‘’Same thing,’ said M‘Turk. ‘You think you’re the only stalky chap in the Coll.’
Corkran kicked him as he had kicked Beetle; and even as Beetle, M‘Turk took not the faintest notice. By the etiquette of their friendship, this was no more than a formal notice of dissent from a proposition.
‘They haven’t thrown out any pickets,’* Corkran went on (that school prepared boys for the Army). ‘You ought to do that—even for apples. Toowey’s farmyard may be full of farm-chaps.’
‘’Twasn’t last week,’ said Beetle, ‘when we smoked in that cart—shed place. It’s a mile from any house, too.’
Up went one of Corkran’s light eyebrows. ‘Oh, Beetle, I am so tired o’ kickin’ you! Does that mean it’s empty now? They ought to have sent a fellow ahead to look. They’re simply bound to be collared. An’ where’ll they bunk to if they have to run for it? Parsons has only been here two terms. He don’t know the lie of the country. Orrin’s a fat ass, an’ Howlett bunks from a guv’nor’ [vernacular for any native of Devon engaged in agricultural pursuits] ‘as far as he can see one. De Vitré’s the only decent chap in the lot, an’—an’ I put him up to usin’ Toowey’s farmyard.’
‘Well, keep your hair on,’ said Beetle. ‘What are we going to do? It’s hefty damp here.’
‘Let’s think a bit.’ Corkran whistled between his teeth and presently broke into a swift, short double-shuffle. ‘We’ll go straight up the hill and see what happens to ’em. Cut across the fields; an’ we’ll lie up in the hedge where the lane comes in by the barn—where we found that dead hedgehog last term. Come on!’
He scrambled over the earth bank and dropped on to the rain-soaked plough. It was a steep slope to the brow of the hill where Toowey’s barns stood. The boys took no account of stiles or footpaths, crossing field after field diagonally, and where they found a hedge, bursting through it like beagles. The lane lay on their right flank, and they heard much lowing and shouting in that direction.
‘Well, if De Vitré isn’t collared,’ said M‘Turk, kicking off a few pounds of loam against a gate-post, ‘he jolly well ought to be.’
‘We’ll get collared, too, if you go on with your nose up like that. Duck, you ass, and stalk along under the hedge. We can get quite close up to the barn,’ said Corkran. ‘There’s no sense in not doin’ a thing stalkily while you’re about it.’
They wriggled into the top of an old hollow double hedge less than thirty yards from the big black-timbered barn with its square outbuildings. Their ten-minutes’ climb had lifted them a couple of hundred feet above the Burrows. As the mists parted here and there, they could see its great triangle of sodden green, tipped with yellow sand-dunes and fringed with white foam, laid out like a blurred map below. The surge along the Pebble Ridge made a background to the wild noises in the lane.
‘What did I tell you?’ said Corkran, peering through the stems of the quickset* which commanded a view of the farmyard. ‘Three farm-chaps—getting out dung—with pitchforks. It’s too late to head off De Vitré. We’d be collared if we showed up. Besides, they’ve heard ’em. They couldn’t help hearing. What asses!’
The natives, brandishing their weapons, talked together, using many times the word ‘Colleger.’ As the tumult swelled, they disappeared into various pens and byres. The first of the cattle trotted up to the yard-gate, and De Vitré felicitated his band.
‘That’s all right,’ he shouted. ‘Oh, won’t old Vidley be wild! Open the gate, Orrin, an’ whack ’em through. They’re pretty warm.’
‘So’ll you be in a minute,’ muttered M‘Turk as the raiders hurried into the yard behind the cattle. They heard a shout of triumph, shrill yells of despair; saw one Devonian guarding the gate with a pitchfork, while the others, alas! captured all four boys.
‘Of all the infernal, idiotic, lower-second asses!’ said Corkran. ‘They haven’t even taken off their House-caps.’ These dainty confections of primary colours were not issued, as some believe, to encourage House-pride or esprit de corps, but for purposes of identification from afar, should the wearer break bounds or laws. That is why, in time of war, any one but an idiot wore his cap inside out.
‘Aie! Yeou young rascals. We’ve got ’e! Whutt be doin’ to Muster Vidley’s bullocks?’
‘Oh, we found ’em,’ said De Vitré, who bore himself gallantly in defeat. ‘Would you like ’em?’
‘Found ’em! They bullocks drove like that—all heavin’ an’ penkin’ an’ hotted! Oh! Shaameful. Yeou’ve nigh to killed the cows—lat alone stealin’ ’em. They sends pore boys to jail for half o’ this.’
