The Vast Abyss

Chapter Twenty Six

The Vicar stopped and chatted, taking his seat upon the stool Tom had I before offered, and watched the process of making the speculum for some time before leaving, and then, shaking hands with Tom, he said, smiling —

“Shows how careful one ought to be in suspecting people, Tom Blount. We are none of us perfect. Good-bye.”

“That’s a hint for us, Tom,” said Uncle Richard, as soon as they were alone. “Perhaps you are wrong about Master Pete Warboys too.”

Tom thought about the pears thrown at Pete by his cousin, and shook his head.

“Pete wouldn’t have been peeping over the wall, uncle, if he had not meant mischief.”

“Perhaps not, Tom; but he may have meant mischief to you, and not to my pears.”

Tom laughed, and they soon after went in to dinner.

That afternoon, and for an hour and a half in the evening, they worked again at the speculum by lamp-light, so that Tom was pretty tired when they gave up and returned to the cottage.

“Going to watch for the fruit burglar to-night, Tom?” asked Uncle Richard.

“Oh yes, uncle. I feel ten times as eager now Mr Maxted’s plums have been stolen;” and, punctual to the moment, he stole down the garden, walking upon the velvety lawn, and advancing so silently upon David, that the gardener uttered a cry of alarm.

“Quite made me jump, Master Tom, coming on me so quiet like.”

“I thought he might be hanging about,” whispered back Tom. “Going to watch from the same place?”

“Ay, sir. Couldn’t be better. Once we hear him at the pears we can drop upon him like two cats on a mouse.”

“Yes,” said Tom; “but we must mind and not scratch ourselves, David.”

“Ay, we’ll take care o’ that, sir. But mind, no talking. Got your stick?”

“I stuck it upright in the second black-currant tree. Yes, here it is.”

“That’s right then, sir. There’s your place, and I’ve got something better for you this time. I stuffed two sacks full o’ hay, and you can sit down now like on a cushion, and pull the horse-cloth you’ll find folded up over you.”

“But what about you?”

“Oh, I’ve got one too, sir. I’m all right. Now then – mum!”

The hay made a faint sound as they both sat down after a glance round and listening intently. Then Tom pulled the horse-cloth up over his knees, for the night was chilly, and found it very warm and comfortable.

Then the various sounds from the village reached him – the barking of dogs, voices, the striking of the clock, the noise of wheels, the donkey’s braying, with a regularity wonderfully like that of the previous night, and then all silence and darkness, and ears strained to hear the rustling sound which must be made by any one climbing over the wall.

The time glided on; and as it grew colder, Tom softly drew the rug cloak-fashion over his shoulders, listened to note whether David made any remark about the rustling sound he made, but all the gardener said was something which resembled the word ghark, which was followed by very heavy breathing.

“Gone to sleep again,” said Tom to himself. “What’s the good of his pretending to sit and watch?”

He secured his hazel, aimed for where his companion sat in the next alley between the blackcurrants, and gave him a poke with the point.

But this had not the slightest effect, and another and another were administered, but without the least result; and thinking that he would have to administer a smart cut to wake up his companion, Tom set himself to watch alone.

“Don’t matter,” he muttered. “I can manage just as well without him.” And then he sat in the thick darkness, with his ears strained to catch the slightest noise, thinking over the Vicar’s visit that day, and about how he would like to catch Master Pete.

It was very warm and comfortable inside the horse-cloth, and must have been close upon nine o’clock, but he had not heard it strike. David was breathing regularly, so loudly sometimes that Tom felt disposed to rouse him up; but each time the breathing became easier, and he refrained.

“I don’t mind,” thought Tom. “I dare say he is very tired, and I don’t want to talk to him. He’s company all the same, even if he is asleep. Wonder whether this speculum will turn out all right.”

David was breathing very hard now, but if Pete came he would make too much noise in moving to notice the sound. Besides, he would not suspect that any one was watching out there in the darkness.

But the breathing was very loud now, and how warm and cosy and comfortable it was inside the rug! The hay, too, was very soft, and the stick all ready for Master Pete when he came. It would be so easy to hear him too, for David’s heavy breathing, that was first cousin to a snore, now ceased, and the slightest sound made by any one coming – and then it was all blank.

How long?

Tom suddenly started up with but one thought that seemed to crush him.

“Why, I’ve been asleep!”

A feeling of rage against himself came over him, and then like a flash his thoughts were off in another direction, for, just in front, he could hear a rustling sound, as if some one was stirring leaves, and, stealing forward, he could just faintly see what appeared like a shadow busy at the Marie Louise pear-tree.

