Chapter Twelve.
TRAGEDY OF A MUD HOUSE.
The dogcart bumped between the trees of Caddam, flinging Gavin and thedoctor at each other as a wheel rose on some beech-root or sank for amoment in a pool. I suppose the wood was a pretty sight that day, thepines only white where they had met the snow, as if the numbed painterhad left his work unfinished, the brittle twigs snapping overhead, thewater as black as tar. But it matters little what the wood was like.Within a squirrel's leap of it an old woman was standing at the doorof a mud house listening for the approach of the trap that was to takeher to the poorhouse. Can you think of the beauty of the day now?
Nanny was not crying. She had redd up her house for the last time andput on her black merino. Her mouth was wide open while she listened.If you had addressed her you would have thought her polite and stupid.Look at her. A flabby-faced woman she is now, with a swollen body, andno one has heeded her much these thirty years. I can tell yousomething; it is almost droll. Nanny Webster was once a gay flirt, andin Airlie Square there is a weaver with an unsteady head who thoughtall the earth of her. His loom has taken a foot from his stature, andgone are Nanny's raven locks on which he used to place his adoringhand. Down in Airlie Square he is weaving for his life, and here isNanny, ripe for the poorhouse, and between them is the hill where theywere lovers. That is all the story save that when Nanny heard thedogcart she screamed.
No neighbour was with her. If you think this hard, it is because youdo not understand. Perhaps Nanny had never been very lovable except toone man, and him, it is said, she lost through her own vanity; butthere was much in her to like. The neighbours, of whom there were twonot a hundred yards away, would have been with her now but they fearedto hurt her feelings. No heart opens to sympathy without letting indelicacy, and these poor people knew that Nanny would not like them tosee her being taken away. For a week they had been aware of what wascoming, and they had been most kind to her, but that hideous word, thepoorhouse, they had not uttered. Poorhouse is not to be spoken inThrums, though it is nothing to tell a man that you see death in hisface. Did Nanny think they knew where she was going? was a questionthey whispered to each other, and her suffering eyes cut scars ontheir hearts. So now that the hour had come they called their childreninto their houses and pulled down their blinds.
"If you would like to see her by yourself," the doctor said eagerly toGavin, as the horse drew up at Nanny's gate, "I'll wait with thehorse. Not," he added, hastily, "that I feel sorry for her. We aredoing her a kindness."
They dismounted together, however, and Nanny, who had run from thetrap into the house, watched them from her window.
McQueen saw her and said glumly, "I should have come alone, for if youpray she is sure to break down. Mr. Dishart, could you not praycheerfully?"
"You don't look very cheerful yourself," Gavin said sadly.
"Nonsense," answered the doctor. "I have no patience with this falsesentiment. Stand still, Lightning, and be thankful you are not yourmaster to-day."
The door stood open, and Nanny was crouching against the opposite wallof the room, such a poor, dull kitchen, that you would have thoughtthe furniture had still to be brought into it. The blanket and thepiece of old carpet that was Nanny's coverlet were already packed inher box. The plate rack was empty. Only the round table and the twochairs, and the stools and some pans were being left behind.
"Well, Nanny," the doctor said, trying to bluster, "I have come, andyou see Mr. Dishart is with me."
Nanny rose bravely. She knew the doctor was good to her, and shewanted to thank him. I have not seen a great deal of the world myself,but often the sweet politeness of the aged poor has struck me asbeautiful. Nanny dropped a curtesy, an ungainly one maybe, but it wasan old woman giving the best she had.
"Thank you kindly, sirs," she said; and then two pairs of eyes droppedbefore hers.
"Please to take a chair," she added timidly. It is strange to knowthat at that awful moment, for let none tell me it was less thanawful, the old woman was the one who could speak.
Both men sat down, for they would have hurt Nanny by remainingstanding. Some ministers would have known the right thing to say toher, but Gavin dared not let himself speak. I have again to remind youthat he was only one-and-twenty.
"I'm drouthy, Nanny," the doctor said, to give her something to do,"and I would be obliged for a drink of water."
Nanny hastened to the pan that stood behind her door, but stoppedbefore she reached it.
"It's toom," she said. "I--I didna think I needed to fill it thismorning." She caught the doctor's eye, and could only half restrain asob. "I couldna help that," she said, apologetically. "I'm richt angryat myself for being so ungrateful like."
The doctor thought it best that they should depart at once. He rose.
"Oh, no, doctor," cried Nanny in alarm.
"But you are ready?"
