Chapter XIX: A Blow

"FATHER, it's been just the nicest day I ever had in all my life," cried little Nannie eagerly, as she rushed into the cottage; and it was a rare thing for Nannie to have spirits to rush anywhere. "Such games down in the Dingle, all of us together, and—oh! father, only think—there was Mr. Prior and all of 'em in the carriage, with a real great hamper of things for all of us to eat. And we had such fun on the grass. O father, it's been just beautiful."

"Nasty foggy sort o' day," growled Amos.

"Ah, but the fog didn't last long, did it, father? I think 'twas all the more fun driving home, when we couldn't see our way. And d'you know they lost the pretty young lady for ever so long, and found her asleep on the grass, 'cause Madge told me."

"Yer can hold yer clack," said Amos ungraciously, not being of a sympathising turn of mind. He did not like to think of the provisions which she had had, and he had missed.

"And the parson made me a beautiful basket out of the peel of my orange," pursued Nannie, too happy to repress her delight at a moment's notice.

"Didn't cost him nothin'," said Amos.

"Ah! But he's as kind—as kind—" repeated Nannie. "And the lady that's come to the Rectory played some games with us, and then we all went up the Dingle."

A grunt was the response. Nannie's excitement was fast cooling. She gave one little patient sigh, as she lighted the tallow dip in the disjointed tin candlestick, thereby revealing a small sombre room of generally musty scent and comfortless aspect. Amos had chosen to close the rickety shutter before her arrival, thus cutting off the last remains of twilight. What a contrast to the Dingle, with its green carpet spreading out in the sunshine.

Nannie felt sobered all at once—hardly knowing why. She talked no more of the day's pleasure, but quietly took out her Testament, and began to learn her next Sunday-school lesson—a text and part of a hymn printed upon a small leaflet. But Amos interposed.

"I say—"

"Yes, father."

"Yer can stop that now."

"I'm only learning for Sunday-school," said Nannie timidly.

"I ain't ageing to have ye wastin' candles over that sort o' work. Get away to bed."

Nannie knew that remonstrance would be useless. She closed her Testament, and put it away quietly. And then, by a sudden impulse, she crept close up to his side. Such an unattractive repellent old man—the marvel was that she cared for him at all. And yet she loved him.

"Father—" she said.

"Tell ye, yer can get to bed," said Amos, jerking his thumb in the direction of Nannie's sleeping apartment.

"Mayn't I say one thing first?" asked Nannie, with a little heart which fluttered and yet was brave.

"Don't care!" said Amos surlily.

"Father, I ain't sure as you'll like it," said Nannie. "But I've been thinking ever so about you to-day,—and I've prayed you may love God,—but I'm so feared every morning that maybe it's the Resurrection-Day, and if you don't make haste, you won't be in time. I'd want the Day to come, but for that. O father—please!"

The little upturned face was touching in its humility. She had no thought of setting him right, or of interfering in matters which did not concern her. It was only that she was so anxious and frightened for him, that she could not help trying a few beseeching words.

But Amos Ackman was not in a state of mind to bear them patiently. Nannie received no answer in speech. His right arm and leg were thrust out sharply at the same moment, towards the slight figure of the little girl beside him. Not that he meant to hurt her. It was just a momentary outbreak of his crusty vicious temper. The candle was struck down and extinguished, and Nannie was flung away—somewhere—he did not know where, only he heard the sound of her heavy fall.

A fall, and then silence. Not a moan or a murmur broke in upon that stillness. A pin-fall would have sounded distinctly through the room. How dark it was! Only a glimmer of departing twilight crept in through the loosely-shuttered window. Amos did so wish he had not put up the shutter that evening. But he did not dare to go and remove it. He did not dare to lift a finger. He did not dare to leave his seat, for if he moved, he must needs go and see after little Nannie.

And the thought of that was dreadful to him. Amos Ackman was a coward at heart. He remembered the words Madge Hardwicke had once uttered,—"Thank God He's kept you from being a downright murderer."

Was he a murderer now? Nannie was lying somewhere on the floor in that small room—lying dead! Amos felt quite sure on that point. He had no doubt at all about the matter. The force of his own blow, as it had come back to his ears, and the sound of her heavy helpless fall, and the silence following, all told the same tale. Nannie was surely dead.

And he was her murderer! It was her own father's arm which had struck the brutal coward-blow. Her own father, whom little Nannie had always loved so well. What a gentle little girl she had been to him for years past, and especially of late! She had borne his rough usage with such patience and fortitude, clinging to him so tenderly through all. How bitterly he had seen her cry over his harsh treatment of her, and yet how ready she had been in the very midst of her tears to run and do his bidding.

And "his" arm had struck the blow. It came over him all at once, what a strange and terrible sight that little room would present to any one looking in. He pictured it to himself vividly, as he sat staring into the darkness, with drops coming thickly out upon his clammy face. The broken wooden dresser on one side, with two mugs and three cracked blue plates upon it. And the rickety round table in the middle. And the two chairs, one having lost a leg, and the other having lost half its back. And the old battered saucepan hanging up upon the wall, and the blackened pipe upon the narrow mantel-shelf, and the dirty stew pan lying down below in the fender among the cold embers. And the figure of the wretched bent old man, cowering and shaking on his three-legged stool. And the lifeless form of the little child, lying upon the floor.

Amos saw it all in his mind, and he was glad that he had put up the shutter after all. There was a sort of shelter in the darkness. He felt that nobody could possibly look in and see what had taken place. By-and-by, as daylight dawned, people would come and find out all, and Amos would be dragged away to prison, and had up before the magistrates, and then—why, then, if they did not contrive to bring him in as insane, which Amos felt quite sure was not the truth, he knew the alternative. It was very dreadful to think of all these things as coming upon him, but still now—just now—he felt relieved to know that nobody could look in through the darkness.

