by Thomas Hardy
“The waters of the earth be as much ours as yours,” said one from beneath. But the remainder were thunderstruck, for they knew that their chance had lain entirely in strategy and not in argument.
The shoemaker then spoke: “Ye have entered upon our property, and diverted the water, and made our parish mill useless, and caused us other losses. Do ye agree to restore it to its old course, close up the new course ye have been at such labour to widen — in short, to leave things as they have been from time immemorial?”
“No-o-o-o!” was shouted from below in a yell of defiance.
“Very well, then,” said the baker, “we must make you. Gentlemen, ye are prisoners. Until you restore that water to us, you will bide where you be.The East Poley men rushed to escape by the way they had entered. But halfway up the tunnel a barricade of adamantine blocks barred their footsteps. “Bring spades!” shouted the foremost. But the stones were so well wedged, and the passage so small, that, as we had anticipated, no engineering force at their disposal could make the least impression upon the blocks. They returned to the inner cave disconsolately.
“D’ye give in?” we asked them.
“Never!” said they doggedly.
“Let ‘em sweat — let ‘em sweat,” said the shoemaker, placidly. “They’ll tell a different tale by to-morrow morning. Let ‘em bide for the night, and say no more.”
In pursuance of this idea we withdrew from our position, and, passing out of Grim Billy, went straight home. Steve was excited by the length of my stay, and still more when I told him the cause of it. ‘What — got them prisoners in the cave?” he said. “I must go myself to-morrow and see the end of this!”
Whether it was partly due to the excitement of the occasion, or solely to the recuperative powers of a strong constitution, cannot be said; but certain it is that next morning, on hearing the villagers shouting and gathering together, Steve sprang out of bed, declaring that he must go with me to see what was happening to the prisoners. The doctor was hastily called in, and gave it as his opinion that the outing would do Steve no harm, if he were warmly wrapped up; and soon away we went, just in time to overtake the men who had started on their way.
With breathless curiosity we entered Grim Billy, lit our candles and clambered up the incline. Almost before we reached the top, exclamations ascended through the chasm to Nick’s Pocket, there being such words as, “We give in!” “Let us out!” “We give up the water forever!”
Looking in upon them, we found their aspect to be very different from what it had been the night before. Some had extemporized a couch with smock-frocks and gaiters, and jumped up from a sound sleep thereon; while others had their spades in their hands, as if undoing what they had been at such pains to build up, as was proved in a moment by their saying eagerly, “We have begun to put it right, and shall finish soon — we are restoring the river to his old bed — give us your word, good gentlemen, that when it is done we shall be free!”
“Certainly,” replied our side with great dignity. “We have said so already.”
Our arrival stimulated them in the work of repair, which had hitherto been somewhat desultory. Then shovels entered the clay and rubble like giants’ tongues; they lit up more candles, and in half an hour had completely demolished the structure raised the night before with such labour and amazing solidity that it might have been expected to last forever. The final stone rolled away, the much tantalised river withdrew its last drop from the new channel, and resumed its original course once more.
While the East Poley men had been completing this task, some of our party had gone back to Nick’s Pocket, and there, after much exertion, succeeded in unpacking the boulders from the horizontal passage admitting to the inner cave. By the time this was done, the prisoners within had finished their work of penance, and we West Poley men, who had remained to watch them, rejoined our companions. Then we all stood back, while those of East Poley came out, walking between their vanquishers, like the Romans under the Caudine Forks, when they surrendered to the Samnites. They glared at us with suppressed rage, and passed without saying a word.
“I see from their manner that we have not heard the last of this,” said the Man who had Failed, thoughtfully. He had just joined us, and learnt the state of the case.
“I was thinking as much,” said the shoemaker. “As long as that cave is known in Poley, so long will they bother us about the stream.”
“I wish it had never been found out,” said the baker bitterly. “If not now upon us, they will be playing that trick upon our children when we are dead and gone.”
Steve glanced at me, and there was sadness in his look.
We walked home considerably in the rear of the rest, by no means a tease. It was impossible to disguise from ourselves that Steve had lost the good feeling of his fellow parishioners by his explorations and their results.
As the West Poley men had predicted, so it turned out. Some months afterwards, when I had gone back to my home and school, and Steve was learning to superintend his mother’s farm, I heard that another midnight entry had been made into the cave by the rougher characters of East Poley. They diverted the stream as before, and when the miller and other inhabitants of the west village rose in the morning, behold, their stream was dry! The West Poley folk were furious, and rushed to Nick’s Pocket. The mischief-makers were gone, and there was no legal proof as to their identity, though it was indirectly clear enough where they had come from. With some difficulty the water was again restored, but not till Steve had again been spoken of as the original cause of the misfortunes.
About this time I paid another visit to my cousin and aunt. Steve seemed to have grown a good deal older than when I had last seen him, and, almost as soon as we were alone, he began to speak on the subject of the mill-stream.
