Cheap Jack Zita

CHAPTER XXXI

PISGAH

ZITA was standing in the room Drownlands called his office, in conversation with the master.

'What did you mean by that which you said to the magistrates—that you were tied here by frost, held by mud, and that when frost went and mud dried you would be free to go?'

'It is so.'

'You will leave me?'

'I would go as soon as the van could roll along the drove,' replied Zita, 'but that there are other difficulties than frost and mud, and how to get out of these I do not as yet see. I work at them in my head, but cannot find a way of escape.' She considered a while, with her hands folded and her eyes on the floor. 'You see, there is the stock. It seems sinful to let it lie idle—if it don't breed money, it will breed moths and rust. Father always said money was made to jump—just the same as frogs were so created. Here is all this store of goods doing nothing. Here is myself—born a Cheap Jack, and a Cheap Jack to my fingers' ends. I am not in my right place if not going about in my van to fairs and markets, selling my goods, and making the money jump, as it was ordained to.' Zita pursed her lips. 'That is on one side. On the other there are considerations also. In the first place, it is awkward for a young girl to be cheap-jacking over the country—it's awkward, and it's not respectable. She cannot manage by herself. As the gentleman said, a Jill must have a Jack. That was true, though I did not like to hear him say it. I could not manage the van and Jewel and the selling alone. I must have some man with me. And if I were to take a servant, he might set his head to make himself Jack and make me Jill. And to take a proper Jack,' pursued Zita,—'I mean, to have a husband,—why, I don't fancy it. I don't like the notion of it at all. There is my great difficulty.'

'Then stay at Prickwillow.'

'I don't know. If I were here, you would not leave me in peace and quietness. I do not desire to remain here, but I do not know where else to go. Now, you see, I am in a cleft stick.'

'Take me, and remain.'

'That, I have told you, can never be. If you ask that again, I will go. If you say nought about it, I will make shift to stay till something turns up.'

'Till you find a Jack?'

'I do not want a Jack. I said so. I want to remain free—Jack and Jill all in one.' Her expression suddenly changed as she asked, 'Have they taken Pip Beamish yet?'

'No; he has been seen, but he eluded capture. He is in the Fens. He has some hiding-place, but where it is we have not yet discovered. The constables are out and watching. He cannot leave the Fens.'

'Cannot? He escaped the dragoons. He has escaped the constables, as you tell me now.'

'Ah! the dragoons were not accustomed to fen ways. The constables will take him. They will form a ring and close in. There is a reward for whoever takes him, and I have added five guineas.'

'And I will give ten to any constable who lets him slip through his fingers. Publish that.'

'We have had enough of Ephraim Beamish,' said the master. 'We were speaking about ourselves. You have your difficulties and troubles, but I also have mine.'

Drownlands seated himself at the table, placed his arms on the board, and for a moment rested his head on his folded arms. Then he looked up and said—

'I have my distresses, but they are of other nature to yours, and different in degree. Do you know Scripture? Did your father ever read the Bible to you?'

'My father was a God-fearing man,' answered Zita, with warmth and pride. 'He made me learn passages by heart, and there was one tale he read over every Sunday, and never tired of it. It was how the Israelites borrowed of the Egyptians jewels of silver and gold, and spoiled the Egyptians, then went off and got the Egyptians drowned, and so were able to keep their borrowings. Father said there was the making of Cheap Jacks in them Israelites.'

'Did you ever read of Moses, how he went up the mountain to view the Promised Land,—the land flowing with milk and honey,—and he looked on it from afar, but was never allowed to set foot thereon? And he died there, in the mount. The wind came to him sweet with thyme, and he saw the green cattle pastures by the waters of comfort, but he might not drink of its milk or eat its honey. And he died there, looking at the land that was so near and yet so far, a land he might see, but never set foot on. He died there, for it broke his heart.'

Drownlands laid his head again on his folded arms. Zita remained in the same position. She had an inkling of his drift, and was uneasy, and cast about for some means of relief from a painful scene.

'I suppose,' she said, 'there were fine bargains to be driven in the Promised Land, and that the Canaanites were as soft-headed as the Egyptians. To a man of proper feeling it was vexing.'

Drownlands paid no attention to the remark. He continued—

'Do you remember why Moses was not suffered to go in and possess the Good Land? There was something betwixt him and it. He had done that which was against the law, therefore the Lord showed him the fields of Canaan, but said he must never lay his head in the dewy grass, never smell its upturned earth, never touch its fair flowers.'

'Yes, I remember something about it,' said Zita.

'What killed Moses was the seeing the land, and being told it never might be his,' continued Drownlands. 'But he could not go back from Pisgah into the wilderness. He could not turn his back on Canaan. He must sit among the rocks, and look on the pleasant land, till his heart broke, and he died.'

