Long Summer Day (A Horseman Riding By)

by R. F Delderfield

  They could see little more than his outline for the barn was large and its recesses beyond the range of the lantern’s rays. Paul thought, fighting the shock, ‘Well, it’s best I suppose but it’s terrible that the boy had to see it!’ and he took him by the arm and said, ‘Don’t look, Ikey, let’s go outside!’

  He heard the boy retch and felt him shudder violently, so that his first thought, that of climbing the ladder and cutting Codsall down, was forgotten in concern for the child. He hustled him into the open, shutting the door in the teeth of the wind. ‘There’s nothing to be feared from him,’ he told the boy, ‘but we’d best go and see if Mrs Codsall’s safe and then rouse Eveleigh, the foreman and send someone for the police,’ and he took the boy’s hand, groping his way across the yard to the Dutch barn and, moving between barn and farmhouse, to the gate that opened on the kitchen garden. He remembered the geography of the place with great clarity and found the back door at once. It was open and they went in, setting the lantern on the table and lighting a table lamp with a faggot from the fire still glowing red in the fierce chimney draught. Paul said, ‘Wait here, boy! I’ll take a look upstairs!’ and feeling Ikey would be better with something to occupy his mind, ‘Blow up the fire and boil a kettle. There’s sure to be cocoa somewhere about and we could both do with a hot drink. Go on, get busy!’ and he lit one of the candles on the mantelshelf and went through the kitchen to the wide staircase.

  Winter gales both tormented and stimulated Martin Codsall. As soon as the winds freshened in the south-west, and the Channel spray whipped across the dunes, he would sniff the air like a retriever and presently, as the elms began to creak, he would wander off, telling no one where he was going and make his way to the shore to watch the breakers crash and cream along the flat sand. The power of them fascinated him and the inevitability of their spill gave him confidence in the sureness and certainty of nature, as though here was the one thing upon which he could rely utterly, the rush and swirl of green-grey water, foaming round his feet and tossing its flotsam high up on the beach. Sometimes, but not always, he would fortify himself against the thrill of the spectacle by drinking a few pints of rough cider and a dash of rum at The Raven but lately the landlord had been reluctant to serve him and when he entered the bar other customers drew together, so that he knew very well they were telling each other he was off his head. He would strain his ears to catch the drift of their conversation but they were not always talking about him, it seemed, for on the third day of the New Year, when he was sitting in the sawdust bar settle, he heard them reopen the topic of Smut Potter’s assault on Keeper Buller back in the summer. The Potter-Buller incident interested Martin almost as much as the curl of the breakers in the bay. He had kept all the newspaper accounts of the trial and paid particular attention to Buller’s injuries for to him they were the highlight of the whole incident. They said that when they carried Buller back to Heronslea his face was a mask of blood and Martin wished very much that he had been there to see it, for it was not often that a man got a chance to witness such a sight. He fell to wondering sometimes how much blood a man had inside him. Some more than others, he would think. Arabella, with her high colour and overweight, would have a great deal, but young Sydney, pale and slight, not very much, hardly worth shedding. It was on this particular day, when he heard them talking of Buller, that his obsession with blood and with the breakers fused so that he had a sudden revelation. After leaving the pub he wandered far along the shore, noticing that the waves had changed colour. They were no longer green-grey but bright crimson, the colour of blood and he took even more pleasure in them than usual, standing with water washing about his knees and the spray beating in his face, watching and watching the curl and crash of the great crimson waves, oblivious of discomfort and the growing force of the gale.

  It was only when he glanced over his shoulder to follow the rush of a particularly big wave that he saw the boy on the brown cob, standing back against the dunes and watching him intently. Codsall was aware, however, that it was not really a boy on a cob but the Devil, masquerading as a boy, and mounted on a horse that could move in any direction without its feet touching the ground. Fortunately he had brought along shotgun and cartridges, hoping to get a shot at a partridge or two if there were any in the stubble fields and standing there in the water Martin felt more than equal to a mounted devil disguised as a boy. He pretended to take no notice but turned his back on the water and climbed the dunes as far as his first field, where there was a stile set in a gap between clumps of elderberry. Here he loaded his gun and waited and sure enough the little devil came on at a walk, presenting a fine target against the skyline of the dunes. When he was twenty yards off Martin fired both barrels and saw the devil’s skirts fly out, saw him reel in the saddle and slump forward, the cob wheeling and tearing back the way he had come. That disposed of the boy and he could now carry on with his main task which was to discover just how much blood Arabella had, and whether it was enough to make a really big wave like one of those he had just seen break on the sand.

