarne remembered him as a child in frocks, tumbling about the roadway; as an

ss the water. Mr. Penrose would rather teach two boys from her school than one from any other parish. Surely-surely-the new Board wouldn't take the bread out of an old woman's mouth and drive her to the workhouse? She didn't believe, as some did, in this new-fangled education, and wouldn't pretend to. Arithmetic up to practice-sums and good writing and spelling- anything up to five syllables-were education

e her to plead with that which she hated worse than the plague. He heard, and all the while his mind was miles away from her petition; for some chance word or words let fall by her had seemed for an instant to offer him a clue. Somewhere in the past these wor

e days one must march with the times." This was all the comfort she could win from him, and the poor

ny, and a pile of bills on the table between. Mrs. Purchase rose and greeted him with a little pecking kiss. She was a cheerful body, by some five or six years his junior, with a handsome weather-tanned face, eyes wrinkled at the corners like a seaman's, and two troubles in the world-the first being that she had borne no children. She shared

on this side of Portland they had met with slight and baffling head-winds, and for two days had done little more than drift with the tides. The vessel was foul with weed, and

over them to-night maybe." He stepped to t

t, some slight greyness in his face,

ief you're u

do for to-night, Benny. You can leave all the papers as they are, just putting thes

s. Purchase, as Mr. Benny closed the door behind him. "You may take m

d in and out among beds of tall Madonna lilies and Canterbury bells, the two children were playing a solemn game of fo

trained and made fit for some

the brains of the family! Leave Myra to teach him for a while. See how she's teach

it? What's a blind

o better-ay, or to see clearer-than other men, '

but God doesn't, you see. On the contrary, God chose to blind 'em. If I'd your religion, i

ine. Haven't I cause to know it? Hadn't she ca

ade he

f thinking you know God's business so much better than God that you take it out of His hands. 'Punishment,' you say, and 'sins of the fathers'? I'd have y

of suspicion. No, her eyes were candid-she

ding. To-night they moved against the dark yew-hedge like figures in a toy theatre, withdrawn within a shadowy world of their own, celebrating a ritual in which he had no concern. The same instant revealed their beauty a

l. The school would compare with any in the Duchy, and should have a teacher worthy of it-one to open the children's eyes and proclaim and inculcate the doctrine of progress. John Rosewarne was a patriot in his unemotional way. He hated the drift of the rural population into the towns, foreseeing that it sapped the strength

lley to the park gates at Damelioc. Beyond these the valley narrowed to a sylvan gorge, and the speckless carriage-road mounted under forest trees alongside a river tumbling in miniature cascades, swirling under mossy footbridges, here and there artfully delayed to form a trout-pool, or as artfully veiled by thickets of trailing wild roses and Traveller's Joy. For a mile and more he rode upward under soft green shadows, t

of Venus and Vulcan," her own youthful face smiled down, her husband having for a whim instructed the painter to depict the goddess in her likeness. It smiled down

ents, game, and live-stock generally, the hiring of a couple of under-keepers, the likeliest tenant for a park-lodge whic

mmand with which she, an actress of obscure birth, had put the stage behind her, assumed her rank, and borne it through all these years with something more than adequacy. John Rosewarne, like

for her childlessness, for the fate ordaining that all these great possessions must be inherited by strang

hed from the pit; but one divine woman passing from avatar to avatar. So, when the last night revealed her as Lady Macbeth, as little could he condemn her of guilt as understand her remorse. He saw her suffering because for so splendid a creature nothing less could be decreed by the jealous gods. It to

afterwards, and flung it away; it tangled him in wo

n him together, and he grasped the clue for which his brain had been searching yesterday while he listened to old Mrs

nd to-morrow,

petty pace fr

syllable of

esterdays hav

to dusty

im in some astonishment-for he had muttered a word or two-and

ds me: in case of illness, my son will post down from Plymouth. He holds himself

. "My good Mr. Rosewarne, I am a very old woman! In a short while you may do as y

ess's grateful affection he took away the

, punctually rendered, to be the business weighing on his mind. But no: as he passed out through the park gates, the imp perche

religious differences in a broad, impartial contempt. But to-night, as Parson Endicott approached the crucial difficulty-the choice of a new teacher-with all the wariness of a practised committee-man, laying his innocent parallels and bringing up his guns under cover of a pleasant disavowal to which the three Dissenters responded with "Hear, hear!" John Rosewarne listened not at all, nor to the fence of debate that followed as Church and Dissent grew heated and their frict

debate. Slowly he lifted his eyes and let them rest upon Mr. Benny, who sat

, "I can find you a teacher-a w

. The five Managers were looking at him with respectful attention. Apparently, then, he was

will not trouble you. She is accustomed to boys, and teaches th

ed. Mechanically he put the resolution, declared it carried, and closed the meeting; as mechanically he shook hands with all the Mana

the reflected lights along the board. Then he arose and passed into

the letter, sealed it carefully, and lean

tered. "I can reconsider it

there, and stood up with a slight shiver-a characteristic shake of his broad shoulders. As he did so his eyes fell again upon the addressed letter. He turned them slowly to the door-and there, between him and the