The girl fixed her eyes on the quivering face of Drownlands. She saw that he was in terrible earnest, and she did not see her way out of an embarrassing situation. He spoke again.

'Zita, do you think it would have been wise for Joshua to have come up into Pisgah when Moses was there? Would not Moses have sprung up and cried out, "This man will enter on what is denied me!" and have held him by the throat?' Drownlands was now on his feet, his hands extended before him, suiting his action to his words. 'He would have held him by the throat, have thrown him on a rock, put his knee to his chest, and bent his back so—and have broken his back.'

As he spoke, he hit and split and crushed down half the table. Then he drew a long inhalation, reseated himself, wiped his brow, and said—

'There is no Joshua. You swore to me there was none.'

'I think I can comprehend this roundabout talk,' said Zita. 'But if you mean that I am your Promised Land, you are mistaken. I never was promised to you.'

'No, that is true; you are the Loved Land, the Desired Land. No, you never were promised.'

'And it is quite certain that I am not for you.'

'I know it.'

'And I will trouble you to keep your Pisgah at a distance, and stick to it,' said Zita.

'You have told me that you never can be mine, and you have told me also why. My sin stands between us, as a sin stood between Moses and Canaan. And yet—I would do it again if I met him. You do not know how Runham wronged me; you have never learned what was my provocation. I pay the penalty of my sin, as did Moses. That very night I killed him—that very same night, not two minutes after the last bubbles came from his lips—I first saw you. The punishment followed on the crime faster than the thunder-clap after the lightning-flash. Well, then, so long as you remain before my eyes, that I can see your golden hair, and hear your lark-like voice, I am content. I have all I can expect. I will try to be content. But I could not endure to have a Joshua near me.'

'There is none—if you mean a Jack.'

'I trust your word. Mark Runham is nothing to you?'

'I am nothing to Mark,' said Zita, with slight evasion. 'He would not even look at me in court.'

'So long as you remain here, I will bear my burden, though it break my heart, bit by bit. But that is better than to lose you altogether. No'—he stood up again, went to the window, leaned his arm and head against the shattered casement, and let the wind blow in on him through the broken glass—'no, that I can bear—to have you here. But to lose you—to see you no more—I cannot even endure to think of that.'

Zita made a movement to escape. He heard her, and, without turning his head, made a sign to her with his hand to stay.

'Do not leave me. I have still something I must say. I want to strike a bargain with you.'

'A deal? I am ready.'

Zita resumed her place. Drownlands came slowly back to the table.

'Listen to me,' he said, with a thrill in his deep tones. 'I have made up my mind to this—that his blood lies between me and you, as a Dead Sea I may never cross. I must sit on my Pisgah and look at you as unapproachable. That is all I can hope for; that is all I demand; and in order to secure this, I am ready to make you an offer. I shall never marry—never. All the land round Prickwillow is mine, and I have money in the bank—many thousands of pounds. You know what money is worth. You can judge what this land brings in every year to heap the pile. It shall all be yours if you will stay with me till I die. I ask for nothing else but to have you here in this house, that I may hear you laugh, that I may see your smiling face. That is all. I will not open my mouth to ask for anything but that—just to see you and hear you every day; now and then to touch your hand; happy, if as you pass me your skirts brush me; glad for a day if you condescend to cast a word at me. That is all—the full, the sum of all. And for that I will pay away everything I have. Command me. Do with me what you please, only do not banish me. My money is at your disposal, and when I die everything that I have becomes yours. See here.' He went to his desk, unlocked it, and drew forth a paper. 'I have made my will, but it is not yet signed and attested. It could not be so till we had come to an arrangement together. If you will undertake to remain with me on the terms I propose, then you will be a wealthy woman some day when I am gone. And whilst I am here cumbering the place,'—his tone was bitter,—'you have but to ask and I will give you what you require. Agree with me, and this document shall be signed and attested forthwith. For a very slight concession on your part you will receive a rich repayment. As you said, you could not go about the country in your van, and you have no settled home to which you can go. Surely you will concede this to me.'

He placed the paper on the table before Zita.

She took up the will and read it through.

In few words, and to the point, Drownlands had constituted her sole heir and legatee to everything he possessed, on the one condition that she remained in his house through the rest of his life.

She put the paper down on the table again, without, however, releasing it from her hand, and stood considering.

'There is one thing,' she said, after a long pause, 'one thing I must stick out for whether I stay here for a short time or for long.'

'What is that?'

'That you board up the shed where my van is kept, so that the fowls may not roost on it.'

Then in at the door came Mrs. Tunkiss.

'There's Mark Runham come,' she said to the master, after looking suspiciously first at Zita, then at him. 'And he says he must speak with you on business.'