“Then he has come,” thought Tom, as his hand closed upon the stick he still held. Softly letting the horse-cloth glide from his shoulders, he raised himself gently, feeling horribly stiff, but getting upon his legs without a sound.

And all the time there was the rustling, plucking sound going on at the tree upon the wall, as the shadow moved along it slowly.

All this was only a matter of moments, and included a thought which came to Tom’s busy brain – should he try to awaken David?

“If I do,” he felt, “there will be noise enough to scare the thief, and he’ll escape.”

There was no time to argue further with himself. He knew that he had been asleep, for how long he could not tell; but his heart throbbed as he felt that he had awakened just in the nick of time, and he was about to act.

Keeping in a stooping position, he crept forward foot by foot without making a sound, till he was on the edge of the walk which extended to right and left; beyond it there was about six feet of border, and then the wall with the tree, and almost within reach the figure, more plain to see now, as it bent down evidently searching upon the ground for fallen pears.

One stride – a stride taken quick as thought, with the stout hazel stick well raised in the air, just as the figure was stooping lowest. Then —

Whoosh! Thwack!

A stinging blow, given with all the boy’s nervous force, as with a bound he threw all his strength into the cut.

“Yah!”

A tremendous yell, a rush, and before Tom could get more than one other stroke to tell, the pear-seeker was running along the soft border, evidently making for the far corner of the garden, where the fence took the place of the wall.

The chord is shorter than the arc; and this applies to walks in gardens as well as geometry, only people generally call that which amounts to the chord the short cut.

Tom took the short cut, so as to meet Pete, but in the darkness he did not pause to think. For a moment all was silent, and the enemy had evidently stopped to hide.

“But he must be close here,” thought Tom, as he reached the end of the cross walk, past which he felt that the boy must come; and to startle him into showing where he was Tom made a sudden rush.

That rush was made too quickly; for he felt himself seized, and before he could do anything, whack! whack! came two cuts on one leg.

“Got yer then, have I?” was growled in his ear; and then came loudly, “Master Tom! here! sharp!”

“I am here,” roared Tom. “What are you doing? Don’t.”

“Master Tom!”

“David! But never mind; look sharp! He’s close to us somewhere. I saw him under the pear-tree, and got one cut at him.”

“Got two cuts at him,” growled David savagely. “I know yer did. That was me!”

“Halloo there! Tom! David! Got him?”

“Got him!” growled David. “Got it, you mean. Hi! Yes, sir. Here we are.”

Uncle Richard was on the way down the path.

“What was the meaning of that yell I heard?” he said, as he drew near.

Neither replied.

“Do you hear, Tom? What was that noise?”

“It was a mistake, uncle,” cried Tom, rubbing his leg.

“Mistake? I said that yell. Oh, here you are.”

“Yes, uncle; it was a mistake. I hit David in the dark, and he holloaed out.”

“And enough to make any one, warn’t it, sir? Scythes and scithers, it was a sharp ’un!”

“I don’t think it was any sharper than the two you hit me, David,” said Tom, who was writhing a little as he rubbed.

“Why, you two have never been so stupid as to attack each other in the dark, have you?” said Uncle Richard.

“I’m afraid so, uncle. I saw something by the tree and heard a rustling, and I thought it must be Pete Warboys.”

“But you should ha’ spoke, sir,” cried David, from over the other side now. “Mussy on us, you did hit hard.”

“Yes; I thought it was Pete, and that he had come at last.”

“Come at last!” grumbled David, as Uncle Richard stood silently shaking with laughter. “Why, he’s been – ”

Just then there was a scratching sound, a flash of light, and a match burned brightly beneath the wall. Then another was struck, throwing up David’s figure against the pear-tree, as, shielding the burning splint with his hands, he held it quickly up and down.

“What are you doing?” said Uncle Richard, as Tom gave a stamp caused by the pain he felt.

“Looking for my pears, sir, as I was when young Master Tom come and hit me. There arn’t a single one left.”

“What!” cried Tom, forgetting the stinging of the cuts on his leg. “Oh, David, don’t say they’re all gone!”

“What shall I say then, sir?” grumbled David; and he then drew in his breath with a hissing sound, and began to rub too.

“Do you mean to say the pears have been stolen while you two were keeping watch?”

“I dunno, sir,” grumbled David. “They’re not here now; and I’ll take half a davy as they was here at arpus eight.”

“Then be off home to bed. Pretty watchmen, upon my word,” cried Uncle Richard, as he turned off to go up to the house; “it’s my belief that you have both been asleep.”

“And I’m afraid that there’s about as near the truth as any one can get, Master Tom,” whispered David. “I must ha’ been mortal tired to-night. But you needn’t have hit a fellow quite so hard.”