"Ay," she said, "I have been ready this twa hours, but you micht waita minute. Hendry Munn and Andrew Allardyce is coming yont the road,and they would see me."
"Wait, doctor," Gavin said.
"Thank you kindly, sir," answered Nanny.
"But Nanny," the doctor said, "you must remember what I told you aboutthe poo--, about the place you are going to. It is a fine house, andyou will be very happy in it."
"Ay, I'll be happy in't," Nanny faltered, "but, doctor, if I couldjust hae bidden on here though I wasna happy!"
"Think of the food you will get; broth nearly every day."
"It--it'll be terrible enjoyable," Nanny said.
"And there will be pleasant company for you always," continued thedoctor, "and a nice room to sit in. Why, after you have been there aweek, you won't be the same woman."
"That's it!" cried Nanny with sudden passion. "Na, na; I'll be a womanon the poor's rates. Oh, mither, mither, you little thocht when youbore me that I would come to this!"
"Nanny," the doctor said, rising again, "I am ashamed of you."
"I humbly speir your forgiveness, sir," she said, "and you micht bidejust a wee yet. I've been ready to gang these twa hours, but now thatthe machine is at the gate, I dinna ken how it is, but I'm terriblesweer to come awa'. Oh, Mr. Dishart, it's richt true what the doctorsays about the--the place, but I canna just take it in. I'm--I'm geyauld."
"You will often get out to see your friends," was all Gavin couldsay.
"Na, na, na," she cried, "dinna say that; I'll gang, but you mauna bidme ever come out, except in a hearse. Dinna let onybody in Thrums lookon my face again."
"We must go," said the doctor firmly. "Put on your mutch, Nanny."
"I dinna need to put on a mutch," she answered, with a faint flush ofpride. "I have a bonnet."
She took the bonnet from her bed, and put it on slowly.
"Are you sure there's naebody looking?" she asked.
The doctor glanced at the minister, and Gavin rose.
"Let us pray," he said, and the three went down on their knees.
It was not the custom of Auld Licht ministers to leave any housewithout offering up a prayer in it, and to us it always seemed thatwhen Gavin prayed, he was at the knees of God. The little ministerpouring himself out in prayer in a humble room, with awed peoplearound him who knew much more of the world than he, his voice at timesthick and again a squeal, and his hands clasped not gracefully, mayhave been only a comic figure, but we were old-fashioned, and heseemed to make us better men. If I only knew the way, I would draw himas he was, and not fear to make him too mean a man for you to readabout. He had not been long in Thrums before he knew that we talkedmuch of his prayers, and that doubtless puffed him up a little.Sometimes, I daresay, he rose from his knees feeling that he hadprayed well to-day, which is a dreadful charge to bring against anyone. But it was not always so, nor was it so now.
I am not speaking harshly of this man, whom I have loved beyond allothers, when I say that Nanny came between him and his prayer. Had hebeen of God's own image, unstained, he would have forgotten all elsein his Maker's pr
esence, but Nanny was speaking too, and her wordschoked his. At first she only whispered, but soon what was eating herheart burst out painfully, and she did not know that the minister hadstopped.
They were such moans as these that brought him back to earth:--
"I'll hae to gang.... I'm a base woman no' to be mair thankfu' to themthat is so good to me.... I dinna like to prig wi' them to take aroundabout road, and I'm sair fleid a' the Roods will see me.... If itcould just be said to poor Sanders when he comes back that I diedhurriedly, syne he would be able to haud up his head.... Oh,mither!... I wish terrible they had come and ta'en me at nicht....It's a dogcart, and I was praying it micht be a cart, so that theycould cover me wi' straw."
"This is more than I can stand," the doctor cried.
Nanny rose frightened.
"I've tried you, sair," she said, "but, oh, I'm grateful, and I'mready now."
They all advanced toward the door without another word, and Nanny eventried to smile. But in the middle of the floor something came overher, and she stood there. Gavin took her hand, and it was cold. Shelooked from one to the other, her mouth opening and shutting.
"I canna help it," she said.
"It's cruel hard," muttered the doctor. "I knew this woman when shewas a lassie."
The little minister stretched out his hands.
"Have pity on her, O God!" he prayed, with the presumptuousness ofyouth.
Nanny heard the words.
"Oh, God," she cried, "you micht!"
God needs no minister to tell Him what to do, but it was His will thatthe poorhouse should not have this woman. He made use of a strangeinstrument, no other than the Egyptian, who now opened the mudhousedoor.