'Mark?—Mark again? Bring him here. I am not afraid of him now. Come, Zita, what say you to my offer?'

For a few moments she remained with her hand to her head, breathing hard, her eyes dim.

'Come, Zita—what answer?'

She looked at him with glazed eyes. She was in pain and sorrow. She would in one moment see Mark,—Mark, whom she loved,—and see him with the knowledge that she never could be his. But the demand made of her to surrender was not so great as it might have been had Mark loved and respected her. He liked, or had once liked her. Now he loved another. He despised her for some reason she could not understand. He held by Kainie, to whom he was bound by promise, and to whom, after a short wavering of his affections, he had returned.

'Come, Zita, what say you to my offer?'

In a whisper, with sunk head, her chin in her bosom, and with folded hands—

'I accept.'

CHAPTER XXXII

A PARTHIAN SHOT

'SHALL I go?' asked Zita.

'No, stay. There can nothing pass betwixt us but what you may hear. And now that he is come, he shall witness the signature to the will.'

'I would rather leave.'

Further discussion of this point was prevented by the entrance of Mark.

The young man noticed that Zita was in the room, but he did not look at her or address her. He directed his eyes steadily at Drownlands, who remained seated at the table.

'I have come on business,' said Mark.

'Say what it is.'

Mark demurred. 'Let us speak together in private.'

'No; what has to be said may be said before her.'

'If you wish it. I have come concerning Kainie.'

'What about Kainie?'

'She is your niece.'

'To my sorrow.'

'You should not say that. She is a good girl. Not to your sorrow, but to your shame.'

Drownlands stamped.

'Spare me words. My patience will not stretch far.'

'Kainie is your sister's only child. She is your nearest relative. I have come to you in her interest. It is no longer possible for her to remain at Red Wings.'

'Why not?'

'It is not seemly. It is not just. The Fens are in commotion; wild men are about, lawless deeds are being done. She is but a girl, and is unprotected, and away from help, if she needed it.'

'She has her dog.'

'That is not sufficient. Dogs have been silenced before now. Consider to what dangers a girl is exposed in such a solitary spot.'

'Pshaw! the men are cowed.'

'Several are about in hiding, and are not yet captured. You do a great wrong to Kainie.'

'I do her no wrong. I leave her alone.'

'That in itself is a grievous wrong. Whose duty is it to guard her, but yours? She bears your name.'

'To my disgrace!' exclaimed Drownlands, glaring up with wrath. 'No more of that.'

'Well, it is no pleasant topic.'

'Did Kainie send you to me?'

'No; I came because I felt concerned for her, and convinced that she must not be allowed—no, not for another night—to remain under the sails of Red Wings. Will you receive her at Prickwillow?'

'Not I.'

'She must be removed from the mill. If you will not take charge of her, then I must.'

'You are welcome. I will have nothing to do with her.'

'Well, then, so be it. It is your duty to see to her security. You refuse to do your duty, so I shall take her. That is settled. Now, one thing further. Will you make Kainie an allowance,—something to support her,—even if you refuse her shelter?'

'Not a penny. I washed my hands of her mother, and I wash my hands of her.'

'I feared this would be your answer,' said Mark, and drew a long breath. 'I feared my application to you would be in vain. Nevertheless, I considered myself bound to make it; I could not act till you had refused to act; much as did Boaz when troubled concerning Ruth. You finally refuse to give protection to Kainie in her loneliness, and at this season of danger?'

'Ay, I do.'

'And refuse to furnish her with even a pittance out of your abundance?'

'Ay, I do.'

'You should blush to deny her what she needs.'

'I blush for her being in the world at all.'

Mark turned to go. Then Drownlands spoke out in strong tones—

'Stay! Now that you are here, I ask you to do me a favour. It is not much—merely to witness a document, to attest my signature to my will. I desire you to see me sign that, and it will be the best answer I can make to your application on behalf of Kainie. Zita, call up Leehanna Tunkiss.'

Mrs. Tunkiss was behind the door. She had been listening in the passage, and now appeared in the doorway, after a short scuffle of feet, to give a semblance of her having come from a distance.

'Do you want me, master?' she asked. 'I was in the midst of baking.'

'Stand there,' ordered Drownlands. Then, rising to his feet, he held up the will and said, 'I have been making my last testament, and I desire that you, Mark Runham, and you, Leehanna Tunkiss, should see me sign it. But that will not suffice. I wish you to know its contents, and then there can be no question relative to its genuineness; and, above all, no delusions, no hopes, no schemes can be based on relationship, fancied or real, that are doomed to disappointment.'

Drownlands looked round him. He saw a flicker in Leehanna's eye. She was akin to him distantly, yet really.