Nobody! What of ONE.

Amos started and shuddered. For happening to glance up, his eye was caught by the steady shining of one brilliant star—a planet rather, but it was all the same to Amos—the beams of which came through a hole in the closed shutter, straight to where he sat.

"The eyes of the Lord are in every place beholding the evil and the
good."

"The darkness hideth not from Thee, but the night shineth as the day;
the darkness and the light are both alike to Thee."

Where had he heard those fearful words? What was there in the shining of that star to bring them to his mind? Were those the verses little Nannie had been conning over so busily in her low clear tones the previous Sunday evening? He had listened a minute or two, and then had struck her book angrily out of her hand, and sent her off supperless to bed. He had little thought those words would ever come back to him—words he had learnt at his own mother's knee in early boyhood, and had long since forgotten. And here they were in strong living power ringing in his ears.

"The eyes of the Lord are in every place."

"The darkness and the light are both alike to Thee!"

Then His Eyes were there, beholding the little room and all it contained. Darkness could make no difference. Darkness was clear as noonday to those all-seeing Eyes.

Amos could not stand the radiance of that star. He pushed his stool a little on one side, so that he was not able to see it. But he wanted to know soon if it were still there, so he pushed his stool back again. And next he wanted to know if the star were shining on the spot where Nannie lay. He half rose from his seat to go and see, and then he was afraid, and sat down again.

"The wicked flee when no man pursueth, but the righteous are bold as
a lion."

What had brought "that" into his head now? He did not remember hearing Nannie say it. Possibly he had, however, and that was how it had come back to him. It was too bad. Amos hated having those texts ringing in his cars. He would take care Nannie should go no more to the Sunday-school, and then she would not pester him with them. No, nor to Madge Hardwicke's either. Nannie should stay at home and be busy. He would have no more nonsense.

Nannie stay at home! Nannie not go to the Sunday-school! Why, he had forgotten! What could he be thinking about? If Nannie were dead, what had she to do any more with Sunday-school or Madge?

Amos groaned, and let his face drop down in his bony hands. He had nobody to help him. He thought how Madge Hardwicke would pray if she were in trouble, but he knew nothing of prayer. He had scorned all notion of religion. Prayer was a foreign language to him altogether. Nobody to help him now. Nobody to love him ever again. Nat Tyrrell would never speak to him after this, and Nat Tyrrell was his only friend. He had dashed aside the love of the one frail little creature, who had held to him so steadfastly. And now—nothing was left to him.

"Father!"

A cold touch came upon his hand in the dark. Amos started back violently in his fear. The old ignorant superstitious man did not think it was Nannie herself come to see him, in the poor little body which he had used so badly, but something of a spirit form—something dreadful, unnatural, terrible. He was ready to believe anything that night.

It was Nannie's own little voice, however, which said again—

"Father." And then, as she felt how he shook and trembled before her, she added, "What's the matter, father?"

"'Taint Nannie, sure," said Amos hoarsely. "I—I wish yer 'd get along."

"Why, father, don't you know me?" asked Nannie. "I couldn't think what you was after, when I got up, and saw you sitting there."

For early dawn was stealing in through the closed shutters, and the long night-hours had passed away somehow. Amos did not know how. He never would know. He might have lived through ten years, or only ten minutes, since the evening before. It was all the same to him. He could have believed either assertion.

Nannie went and opened the closed shutters with her little feeble hands, which had not much of even their usual strength in them this morning. Then she came back again, and for the first time he ventured to look at her.

"I'd been thinkin' I'd killed you outright, Nan," he muttered. "I ain't agoin' to knock you down again, though,—and I didn't mean to then, neither."

"Won't you do it, father, even if I speak to you about the Lord Jesus once in awhile?" asked little Nannie, true even in her pain and weakness to her constant aim, as the needle to the pole.

"I'll let yer say what yer likes," returned Amos. "Be you very bad, Nan?"

Nannie's white drooping face looked up with a brave smile. "I'll be better soon, father. I'll go and lie down a bit, 'cause I'm so tired. But we ain't going to tell nobody about to-night."

"They'd have me took up an' punished, sure enough, if 'twas known," said Amos in fear.

"No, nobody ain't to know," repeated Nannie. "I think I've been stunned, you know, but I'll be better by-and-by. And you're going to love me now, ain't you, please?"

She leant against him feebly. "I've been a bad father to yer, Nannie, I have," he said self-reproachfully.

And then, with a gentle kiss—the first she had dared to give him for a long while past—she walked away and laid herself down on the little palliasse which formed her bed. And Nannie probably knew scarcely better than did Amos himself that the long unconsciousness which followed was not sleep, but alternate fainting and stupor. Poor little Nannie! She had no one to help her in her need, so she only lay in patient meek endurance.

Somewhere about nine o'clock Madge Hardwicke came to the door.

"Amos—up, are you?" she said. "Where's Nannie?"

"Asleep, an' you'd best leave her," said Amos, not caring that the two should meet sooner than was needful.

"Maybe the little lass is tired with yesterday. 'Twas something new for her, and she don't look well neither of late. Tell her from me, will you, Amos, that I'm called off down in the town, and maybe won't be back a good many days."

Amos concealed his satisfaction. "What's the matter? Doctor wants yer, eh?"

"Miss Clyde's down with the fever. Will you give a truthful message for me, Amos? Tell Nannie she's to pray. Poor young lady. I doubt me but it's a bad case, and the doctor's nigh heart-broken already."

"I'll give yer message," said Amos, anxious to have her gone.

And Madge withdrew, marvelling much what could have made him so unlike himself.