“I am glad you have come, Leonard,” he said, “for I want to talk to you. I have never been happy, you know, since the adventure; I don’t like the idea that by a freak of mine our village should be placed at the mercy of the East Poleyites; I shall never be liked again unless I make that river as secure from interruption as it was before.”
“But that can’t be,” said I.
“Well, I have a scheme,” said Steve musingly. “I am not so sure that the river may not be made as secure as it was before.”
“But how? What is the scheme based on?” I asked, incredulously.
“I cannot reveal to you at present,” said he. “All I can say is, that I have injured my native village, that I owe it amends, and that I’ll pay the debt if it’s a possibility.”
I soon perceived from my cousin’s manner at meals and elsewhere that the scheme, whatever it might be, occupied him to the exclusion of all other thoughts. But he would not speak to me about it. I frequently missed him for spaces of an hour or two, and soon conjectured that these hours of absence were spent in furtherance of his plan.
The last day of my visit came round, and to tell the truth I was not sorry, for Steve was so preoccupied as to be anything but a pleasant companion. I walked up to the village alone, and soon became aware that something had happened.
During the night another raid had been made upon the river head — with but partial success, it is true; but the stream was so much reduced that the mill-wheel would not turn, and the dipping pools were nearly empty. It was resolved to repair the mischief in the evening, but the disturbance in the village was very great, for the attempt proved that the more unscrupulous characters of East Poley were not inclined to desist.
Before I had gone much further, I was surprised to discern in the distance a figure which seemed to be Steve’s, though I thought I had left him at the rear of his mother’s premises.
He was making for Nick’s Pocket, and following thither I reached the mouth of the cave just in time to see him enter.
“Steve!” I called out. He heard me and came back. He was pale, and there seemed to be something in his face which I had never seen there before.
“Ah — Leonard,”
he said, you have traced me. Well, you are just in time. The folks think of coming to mend this mischief as soon as their day’s work is over, but perhaps it won’t be necessary. My scheme may do instead.”
“How — do instead?” asked I.
“Well, save them the trouble,” he said with assumed carelessness. “I had almost decided not to carry it out, though I have got the materials in readiness, but the doings of the night have stung me; I carry out my plan.”
“When?”
“Now — this hour — this moment. The stream must flow into its right channel, and stay there, and no man’s hands must be able to turn it elsewhere. Now good-bye, in case of accidents.”
To my surprise, Steve shook hands with me solemnly, and wringing from me a promise not to follow, disappeared into the blackness of the cave.
For some moments I stood motionless where Steve had left me, not quite knowing what to do. Hearing footsteps behind my back, I looked round. To my great pleasure I saw Job approaching, dressed up in his best clothes, and with him the Man who had Failed.
Job was glad to see me. He had come to West Poley for a holiday, from the situation with the farmer which, as I now learned for the first time, the Man who had Failed had been the means of his obtaining. Observing, I suppose, the perplexity upon my face, they asked me what was the matter, and I, after some hesitation, told them of Steve. The Man who had Failed looked grave.
“Is it serious?” I asked him.
“It may be,” said he, in that poetico-philosophic strain which, under more favouring circumstances, might have led him on to the intellectual eminence of a Coleridge or an Emerson. “Your cousin, like all such natures, is rushing into another extreme, that may be worse than the first. The opposite of error is error still; from careless adventuring at other people’s expense he may have flown to rash self-sacrifice. He contemplates some violent remedy, I make no doubt. How long has he been in the cave? We had better follow him.”
Before I could reply, we were startled by a jet of smoke, like that from the muzzle of a gun, bursting from the mouth of Nick’s Pocket; and this was immediately followed by a deadened rumble like thunder underground. In another moment a duplicate of the noise reached our ears from over the hill, in the precise direction of Grim Billy.
“Oh — what can it be?” said I.
“Gunpowder,” said the Man who had Failed, slowly.
“Ah — yes — I know what he’s done — he has blasted the rocks inside!” cried Job. “Depend upon it, that’s his plan for closing up the way to the riverhead.”
“And for losing his life into the bargain,” said our companion. “But no — he may be alive. We must go in at once — or as soon as we can breathe there.”
Job ran for lights, and before he had returned we heard a familiar sound from the direction of the village. It was the patter of the mill-wheel. Job came up almost at the moment, and with him a crowd of the village people.
“The river is right again,” they shouted. “Water runs better than ever — a full, steady stream, all on a sudden — just when we heard the rumble underground.”
“Steve has done it!” I said.
“A brave fellow,” said the Man who had Failed. “Pray that he is not hurt.”
Job had lighted the candles, and, when we were entering, some more villagers, who at the noise of the explosion had run to Grim Billy, joined us. “Grim Billy is partly closed up inside!” they told us. “Where you used to climb up the slope to look over into Nick’s Pocket, ‘tis all altered. There’s no longer any opening there; the whole rock has crumbled down as if the mountain had sunk bodily.