'Zita and I have come to an understanding together,' said the yeoman, in articulate words spoken slowly. 'Zita has promised that she will remain with me, and will look after my house, rule over my servants, attend to my comforts as long as I live. If you, Leehanna, choose to remain with this understanding'—

'I shall do no such thing,' said the housekeeper, tossing her head. 'I thought matters would come to this very quickly. I knew what the minx was aiming at.'

'That is your affair,' said the master. 'Zita stays here, and her word is to be law in my house. I have made my will, and leave to her everything I possess—every brick of my house, every clod of my soil, every guinea of my hoard.' He paused, and looked from one to another. Mark and Leehanna remained mute with astonishment. 'Now go, Mark Runham, as soon as you have attested my signature, and tell Kainie she has nothing to expect from me at present, nor in times to come—nothing from Drownlands living, or Drownlands dead. Let this be known throughout the Fens. Mark Runham, stand here and witness me sign my name. This is my true act and deed.'

'I will not do this,' said the young man, turning white. 'Get some one else to see this done—this that stamps her infamy and your baseness.' He turned sharply about and went through the door. Then he halted for a moment, hesitated, holding the jamb with one hand, and, looking back with a face devoid of colour, said, 'To-night I shall fetch Kainie away, and she shall find her home with me.'

'Mark!' exclaimed Zita, running to him.

'Stand back!' said he roughly. 'Do not come near me; you, who sell yourself body and soul for what you call profits.'

Then he turned and staggered down the stairs.

'And I give notice that I leave this house at once,' said Mrs. Tunkiss. 'Fine goings on these be. I have ever kept myself respectable. I've been the only respectable woman here besides Sarah. I'm not going to stay in this house, which will be avoided by every decent woman, with a man that will be pointed at by every decent man, with her in it as missus—as missus'—

The woman laughed bitterly, tauntingly, and threw a foul name in the face of Zita, and then backed, with a sneer on her lips and hate in her eyes.

CHAPTER XXXIII

PURGATORY

SUDDENLY, and for the first time, did the thought flare through Zita's brain and scorch it—that she had compromised her character.

Now only did she see why Mark had refused to look at her; now only understand what he meant when he said that she had sold herself body and soul; now only comprehended what the laughter signified when the chairman in court had suggested that she was the 'companion' of Drownlands, a suggestion which had been received with titters. She remembered how then her brow had become hot, her heart had beat fast; she was sensible that something had been said that hurt her maiden pride, something that lowered her in the esteem of those assembled in the court. But she had not sounded the meaning of the insinuation, and had not thought what was really the sting in the words which wounded her.

Zita possessed a considerable amount of pride—a different sort of pride, maybe, from any that we can conceive in our stations in life. It was not vanity. She concerned herself little about her personal appearance, and made no effort by dress to display her beauty. She knew she was a good-looking girl, and was indifferent to the fact. She had no education of the sort which we prize; but she had stood on platforms, her feet level with the shoulders of the general public, and she had come, instinctively, without being able to account to herself for it, to regard herself as possessing a character, a dignity of her own above that which belonged to the members of the general public. She who stood above it actually must live up to her level, and stand above it in moral strength and integrity.

Zita had a simple and innocent mind. She had been reared in a van, had led a rambling life, her sole associate had been a father—a kindly man, gentle, good after his lights, and very careful of her welfare. The fact of her having been shifted perpetually from place to place had prevented her forming associates, making fast friendships, so that she had really had none to affect her mind save her father, and had grown to womanhood a singular combination of shrewdness and simplicity. Thus her heart was fresh and childlike, whilst her brain was keen in all that concerned commerce. She had been carefully screened by the Cheap Jack father from everything that could taint the sweetness of her innocence and sully the crystalline purity of her mind.

There was one thing she had never learned from her father, one thing of which till this moment she had no conception—the power of public opinion. She had acquired in her vagrant life an idea that the general public was a something to be laughed at and laughed with, that was to be humoured, cajoled, befooled; but it had never been suspected by her that the public could utter its voice and make the heart quake, breathe on and blast a reputation, could bite and poison the blood.

Now, suddenly, a veil was lifted, and she saw the general public in a new light, and felt the terrible power over her life and happiness that it exercised.

No man is so free as the man without a home. If he has committed an indiscretion, he pulls up his tent-pegs, moves away, and is forgotten. But a man who remains on the scene of his indiscretion is haunted by it ever after. The remembrance clings to him as the shirt of Nessus. It is never forgotten, never forgiven. As long as the van crawled over the face of the country, changing the atmosphere that surrounded it, it eluded the force of public opinion. Its inmates paid no tax to it; were not registered on its books. But hardly had Zita become settled before its burden fell upon her.