‘That’s a lie,’ said Beetle to M‘Turk, turning on the wet grass.
‘I know; but they always say it. ’Member when they collared us at the Monkey Farm that Sunday, with the apples in your topper?’
‘My Aunt! They’re goin’ to lock ’em up an’ send for Vidley,’ Corkran whispered, as one of the captors hurried downhill in the direction of Appledore, and the prisoners were led into the barn.
‘But they haven’t taken their names and numbers, anyhow,’ said Corkran, who had fallen into the hands of the enemy more than once.
‘But they’re bottled! Rather sickly for De Vitré,’ said Beetle. ‘It’s one lickin’ anyhow, even if Vidley don’t hammer him. The Head’s rather hot about gate-liftin’, and poachin’, an’ all that sort of thing. He won’t care for cattle-liftin’ much.’
‘It’s awfully bad for cows, too, to run ’em about in milk,’ said M‘Turk, lifting one knee from a sodden primrose-tuft. ‘What’s the next move, Corky?’
‘We’ll get into the old cart-shed where we smoked. It’s next to the barn. We can cut across over while they’re inside and climb in through the window.’
‘S’pose we’re collared?’ said Beetle, cramming his House-cap into his pocket. Caps may tumble off; so one goes into action bare-headed.
‘That’s just it. They’d never dream of any more chaps walkin’ bung into the trap. Besides, we can get out through the roof if they spot us. Keep your eye on your Uncle. Come on,’ said Corkran.
A swift dash carried them to a huge clump of nettles, beneath the unglazed back window of the cart-shed. Its open front, of course, gave on to the barnyard.
They scrambled through, dropped among the carts, and climbed up into the rudely boarded upper floor that they had discovered a week before when in search of retirement. It covered a half of the building and ended in darkness at the barn wall. The roof—tiles were broken and displaced. Through the chinks they commanded a clear view of the barnyard, half filled with disconsolate cattle, steaming sadly in the rain.
‘You see,’ said Corkran, always careful to secure his line of retreat, ‘if they bottle us up here, we can squeeze out between these rafters, slide down the roof, an’ bunk. They couldn’t even get out through the window. They’d have to run right round the barn. Now are you satisfied, you burbler?’
‘Huh! You only said that to make quite sure yourself,’ Beetle retorted.
‘If the boards weren’t all loose, I’d kick you,’ growled Corkran. ‘’No sense gettin’ into a place you can’t get out of. Shut up and listen.’
A murmur of voices reached them from the end of the attic. M‘Turk tiptoed thither with caution.
‘Hi! It leads through into the barn. You can get through. Come along!’ He fingered the boarded wall.
‘What’s the other side?’ said Corkran the cautious.
‘Hay, you idiot.’ They heard his boot-heels click on wood, and he had gone.
At some time or other sheep must have been folded in the cart-shed, and an inventive farmhand, sooner than take the hay round, had displaced a board in the barn-side to thrust fodder through. It was in no sense a lawful path, but twelve inches in the square is all that any boy needs.
‘Look here!’ said Beetle, as they waited for M‘Turk’s return. ‘The cattle are coming in out of the wet.’
A brown, hairy back showed some three feet below the half—floo
r, as one by one the cattle shouldered in for shelter among the carts below, filling the shed with their sweet breath.
‘That blocks our way out, unless we get out by the roof, an’ that’s rather too much of a drop, unless we have to,’ said Corkran. ‘They’re all bung in front of the window, too. What a day we’re havin’!’
‘Corkran! Beetle!’ M‘Turk’s whisper shook with delight. ‘You can see ’em; I’ve seen ’em. They’re in a blue funk in the barn, an’ the two clods are makin’ fun of ’em—horrid. Orrin’s tryin’ to bribe ’em an’ Parsons is nearly blubbin’. Come an’ look! I’m in the hayloft. Get through the hole. Don’t make a row, Beetle.’
Lithely they wriggled between the displaced boards into the hay and crawled to the edge of the loft. Three years’ skirmishing against a hard and unsympathetic peasantry had taught them the elements of strategy. For tactics they looked to Corkran; but even Beetle, notoriously absent—minded, held a lock of hay before his head as he crawled. There was no haste, no betraying giggle, no squeak of excitement. They had learned, by stripes, the unwisdom of these things. But the conference by a root-cutter on the barn floor was deep in its own affairs; De Vitré’s party promising, entreating, and cajoling, while the natives laughed like Inquisitors.