“That’s what I feel, David; but being so stupid: that’s worse than the stick.”

“Well, I dunno ’bout that, sir,” said David, still rubbing himself; “them hazels is werry lahstick, and you put a deal o’ muskle into that first cut.”

“Well,” said Tom mournfully, “I did hit as hard as I could, David.”

“You did, Master Tom, and no mistake. Feels to me it must have cut right in. But I don’t like the master to talk like that. It arn’t nice.”

“Come, Tom! Fasten the gate!” shouted Uncle Richard.

“Yes, uncle; I’m coming. Now, David, off home.”

“Yes, sir, I’m a-goin’; but after all this trouble to lose them pears. Oh, Master Tom, it’s that there as makes me feel most sore!”

But David kept on rubbing himself gently all the same.

“Pretty pair, ’pon my word!” said Uncle Richard, as Tom came blinking into the light just as the clock was striking ten. “Then you couldn’t keep awake?”

“No, uncle. I suppose I must have been very tired to-night.”

“The Vicar’s plums last night; my pears to-night. Humph! It’s time that young fruit pirate was caught.”

Chapter Twenty Seven

Tom thought the matter over for days as he worked at the speculum now approaching completion. He had met Pete Warboys twice, but the fellow looked innocency itself, staring hard and vacantly at him, who longed to charge him with the theft, but felt that he could not without better evidence.

Then a bright thought came as he was polishing away opposite his uncle, and using the finest emery.

“I know,” he said to himself, and he waited impatiently to be at liberty, which was not until after tea.

“Going for a walk, Master Tom?” said David, whom he encountered in the lane.

“Yes; rather in a hurry now.”

“Can’t tell him yet, because I’m not sure,” thought Tom; and he walked sharply away for the corner where he had left his uncle in the bath-chair, and all the memories of that day came back as the various familiar objects came in view.

“I wonder whether he’s quite well again now,” said the boy to himself; “but he can’t have been so ill as he thought.”

But his walk on that golden orange sunset evening had nothing whatever to do with his uncle, for, as soon as he reached the bend where the road began to slope, he struck off to the left in among the trees, trying hard to follow exactly the same track as that taken by Pete Warboys when he was pursued.

It was not easy, for the great lad had dodged about among the great fir-trees in quite a zigzag fashion. Still Tom followed the direction, with the scaly, pillar-like trunks looking golden-red in the horizontal rays of the sun, which cast their long shadows in wonderful array, till it seemed to the boy at last as if he were walking through a quivering golden mist barred with great strokes of purply black.

“I shan’t get there before it begins to be dark,” he thought, “for this can’t last. Why, it’s like a fiery furnace now burning on great iron bars.” Then there was another change, for the dark-green rough fir-boughs began to be lit up overhead, and the forest looked brighter than ever.

A wood of fir-trees is a puzzling place, from the fact that in a mile or two, consequent upon their regular growth, you may find hundreds, perhaps thousands, of places exactly alike – the same-looking tall, red, scaly columns, the same distance apart, the same grey carpet of fir-needles, and the same grey rough-topped, mushroom-shaped fungi growing up and pushing the fir-needles aside to make room for them. Then too the great natural temple, with its dark column-supported roof, has a way of looking different at morning, noon, and eve; and as different again according to the state of the weather, so that though you may be pretty familiar with the place, it is a difficult task to find your way for the second time.

It was so now with Tom Blount. There was a spot in the wood for which he had aimed, and it seemed to be the easiest thing possible to go straight there; but the trees prevented any such straight course, and after a little dodging in and out the mind refuses to bear all the changes of course and repeat them to the traveller, who gradually grows more and more confused, and if he does not hit upon the spot he seeks by accident, in all probability he has to give it up for what people call a bad job.

“Here it is at last,” said Tom to himself, after following, as he thought, exactly the course he had taken when he chased Pete Warboys for throwing stones at the bath-chair, and coming upon a rugged portion of the fir-wood.

“Bother! I made so sure it was,” he muttered, for the opening he sought beside a great fir-tree was not there, and rubbing one of his ears with vexation, he stood looking round again, and down long vistas between the straight tree-trunks.

But no, there was not a sign of the spot he wanted, and the farther he went the more confused he grew. It was still gloriously bright overhead, but the dark bars of shadow were nearly all gone, and it looked as if darkness were slowly rising like a transparent mist out of the earth; one minute it was up to his knees, and then creeping up and up till the tree-trunks looked as if they were plunged in a kind of flood, while their upper portions were glowing as if on fire.

