Dawn

by S. Fowler Wright

  “It wouldn’t influence me if it were so; but, in fact, it isn’t. You may not know that Hatterley has discovered about fifteen people on our north-west coast, and that one of them is an experienced doctor. I hope to get them to come here when the sea is favourable.”

  “Well, even so, two doctors aren’t too many for all the people, here. One might die any time.”

  “I’m afraid one will,” Martin answered, with a brutality which he regretted as soon as it was spoken, but Butcher did not appear to notice it.

  He went on, “There’ve been a good many points of friction between us. There’s the cloth now, that we were arguing about last week. You’ve got something to sell now. I want to save my son’s life, and I’m prepared to bid high.”

  “I’m not prepared to deal,” Martin answered, “but I’ll consider all you’ve said—and perhaps some things that you haven’t—and give you my answer tomorrow.”

  “Would you listen to Miss Temple?”

  “I would listen to anyone. I’ve no reason to think she would

  “I don’t know, but I must try all I can. She’s a religious woman. She ought to see it differently from how you do.”

  “Well, I believe she’s with the dying girl. You can try if you like.”

  Butcher went out.

  “I never thought I should be sorry for that man,” Helen said. “Is there no other way? Of course, you know best.”

  “I’m sorry for the father,” said Claire, “but the man needs hanging, all the same. What do you say, Jack?”

  Jack Tolley assented. He remembered the poisonous whisper to his own wife. He had not been roused to any great indignation. It had been too absurd to suppose that Madge would act in such a way, or could think that he would approve it. He was not stirred to any violent emotion now, but he recognized that dirt should be cleared out. He said, “I don’t see what his father’s feelings have to do with it.”

  Martin noticed that he was getting more support than he would have expected. None of them, he thought, would have advocated such drastic action if he had not taken it, and now they were surer than he was himself that it should be carried to its extremity. They lacked the responsibility of the last decision.

  Chapter Sixty

  Dr. Butcher stood trembling in the uncertainty of life and death, his hands still tied, and Monty still beside him, while Martin looked at him with a contempt which he made no effort to cover. There was the same group in the room that had been round him the night before.

  Muriel was not there. Butcher had seen her, and had implored her to use her influence for his son’s life, and she had disconcerted him with an unexpected question, “Is he sorry for what he did?” He had answered it as he thought she would wish, but there had been a second’s pause, which she understood. She knew Butcher.

  She said, “I will see the Captain if you ask me again; but I don’t know that I shall help you if I do. I should like you to know that before you ask.”

  He had looked at her in silence, and turned away.

  Now Martin’s voice broke the tense silence of the room. He addressed himself to the father.

  “Mr. Butcher, I have thought of all you said, and I have remembered the atmosphere in which your son was trained. I don’t mean that all doctors were of his character, or of his way of thinking, because that would be to malign dead men, among whom I had valued friends; but I am giving him the full benefit of the worst influences which may have acted upon him. They are considerations which may reduce his guilt, but do not supply any good reason why I should allow him to contaminate others.

  “I am about to take a course which is merciful, but I wish I were sure that it is something better than moral cowardice which has led me to this decision. I do not wish to take your son’s life with my own hand, and I do not wish to require of others what I am unwilling to do myself. He will have six hours to leave the district. After that, if he should be within five miles of this room at any time, or if by word or writing he should so much as mention any one of the vices of which he learnt in the old days, to any one of our people, young or old, he will die very surely, without mercy or delay.

  “I should not hesitate again.

  “Monty, you can loose his hands.”

  There was no word in reply either from father or son. The condemned man leaned his released hands on the table, as though he could not stand easily. He breathed hard, as though he had been running. His father came over to him. He put a hand under his son’s arm, and led him out.

  Helen said, “I think I’m glad you’ve let him go. He won’t come here again. He’s too frightened.”

  Claire said, “I think I’m sorry. I don’t want to think such a man is alive. I can’t get it out of my mind, and I know I ought to.” She had the thought of her own child that was coming. She did not want any thought that should not be gracious: no thought of ignoble things. But thought is hard to control, perhaps hardest when there is conscious effort to do so. She had a feeling that it would be ended if he were dead.

  Chapter Sixty-One

  It was scarcely five minutes after the two men had left that Steve Fortune was at the door. He had met Monty along the road, and asked him what the Captain’s order was about Dr. Butcher. Monty, who did not like him, gave a fantastically sanguinary reply, which he would have regarded as satisfactory if he had been able to credit it.

  He went on, and as he reached the door Martin came out. That was better than he had hoped. He had not expected to get past the vigilant Phillips without considerable difficulty. The Captain himself would talk to anyone, but those about him constituted a difficult barrier to surmount.

  “Can I have a word with you, Captain?”

  “You’d better come inside, if you’ve anything to say. It’s too cold here.”

  Martin knew him to be a man of unhurried speech, and the cold was bitter. There was a sea-mist also, that lay thickly over the land, and might not lift all day. A cold, wet, penetrating mist, such as they had had many times during the past month. A new thing, and unpleasant to these English Midlanders.

  He talked to Steve in the hall for a few moments, and let him go.