  He did not go straight home but wandered slowly along the river bank, making sure that he really had scared the devil out of range, for he was not such a fool as to suppose that a devil could be laid low with buckshot. One needed a silver bullet for work of that kind, and sooner or later the boy would get over his fright and follow on, perhaps in some other guise, as a labourer; or a buzzard, or even a harmless little creature like a vole. He saw nothing, however, and when it grew dark he was in the vicinity of the farm but even then he did not go in but continued to skulk in the spinney near the river, sheltering as best he could from the slashing rain and terrible wind that came out of the west. One thing worried him a little. His coat was so wet that his spare cartridges were damp and probably useless, so he threw them away, promising himself to get more as soon as the kitchen lights went out and he could enter the house without being seen. He saw his hired men trudge off across the fields and later, his foreman Eveleigh go down the lane to his cottage but even then he waited and it must have been close on nine before he crossed the yard and tried the front door. It was locked but he knew he could get in through the buttery window which had a broken catch and on his way round he looked into the big barn and lit one of the storm lanterns. It was here that he had another inspiration for immediately under the lantern, wedged in a bale of hay, was a hay knife more than two feet in length and freshly whetted, as he could tell after running his thumb along the edge. He gave up all thought of finding fresh cartridges and laying the gun aside picked up the knife. He was wet to the skin but hot and sweating rather than cold. He felt stronger and happier than he had felt for months and he stayed snug in the barn until he was sure that Arabella, Sydney and the two maids were in bed and asleep. The force of the gale shook the wooden building to its foundations but he enjoyed the uproar for to be alone in it made him feel superior to everyone. At last he got up and went out into the storm, not forgetting to latch the barn door. He tried the back door and was surprised to find it open and the kitchen fire still bright. He stood there listening and heard Arabella, or someone else, moving about upstairs and that made him glance at the clock, noting that it was still only half-past nine. Suddenly he could wait no longer. He opened the kitchen door very quietly and went upstairs.

  Arabella was half-undressed when he entered the bedroom. She was standing beside the bed, great folds of flesh straining at her corsets and her hair screwed into a cluster of ringlets, as though she had been a girl of fifteen instead of a fat woman of fifty. He had never realised just how fat she was, with breasts like huge pink cushions and thighs that were like saplings stripped of bark. She turned when she heard him enter and when she saw him standing there, wet through, and with the hay knife in his right hand, she began to gobble like a turkey, perhaps, he thought, to scare him off but he made no move, for a man who had disposed of the devil was unlikely to be intimidated by Arabella Codsall. So they faced one another for what seemed t
o him a long time, he regarding her with mild pleasure and Arabella with her pale blue eyes almost popping from her head and her turkeycock cheeks getting more turkey-like every second. He had never seen her look at him like this before, without contempt or exasperation but without fear too, for her expression was one of the blankest astonishment, as though he was not a man at all but a freak of nature like a midnight sun. She seemed to be trying to say something, for her lips moved but no sound issued from her and it seemed to him that both of them had been turned to pillars of salt like Lot’s wife fleeing from the cities of the damned. Then, with a single, well-aimed kick, she upended the little table on which the candle stood and plunged them into total darkness and at the same time she began to scream so that her voice rose above the continuous roar of the storm. She began to run, too, although in which direction he could not have said except it could not have been towards the door for he had his back to it. Then a little of his calm left him and he advanced into the room, groping with his free hand and after a few moments of blind man’s buff they collided and he took hold of her by the hair, striking outward and downward, twice and then, standing back a pace, a dozen times but without being sure that he was hitting anything except the bedpost, or the pile of her discarded clothes on the armchair. Then she seemed to melt away and her screaming ceased and he despaired of finding the candle among the wreckage of the room but it did not matter for he realised at once that he had failed in his essential purpose. He had not seen a wave of blood after all and disappointment choked him so that he flung down the knife, turned and began to grope for the door.