“I’ll have one more try,” thought Tom, “and then give it up till to-morrow morning. That’s the best time, when you’ve got the whole day before you, and not the night. Let’s see, what did uncle say about my getting to know a lot about optics and astronomy? Of course – I remember: it was nice to be a boy, for he was in the morning of life, and all the long bright day of manhood before him in which to work; and the pleasant evening in which to think of that work well done, before the soft gentle night fell, bringing with it the great peaceful sleep. How serious he looked when he said all that!”

These thoughts in the coming gloom of the autumn evening made Tom feel serious too. Then they passed away as he had that other try, and another, and another, pretty well a dozen before he made a rush for what he rightly assumed to be the north-east, and finally reached the road pretty well tired out.

It was before the sun was far above the horizon the next morning that Tom went out of the garden gate, and by the time he reached the spot where he had turned into the wood, and gone many yards in amongst the trees, he found the appearance of the place almost precisely the same as he had seen it on the previous evening. There was the roof of the natural temple all aglow, the dark bars across the tall boughs, and the shadows stretching far away crossing each other in bewildering confusion. But everything was reversed, and instead of the shadows creeping upwards they stole down lower and lower, till the roof of boughs grew dark and the carpet of soft fir-needles began to glow.

Then too, as he went south, the bright light came from his left instead of his right.

“How beautiful!” he thought. “How stupid it is to lie in bed so long when everything is so soft and fresh and bright in the morning. But then bed is so jolly snug and comfortable just then, and it is so hard to get one’s eyes open. It’s such a pity,” he mused; “bed isn’t much when one gets in first, but grows more and more comfortable till it’s time to get up. I wish one could turn it right round.”

These thoughts passed away, for there were squirrels about, and jays noisily resenting his visit, and shouting to each other in jay – “Here’s a boy coming.”

Then he caught sight of a magpie, after hearing its laughing call. A hawk flew out of a very tall pine in an opening, and strewn beneath there were feathers and bones suggestive of the hook-beaked creature’s last meal.

But as he followed the track of the pursuit once more, he had that to take up his attention, till he felt sure that he must be close to the place he sought, but grew more puzzled than ever as he gazed right round him.

“It must be farther on,” he muttered; and, starting once more, he stopped at the end of another fifty yards or so, to have a fresh look round down each vista of trees, which started from where he stood.

It was more open here, and in consequence a patch of bracken had run up to a goodly height, spreading its fronds toward the light, but there was nothing visible as Tom turned slowly upon his heels, till he was looking nearly straight back along the way he had come, and then, quick as thought, he dropped down amongst the bracken, and crept on hands and knees till, still sheltered by it, he could watch the object he had seen.

That object was Pete Warboys, who had suddenly risen up out of the earth, and stood yawning and stretching himself, ending by giving one of his shoulders a good rasp against a fir-tree.

“Why, he must have been sleeping there,” thought Tom, “and I must have passed close to his hole. What an old fox he is. Hullo! there’s the dog.”

For the big mongrel suddenly appeared, and sprang up so as to place its paws upon its master’s breast, apparently as a morning greeting. But this was not received in a friendly way.

“Get out!” growled Pete, kicking the dog in the leg. There was a loud yelp, and Pete shook himself and began to slouch away.

Tom watched him till he had disappeared among the trees, and then went back over his track till he stood close to the spot whence the lad had appeared. Here Tom looked round, but nothing was visible till he had gone a few yards to his right, when, to his surprise, he came to the side of the opening down in which was the side hole running beneath the roots of the great fir.

Tom had another look back, and, seeing nothing, he leaped down on to the soft sand, felt in his pocket, and brought out a tin box of wax-matches. Then, dropping upon his knees, he lit one, and holding it before him, crept under the roots and into a little cave like a low rugged tunnel scooped out of the sandy rock, and in one corner of which was a heap of little pine boughs, and an exceedingly dirty old ragged blanket.

By this time Tom’s match went out, and he lit another, after carefully placing the burnt end of the first in his pocket.

This light gave him another view of the little hole, for it was quite small, but there was not much to see. There were the leaves and blanket, both still warm; there was a stick, and a peg driven into the side, on which hung a couple of wires; and some pine-tree roots bristled from the top and sides. That was all.

“No pears, not even a plum-stone,” said Tom, in a disappointed tone, for he had pictured this hole from which he had seen Pete issue as a kind of robber’s cave, in which he would find stored up quantities of stolen fruit, and perhaps other things that would prove to be of intense interest.

“Nothing – nothing at all,” said Tom to himself, as the last match he had burned became extinct. “All this trouble for that, and perhaps it wasn’t him after all. But how comic!” he said to himself after a pause. “He comes here so as to be away from that dreadful old woman. No wonder.”