  He went in to Helen and Claire, who were working on the provision of warmer garments for themselves and the children. There was still material available, but not much, and Butcher was known to have a quantity of uncut rolls of cloth—a very large quantity, it was believed—which he would not sell at any reasonable figure.

  “I’ve had Steve Fortune here about Dr. Butcher,” he said; “he wouldn’t say what he wanted when he found I’d let him off. I half thought he meant to volunteer as executioner.”

  “It’s never easy to tell what Steve’s thinking,” Helen answered. “Wasn’t he fond of Doll?”

  “There was some trouble about that before I came, so Tom told me, and I saw something of it myself. But there’s been nothing since.”

  The conversation was interrupted by Muriel’s entrance.

  “I want to see you alone,” she said to Martin.

  “Quite alone?” he said, in some surprise, for there were few things which were not shared openly among those who were present.

  “Yes, quite. I’ve promised.”

  “Then come into the library.”

  “It’s about Dr. Butcher,” Muriel began, as soon as the library door was closed upon them. “His father came last night, and asked me to see you, and I declined; but Doll has told me something this morning which alters it—or you may think so. Anyway, she thinks you ought to know. But she only told me on condition that I should tell no one but you; and that Will Carless should never know, under any circumstances. I’ve promised that, and I can say nothing unless you do the same.”

  “Very well, if you think I ought.”

  “It’s this. She says the child wouldn’t have been Will’s. It was Steve Fortune’s. She says she was sorry after it happened, and she hasn’t spoken to Steve for three months. I think he bribed her with something. You know she’s always been like a
child for anything she could wear.

  “She says she got to hate the thought of always having Steve’s child, and Will not knowing. And she was dreading that it might be like Steve—you know how different they are—and every one would guess. She says she begged Dr. Butcher to do something to stop it, and he said he was afraid of you, but he gave in at last.

  “I told her you ought to know, and she agreed, as long as Will never hears. They’ve been happy together the last three months, except for this trouble on her mind, and I suppose now she’s dying—”

  “I don’t think it makes much difference to what I think of the doctor; and, in any case, it’s too late to alter anything. I’ve let him go, with a warning that he’ll be shot unless he keeps away.”

  “I can’t say I’m glad,” Muriel answered, “though perhaps I should be. I only brought you this tale because I knew I ought…. I don’t want any man killed, but I think the children come first, and I don’t think even you know how far this trouble goes…. You see, I get a good many confidences that I can’t repeat…. But I can tell you this—if they spoke their real thoughts, there are about a quarter of the women who wouldn’t say that Doll did anything wrong at all. There are several others who don’t want children, and don’t mean to have any. I don’t say there are so many as there were. Some of them are beginning to see that children may be useful, and they’ll be lonely later on.

  “But the queer thing is that when a woman makes up her mind she won’t have children, she always tries to influence others in the same way. It’s like a kind of disease. They talk to younger women about how dreadful it is to have a child, and whisper ways of avoiding it, and they try to frighten them into getting rid of it, if they are expecting to have one. I suppose it’s jealousy, really.

  “Some of them tried it with Madge, but she was too sensible to take much notice: and they’ve frightened Belle Rivers till she thinks she’s going to die for certain.

  “You’re right to try, of course; but you won’t do much with some of these women. The only chance is to keep such ideas from the children. I don’t know whether we can manage that.

  “I’m only saying this because you should know the truth. It would have done good if you had had Dr. Butcher hanged. They won’t think much of him being sent away. It will look weak—and a man that’s sent away can come back.”

  Martin said, “I’m glad you’ve told me all this. I partly guessed, though I didn’t know…. I knew I was wrong about Butcher. It was just cowardice, because I didn’t like killing him…. And it won’t make any difference to his father’s enmity. As to his coming back, well, we must just wait, and see.”

  Chapter Sixty-Two

  Helford Grange had been built about four hundred years earlier, on the ruins of a castle which had been stormed and burnt in the Barons’ wars. That castle had been ancient and decaying in Lancastrian times. It was said that it had been built upon the site of a stronghold that had repelled the Mercian raiders of an earlier millennium.

  The cellars of Helford Grange were of a great, but uncertain, antiquity. They were very extensive, and had been dark and ill-ventilated when Butcher had first occupied them. But he had altered that.

  He had made progress in many ways during the last few months. He had enlisted the services of seven additional men, so that he now had a force of fourteen on whom he felt that he could rely. He still used them for the systematic raiding of the deserted country, and, though he professed the creed of the peaceful trader, he had armed them, for the legitimate reason that the wild places into which they penetrated were rendered unsafe by the increasing ferocity of the dogs and cattle.

  He now sat with his son in an inner cellar, which he used as his own apartment.

  It was furnished simply, and without harmony of form or colour, but with articles of selected value.

  The bedstead in the corner of the room was a choice example of Sheraton; the desk at which he sat was of polished oak, of ample size, and of many internal intricacies. Its papers were neatly arranged, and there was a rack of account-books above it, containing records of a thousand complicated barterings, which he entered and balanced with his own hand.