  It opened before he got there and he saw Sydney was standing just outside in his long, white nightshirt, with a candlestick raised above his head. Martin rushed upon the boy with relief meaning him no harm at all but Sydney, uttering a single shriek, flung down his candle and fled. A moment later there was a loud crash of glass and Martin forgot about Sydney in his efforts to find the second candle and light it from matches he kept in his waistcoat pocket. He had some difficulty in lighting it for the matches were damp and his hands trembled violently. He managed it at last, however, and turned across the doorway to survey his work. There was blood enough in all conscience but it was not curling over in a wave, as he had imagined it would, whereas the untidy bundle that had been Arabella, although it looked rather like a large piece of flotsam, was not floating as surely it should have been. His sense of failure began to drag at him, like a cart being drawn up a steep hill and presently he understood the truth. Now, having made such a muddle of things, the devil would get him after all so he had best use what time there was to make away with himself in his own fashion. He clumped down to the kitchen, across the small yard to the barn and then up the ladder to the loft where he knew that baling cord was kept in a barrel. He found a length and in less than five minutes was out of reach of the devil in any guise. He hanged himself expertly, without even bothering to relight the storm lantern and see where to anchor the rope.

  II

  Paul came slowly downstairs and found Ikey had already made the cocoa for the kettle had been on the boil and the cocoa was on the long table, together with sugar and a can of milk. For a few seconds, pausing outside the bedroom door, Paul had been sure that he was going to faint, but the sight of the boy pottering about in the kitchen was like looking through a window on a sane, workaday world, where folk went about everyday tasks and children of thirteen were sometimes capable of tremendous exertions and matchless courage. He said, hoarsely, ‘We’ll go for the foreman, Ikey. Don’t bother with the drinks!’ and he grabbed the boy and almost pushed him out of the house and into the blessed open air, stumbling over the slippery cobbles and down the muddy lane that led to the foreman’s cottage a hundred yards away. All the time he held Ikey’s hand tightly but for his own comfort more than Ikey’s and together they staggered through the slush until the lantern, which he had picked up instinctively in his flight, revealed the outline of the squat, thatched dwelling under the bank. Paul hammered on the door, shouting into the wind and when no one answered he fell to kicking the door with all his strength until a voice above called, ‘What’s to do? Who is it?’ and Paul shouted, ‘It’s Craddock, the Squire! Open up! There’s been bad trouble at the farm!’ and a moment later the door was unlocked to reveal Eveleigh, the foreman, his flannel nightgown stuffed into his corduroys and a bemused expression on his narrow, intelligent face. They went into the kitchen and Mrs Eveleigh called down from the top of the stairs, ‘What is it, Norman?’ and Eveleigh told her to come down and blow up the fire and make sure that the children stayed in bed.

  Inside the little kitchen Paul’s senses again began to swim and it required a stiff tot of Eveleigh’s rum to steady him. Mrs Eveleigh, a pleasant-voiced, ginger-haired woman, bustled about getting hot drinks and it was not until she put a mug in his hand that Paul said, ‘Martin Codsall is dead, Eveleigh! He’s just made away with himself!’ but he made no mention of the bundle upstairs, waiting until Ikey’s eyes were lowered over his cocoa before jerking his head to indicate that they should get the boy out of the room. Eveleigh seemed an exceptionally quick-witted man. He said, briefly, ‘Pop the boy in with young Gil, Marian. He’s chilled through and we can send him back in the morning, when he’s got a good breakfast inside him!’ and Ikey went off without another word. Eveleigh said, sombrely, ‘Did the lad see it?’

  ‘He saw Martin hanging from a beam in the barn,’ Paul told him, ‘but thank God he saw nothing worse!’

  ‘Arabella? And their boy, Sydney?’

  ‘Only Arabella. Ikey was there earlier and got Sydney away. Arabella is lying in the bedroom.’