“Without waiting to answer, we, who were about to enter Nick’s Pocket, proceeded on our way. We soon had penetrated to the outer approaches, though nearly suffocated by the sulphurous atmosphere; but we could get no further than the first cavern. At a point somewhat in advance of the little gallery to the inner cave, Nick’s Pocket ceased to exist. Its roof had sunk. The whole superimposed mountain, as it seemed, had quietly settled down upon the hollow places beneath it closing like a pair of bellows, and barring all human entrance.
But alas, where was Steve? “I would liever have had no water in West Poley forevermore than have lost Steve!” said Job.
“And so would I!” said many of us.
To add to our terror, news was brought into the cave at that moment that Steve’s mother was approaching; and how to meet my poor aunt was more than we could think.
But suddenly a shout was heard. A few of the party, who had not penetrated so far into the cave as we had done, were exclaiming, “Here he is!” We hastened back, and found they were in a small side hollow, close to the entrance, which we had passed by unheeded. The Man who had Failed was there, and he and the baker were carrying something into the light. It was Steve — apparently dead, or unconscious.
“Don’t be frightened,” said the baker to me. “He’s not dead; perhaps not much hurt.”
As he had declared, so it turned out. No sooner was Steve in the open air, than he unclosed his eyes, looked round with a stupefied expression, and sat up.
“Steve — Steve!” said Job and I, simultaneously.
“All right,” said Steve, recovering his senses by degrees. “I’ll tell — how it happened — in a minute or two.”
Then his mother came up, and was at first terrified enough, but on seeing Steve gradually get upon his legs, she recovered her equanimity. He soon was able to explain all. He said that the damage to the village by his tampering with the stream had weighed upon his mind, and led him to revolve many schemes for its cure. With this in view he had privately made examination of the cave; when he discovered that the whole superincumbent mass, forming the roof of the inner cave, was divided from the walls of the same by a vein of sand, and, that it was only kept in its place by a slim support at one corner. It seemed to him if this support could be removed, the upper mass would descend by its own weight, like the brick of a brick-trap when the peg is withdrawn.
He laid his plans accordingly; procuring gunpowder, and scooping out holes for the same, at central points in the rock. When all this was done, he waited a while, in doubt as to the effect; and might possibly never have completed his labours, but for the renewed attempt upon the river. He then made up his mind, and attached the fuse. After lighting it, he would have reached the outside safely enough but for the accident of stumbling as he ran, which threw him so heavily on the ground, that, before he could recover himself and go forward, the explosion had occurred.
All of us congratulated him, and the whole village was joyful, for no less than three thousand, four hundred and fifty tons of rock and, earth — according to calculations made by an experienced engineer a short time afterwards — had descended between the river’s head and all human interference, so that there was not much fear of any more East Poley manoeuvres for turning the stream into their valley.
The inhabitants of the parish, gentle and simple, said that Steve, had made ample amends for the harm he had done; and their goodwill was further evidenced by his being invited to no less than nineteen Christmas and New Year’s parties during the following holidays.
As we left the cave, Steve, Job, Mrs Draycot and I walked behind the Man who had Failed.
“Though this has worked well,” he said to Steve, “it is by the merest chance in the world. Your courage is praiseworthy, but you see the risks that are incurred when people go out of their way to meddle with what they don’t understand. Exceptionally smart actions, such as you delight in, should be carefully weighed with a view to their utility before they are begun. Quiet perseverance in clearly defined courses is, as a rule, better than the erratic exploits that may do much harm.
“Steve listened respectfully enough to this, but he said to his mother afterwards: “He has failed in life, and how can his opinions be worth anything?”
“For this reason,” said she. “He is one who has failed, not from want of sense, but from want of energy, and people of that
sort, when kindly, are better worth attending to than those successful ones, who have never seen the seamy side of things. I would advise you to listen to him.”
Steve probably did; for he is now the largest gentleman-farmer of those parts, remarkable for his avoidance of anything like speculative exploits.
THE END.
Master John Horseleigh, Knight
In the earliest and mustiest volume of the Havenpool marriage registers (said the thin-faced gentleman) this entry may still be read by any one curious enough to decipher the crabbed handwriting of the date. I took a copy of it when I was last there; and it runs thus (he had opened his pocket-book, and now read aloud the extract; afterwards handing round the book to us, wherein we saw transcribed the following) —
Mastr John Horseleigh, Knyght, of p’ysshe of Clyffton was maryd to Edith the wyffe late off John Stocker, m’chawnte of Havenpool the xiiij daie of December be p’vylegge gevyn by our sup’me hedd of the chyrche of Ingelonde Kynge Henry the viiith 1539.
Now, if you turn to the long and elabourate pedigree of the ancient family of the Horseleighs of Clyfton Horseleigh, you will find no mention whatever of this alliance, notwithstanding the privilege given by the Sovereign and head of the Church; the said Sir John being therein chronicled as marrying, at a date apparently earlier than the above, the daughter and heiress of Richard Phelipson, of Montislope, in Nether Wessex, a lady who outlived him, of which marriage there were issue two daughters and a son, who succeeded him in his estates. How are we to account for these, as it would seem, contemporaneous wives? A strange local tradition only can help us, and this can be briefly told.
