Chapter I: 'mother's Stone'

Adam Winter and William Marydrew were walking home side by side from the funeral of Margery Bullstone. Both wore black broadcloth and soft, black felt hats, but there was a touch of colour about the elder, for a red wool muffler wrapped his throat. Billy stopped after climbing the steep hill from Lydia Bridge to the hamlet above; then he drew a little bone box from his pocket and took snuff.

"The man held in all right; but it's the calm before the storm for certain," said William. "He's raging a good bit. They didn't ought to have hid her dying state from him, or kept 'em apart after they knew she wanted to come home."

"They did not," answered Winter, "and yet my aunt, who knows Mrs. Huxam very well, tells me it was done for high religious reasons, William."

"She hadn't been dead a minute, poor woman, afore Jacob smashed in the door of the room; but he had this consolation from Lawrence Pulleyblank, that his wife had been unconscious for hours and couldn't have known him, even if he'd come in time to see her alive."

"The call on faith gets heavier as we grow older, William. Life, after a certain age, seems no more than a cry for patience and a test of pluck. Don't you think my faith be growing weak; but 'tis only human to be down-daunted sometimes afore the things that happen."

"But when you come to my years, such things be different from what they are to you men in the fifties. As a general rule you'll find great deceits in men and women, deceits done for fineness as well as for poorness of spirit. Those who look to be happiest, Adam, are sometimes only the bravest, and them who have most to grumble at often grumble least. And there be some like dogs, without care, yet, out of their cowardice, will begin to yelp if they see so much as the shadow of a stick."

"He was pretty patient--for him--afore this break-up."

"And will be again, if his mind holds. There's a great strain on his thinking parts for the minute; and I hope they'll stand to him."

"I was a good bit surprised to see she'd gone in along with the Bullstones. I'd have thought now that them, as kept her from him so jealous in life, would have fought to have her buried with her father's family," mused Winter.

"Judith Huxam fell ill after Margery died, and Barlow was in a good deal of trouble for a minute. In fact he found himself too busy to bother about the funeral," answered William.

"All her children stood beside the grave--in fact everybody belonging to her except her mother."

"A funeral be nought to the old witch doctor. When the soul have flown to safety, that's all she troubles for. The dust would be no more to her than the empty acorn shard when the young oak springs up. I wrestled with her once, for I'll always say that if her daughter had come home, she might have been spared; but Judith Huxam treated me as though I was an imp of darkness, with the mark of the toasting-fork on my brow."

George Middleweek overtook them. He, too, was in black and had been at the funeral. With him came Peter Bullstone in a new, black suit.

The young man was subdued. He nodded but did not speak.

"How's your grandmother this morning?" inquired Adam. "I couldn't ask anybody that knew."

"She's better--very near well I believe."

Peter then pushed forward alone and George spoke.

"Hope us shall have a bit of peace to Red House now. Merry hell I can tell you for all parties since this happened."

"Is he calming?' asked Adam.

"He's been calm since the corpse came to Red House--calm by day, but not by night. He's pretty broke up. And women as usual at the bottom of all his troubles. Blast 'em, they be at the bottom of most. Why don't we keep 'em like cows or sheep--in herds--and only use 'em for breeding men? They'll always be a canker and a curse so long as we treat 'em like we do."

"This is your silly way of showing sorrow for your master, George," said Mr. Marydrew. "You mean well, though you talk foolishness. But you must keep your reason in bounds and put a bit on your tongue, or you won't help him."

"I'd help him with truth if I could," answered the other. "He's a chap lost in a fog of misery, that's half rubbish if he could see it. He's cussed Providence--that's something to the good; and from cussing, he'll soon get like me, to fling Providence over altogether. I'm damn bad myself, and none the worse for that I believe."

George elaborated his opinions with a good deal of ferocity. It was his way of expressing sympathy with Jacob Bullstone, a fact that William had appreciated.

"Come, come," said Billy, "you ain't half the sinner you want us to think, my dear. 'Tis just a habit you've fallen into, George--to frighten us all with your fearful wickedness. But you didn't ought only to talk of it; you ought to do some wicked things, so as we can believe in you--eh, Adam?"

Mr. Winter was of simpler understanding.

"If he don't believe in Providence, he's about wicked enough," answered the farmer.

A mourning coach conveying Jacob and Auna drove past the pedestrians. Bullstone had stopped to see the earth returned to his wife's grave, and Barlow Huxam had stopped with him.

Auna sat beside her father and held his hand. She did not attempt to speak. He had leaned back in the carriage and shut his eyes. When they reached Red House, he roamed away up the valley and Auna took off her new mourning frock and went about her business.

Jacob did not return to dinner, and presently his daughter set out to find him.

"I'd come," said Peter, "but he'll do more for you. The dark will soon be down--so best you not go far."

Auna took a couple of dogs and started to seek her father. She believed that she knew where he would be, and she was right. He sat on a mossy stone two miles up the valley. It was a spot dedicated of old to Margery and the stone, carved by time into a natural resting-place, had long been known to her children as "Mother's Stone."

Jacob addressed Auna as though he were expecting her. He was very quiet for the moment; but she feared his look. His hat was off and his hair was rough, for he had been running his hands through it.

"A great thought--to put this stone on her grave," he said. "Here she sat a thousand times, and it belongs to her. It's her stone, Auna. You can't give the dead much. And yet to give her a stone--her I denied bread----"

"Don't say that, dear father. Perhaps it would be a beautiful thing if the stone were set up to her."

"Just as it is, mind. No tinkering it--just as it is--because she rested here. But that's all one. She shall have her stone, if parson lets me put it up; and her name shall be cut upon it."

"I'm sure he'll let you, father."

"But no cross. She's born her cross in life; the cross I put on her; the cross she broke down and died under. I'll bear her cross now, and if men was to come and say 'Jacob Bullstone, we be going to crucify you on your wife's cross,' I should thank God and glory in it."

"Don't you talk wild like that. Come home. It's getting dark and offering for rain. I'm so glad about the stone. Mother will like that; and you mustn't think she's dead, father."

"We'll meet again--in the earth. I'll lie next to her, as close as graves are allowed. I'll get to her, bone to her bone, ashes to her ashes, dust to her dust some day."

She comforted him to the best of her powers and he rose and took his hat from her and put it on. It was dark before they returned, and then he lighted a lamp and went to his own room. There they heard him busy with the drawers of the big wardrobe he had bought for Margery.

George Middleweek advised that he should be left alone. Auna called him to supper and he came quietly and appeared to be more calm and controlled. But he spoke of feeling very weary and began to talk concerning Huntingdon. He declared his determination to leave Red House as soon as possible and henceforth live at the warrens. His children listened and Peter was secretly fired with great hopes that his father might keep his word. Already he saw himself master of the dogs.