  Eveleigh looked thoughtful and Paul, who had always respected the man, could not help admiring his remarkable self-control and complete lack of blather. The foreman said, finally, ‘Well, I can’t say I’m surprised but I never thought it would run to murder. How did he go about it?’

  ‘With a hay knife,’ Paul said, ‘it’s still up there and nothing will induce me to go back, Eveleigh. In any case, everything had better be left as it is until the police get here. It’s a miracle the boy escaped,’ and he told briefly of Codsall’s attempt on Ikey’s life with the gun and how Sydney had jumped from the window.

  ‘It might easily have been my missus and my kids,’ Eveleigh said, soberly. ‘Doctor O’Keefe should have put the old fool away months ago!’ Then, glancing at Paul under his dark brows, ‘Do you think you could help me to take The Gaffer down, sir?’

  ‘Yes,’ Paul said, ‘I think I could manage that after another glass of rum!’ and Eveleigh poured him a measure and went into the scullery to get his rubber boots and mackintosh. He called upstairs, ‘I’m going up there now, Marian! Better dress and start breakfast,’ and Paul marvelled at his matter-of-fact tone and phlegm. ‘How many children have you?’ he asked and Eveleigh told him six, four girls and two boys, the eldest of them eleven. ‘Gaffer was a hard man to work for,’ he said, as they trudged up the lane, ‘but his son Will would have made things all right. She was the main trouble, of course; she never could get to grips with a farm. A man oughtn’t to go looking for a wife outside the place where he was born and raised!’

  It was only then that Paul remembered Grace and the child she was struggling to bring into the world. It seemed to him incredible that he could have completely forgotten her during the last two hours but it was so. All his nervous energy had been expended getting here through the storm and after that the sight of Codsall, and the shambles in the bedroom, had wiped everything from his mind. He said, ‘Mrs Craddock is having her first child tonight, Eveleigh. There were serious complications and I had to leave before it was born,’ and he thought the man glanced at him sympathetically although he could not be sure. The storm was subsiding rapidly now and the comparative silence, after the uproar, was uncanny, as though everything in the Valley had been smashed down and beaten flat like Arabella. Eveleigh flung the barn door wide and there was just
light enough to see the two horses, munching hay beyond the partition and, over to the left alongside the loft ladder, the thick-set figure of Martin Codsall gyrating in the draught.

  ‘God’s mercy!’ Eveleigh said, softly, ‘how did he manage it? Did he leave a lantern burning?’

  ‘No,’ Paul told him, ‘it was pitch dark when we came in. He must have gone about the whole business in the dark!’ and he thought, ‘That’s curious! Eveleigh’s first thought was the danger of fire! He’s a good farmer and deserves something better than this,’ and he found himself drawing strength from the man’s stillness as he respectfully directed Paul to climb the ladder and cut the cord, while he enfolded Martin’s body in his strong, wiry arms and gently lowered it to the floor. Codsall did not look much like a man who had hanged himself. His eyes were closed and his mouth tight shut. He looked almost as calm as someone who had died in his sleep. ‘He must have done it soon after the boy left here,’ Eveleigh said, ‘for he’s stone cold, poor old devil!’ Paul noticed that the soles of Codsall’s boots were caked with blood and turned away, so that Eveleigh said gently, ‘You go on home, sir, and see to your wife. I can manage here, me an’ the missus will take care of your stable-lad. He must be a spunky kid to ha’ done all he did.’

  Paul, ashamed of his weakness, said, ‘What about informing the police?’ and Eveleigh told him that Ben and Gerry would be here in an hour and he would send one of them to Whinmouth and meantime keep everyone out of the house. ‘You might send one of Honeyman’s men over, sir,’ he suggested, ‘we shall need help one way and another,’ and Paul recalled then that Honeyman would have been informed by now and would probably arrive before the labourers. ‘Now you’d best get off, sir!’ Eveleigh said, impatiently, as though he would prefer to handle things alone. ‘I’m mortal sorry about it, Mr Craddock, and somehow I feel it’s partly my fault not keeping an eye on him. Still, a man has so much to do, things being what they have been about here lately.’