‘Wait till Muster Vidley an’ Muster Toowey—yis, an’ the policemen come,’ was their only answer. ‘’Tis about time to go to milkin’. What’ull us do?’
‘Yeou go milk, Tom, an’ I’ll stay long o’ the young gentlemen,’ said the bigger of the two, who answered to the name of Abraham. ‘Muster Toowey, he’m laike to charge yeou for usin’ his yard so free. Iss fai! Yeou’ll be wopped proper. ’Rackon yeou’ll be askin’ for junkets to set in this week o’ Sundays to come. But Muster Vidley, he’ll give ’ee the best leatherin’ of all. He’m passionful, I tai ’ee.’
Tom stumped out to milk. The barn doors closed behind him, and in the fading light a great gloom fell on all but Abraham, who discoursed eloquently on Mr. Vidley, his temper and strong arm.
Corkran turned in the hay and retreated to the attic, followed by his army.
‘No good,’ was his verdict. ‘I’m afraid it’s all up with ’em. We’d better get out.’
‘Yes, but look at these beastly cows,’ said M‘Turk, spitting on to a heifer’s back. ‘It’ll take us a week to shove ’em away from the window, and that brute Tom’ll hear us. He’s just across the yard, milkin’.’
‘Tweak ’em, then,’ said Corkran. ‘Hang it, I’m sorry to have to go, though. If we could get that other beast out of the barn for a minute we might make a rescue. Well, it’s no good. Tweakons!’*
He drew forth a slim, well-worn home-made catapult—the ‘tweaker’ of those days—slipped a buckshot into its supple chamois leather pouch, and pulled to the full stretch of the elastic. The others followed his example. They only wished to get the cattle out of their way, but seeing the backs so near, they deemed it their duty each to choose his bird and to let fly with all their strength.
They were not prepared in the least for what followed. Three bullocks, trying to wheel amid six close-pressed companions, not to mention three calves, several carts, and all the lumber of a general-utility shed, do not turn end-for-end without confusion. It was lucky for the boys that they stood a little back on the floor, because one horned head, tossed in pain, flung up a loose board at the edge, and it came down lancewise on an amazed back. Another victim floundered bodily across the shafts of a decrepit gig, smashing these and oversetting the wheels. That was more than enough for the nerves of the assembly. With wild bellowings and a good deal of left-and-right butting they dashed into the barnyard, tails on end, and began a fine free fight on the midden. The last cow out hooked down an old set of harness; it flapped over one eye and trailed behind her. When a companion trod on it, which happened every few seconds, she naturally fell on her knees; and, being a Burrows cow, with the interests of her calf at heart, attacked the first passer-by. Half-awed, but wholly delighted, the boys watched the outburst. It was in full flower before they even dreamed of a second shot. Tom came out from a byre with a pitchfork, to be chased in again by the harnessed cow. A bullock floundered on the muck-heap, fell, rose and bedded himself to the belly, helpless and bellowing. The others took great interest in him.
Corkran, through the roof, scientifically ‘tweaked’ a frisky heifer on the nose, and it is no exaggeration to say that she danced on her hind legs for half a minute.
‘Abram! Oh, Abram! They’m bewitched. They’m ragin’. ’Tes the milk fever. They’ve been drove mad. Oh, Abram! They’ll horn the bullocks! They’ll horn me! Abram!’
‘Bide till I lock the door,’ quoth Abraham, faithful to his trust. They heard him padlock the barn door; saw him come out with yet another pitchfork. A bullock lowered his head, Abraham ran to the nearest pig-pen, where loud squeakings told that he had disturbed the peace of a large family.
‘Beetle,’ snapped Corkran. ‘Go in an’ get those asses out. Quick! We’ll keep the cows happy.’
A people sitting in darkness and the shadow* of monumental lickings, too depressed to be angry with De Vitré, heard a voice from on high saying, ‘Come up here! Come on! Come up! There’s a way out.’
They shinned up the loft-stanchions without a word; found a boot-heel which they were bidden to take for guide, and squeezed desperately through a hole in darkness, to be hauled out by Corkran.
‘Have you got your caps? Did you give ’em your names and numbers?’
‘Yes. No.’
‘That’s all right. Drop down here. Don’t stop to jaw. Over the cart—through that window, and bunk! Get out!’
De Vitré needed no more. They heard him squeak as he dropped among the nettles, and through the roof-chinks they watched four slight figures disappear into the rain. Tom and Abraham, from byre and pig-pen, exhorted the cattle to keep quiet.