  The cellar was lighted by an oil-lamp, and a faint gleam from a weed-hidden grating that opened into the side of an ancient moat.

  He was writing a letter to Jerry Cooper, while his son sat waiting beside him.

  “You’ll have to go today,” he said, as he blotted and closed it down, “and you’ll have to start at once, if you’re to be there before dark. But whom to send with you, I don’t know. Reeves took most of the men to do that digging at Tipton. I don’t think they can possibly be back for two days yet, though I sent Pollock and Sims after them as soon as the trouble started. That only makes me shorter. I’ve got no one fit to go now, except Slater, and he doesn’t know the way properly. Besides, he wouldn’t like to come back alone. It’s not safe in the night.”

  “Couldn’t he wait there till tomorrow?”

  “Yes—if he got there, but he mightn’t find the way before dark.”

  “I can’t go alone. I’ve never been farther than Sterrington.”

  “We might hide you here till we get the men back. But I don’t like it. Webster’s hard to move when he’s said anything. It won’t last much longer now.”

  A woman pushed open the heavy oak door, without the ceremony of knocking.

  “There’s that Steve Fortune waitin’ to see you, sir. He says it’s important.”

  “Tell him I can’t see him today…. No…. Here, Maria.… Tell him I’ll see him in a minute. He may be just what we want.”

  He rose and followed the woman to the outer cellar, in which he had once bargained with Jerry Cooper for the arming of Rattray.

  Steve stood by the door. He was not asked to sit down.

  He said he wanted a smooth-haired terrier dog. He believed two or three had been seen running loose, but he couldn’t get on their tracks. He’d pay well. He’d give a week’s work if he could get one caught for him.

  Butcher was not stirred by the offer. Dogs were hard to catch now, and his men were busy. He let Steve turn to go before he said, “You know the way to Cooper’s camp, don’t you?”

  Yes, Steve knew that. He had spent a month, at the Captain’s order, exploring the inland ways from coast to coast, and reporting the results—or as much as he had felt inclined to tell.

  “I want someone to guide Dr. Butcher to Cooper’s camp. I want him to start now. I’ll give five yards of good cloth. It’s a high price.”

  It certainly was a high price. So high that Steve saw that Butcher meant to settle the matter without haggling. But he was not enthusiastic. He would have to come back alone. No man would like to do that.

  Butcher pointed out that he need not start his return till the next day. In the end he agreed; providing the question of the dog should be reconsidered.

  Butcher arranged that he should have a meal there, and be ready to start in half an hour. He did not see the smile which quivered on the gipsy’s face as he left the room—a smile that died at once, as though afraid that even the walls should see it.

  Chapter Sixty-Three

  It would be entirely unfair to a great profession, which had included many of the leading men of their time, both in intellect and character, to regard Dr. Butcher as a typical example of them. He was of a constitutional cowardice, and there were not more cowards among them than in any other section of the nation: his present trouble arose from practices which would have been repudiated with indignation by the majority of his colleagues.

  But it would be as entirely wrong to regard him as one who caricatured the profession to which he belonged—a profession which had been held up to public contempt only a few years before, when a doctor had first refused his evidence before a judge of assize on the ground that his professional honour pledged him to secrecy, and had then given the required information when threatened with legal penalties.

  It had been held up to public ridicul
e when a member whom it had agreed to honour as one of its greatest and most original thinkers had informed a world of hilarious anglers that he had discovered by his researches that fishes do not learn by experience.

  It is a fact that many of its weaker members had been stampeded by the chimeras of the birth-restrictioner and the psychoanalyst, or had prostituted their profession to form a lucrative practice in the service of vice or hysteria.

  But Dr. Butcher was an individual, not a type.

  He was a very miserable individual as he crouched beside the wood-fire which Steve was making on the frozen ground after they had wandered for several hours in search of Cooper’s headquarters, and the short day was fading round them.

  Steve had chosen their camp with care, at a spot where a thick hedge of holly protected them on the weather side, and he had started a fire about three yards away, so that they could be in some safety between these barriers.

  He persuaded the weary man, with some difficulty, to do his share in searching for the needed wood by threatening that they would be devoured by dogs before morning should they fail to outpace the challenge of the advancing dusk.

  When they sat side by side between the barriers of hedge and fire, Steve had a different tale.

  He shared the food he had brought very fairly, tending his companion with an exemplary solicitude.

  He drawled lamentation that the shortness of the winter day had made it impossible to finish their journey before the night had closed upon them.

  He said that he would take the first watch, but that Butcher must be prepared for prompt action if he should call upon him. The dog-pack came so quickly….

  “But if we keep the fire going—” said the trembling man. He was not used to such exposures, and cold and fear combined to make him shiver miserably on the frozen ground.

  “It’s not much good for the dogs,” Steve drawled. “Did I say dogs? I shouldn’t have said dogs. It might keep off the cattle. But dogs rather like fires. They’re used to fires….

  “Didn’t you hear tell of how Reeves and three men with him were turned off their own fire, down south, a week ago? The dogs only drove them off, and sat round the fire to get warm…. But they caught one of Cooper’s men…. They found his bones by the fire in the morning, and it wasn’t near out then.”