‘By gum!’ said Beetle; ‘That was stalky! How did you think of it?’
‘It was the only thing to do. Anybody could have seen that.’
‘Hadn’t we better bunk, too, now?’ said M‘Turk uneasily.
‘Why? We’re all right. We haven’t done anything. I want to hear what old Vidley will say. Stop tweakin’, Turkey. Let ’em cool off. Golly! how that heifer danced! I swear I didn’t know cows could be so lively. We’re only just in time.’
‘My Hat! Here’s Vidley—and Toowey,’ said Beetle, as the two farmers strode into the yard.
‘Gloats! oh, gloats! Fids! oh, fids! Hefty fids and gloats to us!’ said Corkran.
These words, in their vocabulary, expressed the supreme of delight. ‘Gloats’ implied more or less of personal triumph, ‘fids’ was felicity in the abstract, and the boys were tasting both that day. Last joy of all, they had had the pleasure of Mr. Vidley’s acquaintance, albeit he did not love them. Toowey was more of a stranger; his orchards lying over-near to the public road.
Tom and Abraham together told a tale of stolen cattle maddened by overdriving; of cows sure to die in calving, and of milk that would never return; that made Mr. Vidley swear for three consecutive minutes in the speech of north Devon.
‘’Tes tu bad. ’Tes tu bad,’ said Toowey, consolingly; ‘let’s ’ope they ’aven’t took no great ’arm. They be wonderful wild, though.’
‘’Tes all well for yeou, Toowey, that sells them dom Collegers seventy quart a week.’
‘Eighty,’ Toowey replied, with the meek triumph of one who has underbidden his neighbour on public tender; ‘but that’s no odds to me. Yeou’m free to leather ’em saame as if they was yeour own sons. On my barn-floor shall ’ee leather ’em.’
‘Generous old swine!’ said Beetle. ‘De Vitré ought to have stayed for this.’
‘They’m all safe an’ to rights,’ said the officious Abraham, producing the key. ‘Rackon us’ll come in an’ hold ’em for yeou. Hey! The cows are fair ragin’ still. Us’ll have to run for it.’
The barn being next to the shed, the boys could not see that st
ately entry. But they heard.
‘Gone an’ hided in the hay. Aie! They’m proper afraid,’ cried Abraham.
‘Rout un out! Rout un out!’ roared Vidley, rattling a stick impatiently on the root-cutter.
‘Oh, my Aunt!’ said Corkran, standing on one foot.
‘Shut the door. Shut the door, I tai ’ee. Rackon us can find un in the dark. Us don’t want un boltin’ like rabbits under our elbows.’ The big barn door closed with a clang.
‘My Gum!’ said Corkran, which was always his War Oath in time of action. He dropped down and was gone for perhaps twenty seconds.
‘And that’s all right,’ he said, returning at a gentle saunter.
‘Hwatt?’ M‘Turk almost shrieked, for Corkran, in the shed below, waved a large key.
‘Stalks! Frabjous Stalks! Bottled ’em! all four!’ was the reply, and Beetle fell on his bosom. ‘Yiss. They’m so’s to say, like, locked up. If you’re goin’ to laugh, Beetle, I shall have to kick you again.’
‘But I must!’ Beetle was blackening with suppressed mirth.
‘You won’t do it here, then.’ He thrust the already limp Beetle through the cart-shed window. It sobered him; one cannot laugh on a bed of nettles. Then Corkran stepped on his prostrate carcass, and M‘Turk followed, just as Beetle would have risen; so he was upset, and the nettles painted on his cheek a likeness of hideous eruptions.
“Thought that ’ud cure you,’ said Corkran, with a sniff.
Beetle rubbed his face desperately with dock-leaves, and said nothing. All desire to laugh had gone from him. They entered the lane.
Then a clamour broke from the barn—a compound noise of horse-like kicks, shaking of door-panels, and various yells.
‘They’ve found it out,’ said Corkran. ‘How strange!’ He sniffed again.
‘Let ’em,’ said Beetle. ‘No one can hear ’em. Come on up to Coll.’
‘What a brute you are, Beetle! You only think of your beastly self. Those cows want milkin’. Poor dears! Hear ’em low,’ said M‘Turk.
‘Go back and milk ’em yourself, then.’ Beetle danced with pain. ‘We shall miss call-over, hangin’ about like this; an’ I’ve got two black marks this week already.’
The Complete Stalky & Co Page 5
