CHAPTER IV
WE START UPON OUR PILGRIMAGE

All the way I had come I had heightened my disguise by mouching along with my hat low down over my eyes, the collar of my coat turned up to my ears, and my hands stuck deep in my pockets. And so effectual was this mode, that though Cynthia was awaiting me in fear and impatience, I had walked right up to her and taken her by the arm ere she knew I was so near.

"Oh, Jack," she sobbed, "I – I am so glad. S – something s – seemed to tell me that you would never return. I was certain you were ta'en, and that I should never see you again, except between the iron bars of a prison."

I kissed her.

"Foolish child," says I, with dignified forgetfulness, "to entertain such silly fears. Alas, you women, that you should give way to weaknesses of this sort! What would you say of us men now, if we were so easily afflicted?"

It was fine the way in which I wielded my advantage, and clearly showed to the shrinking little creature how ill the poor weak female character compared with the hardy, resolute male. But as this instance goes to show, I do not really think that the masculine character is so much sterner than the feminine; for is not its pre-eminence largely a matter of assumption? A man scorns and conceals the weaknesses a woman flaunts and cherishes.

The twilight was deepening rapidly and giving way to an evening of heavy clouds and rainy wind, when arm-in-arm we started to walk we knew not where. We started to walk into the night and the country places, away from our enemies, and from those who would sever or deter us. We had not the faintest idea as to the place we were bound for. One spot was as good as another. Involuntarily we turned into the park, although we knew not why we should. But I suppose we felt that every step we took into this mysterious nowhere of our destination, we were leaving the law behind, and that together, friendless and resourceless, but ever hand-in-hand, we were beginning our lives anew.

We moved away at a brisk round pace, possessed with the thought of putting a long distance between us and our foes. And in the pleasure of having come together again we walked lightly and easily for long enough, not heeding the way, nor the wind, nor the threat of the rainclouds and the dark evening. We rejoiced in the exquisite sense of our comradeship, and in the thought that every step we took together was a contribution to our freedom. We came out of the park again, and went on and on, past the houses of Kensington, and then past straggling and remoter places, the names of which I did not know.

In a surprisingly little while, as it seemed to us, sunk in the obsession of our companionship, we were groping in the unlit darkness of the country lanes, with the lights of the town we had left fading away behind us. But we must have been walking considerably more than two hours, and at a smart pace, to judge by the distance we had made. It was then that I pressed Cynthia's hand and says:

"Are you not tired, little one?"

"Nay," says she, "my feet are slipping by so light, I do not know that I am walking. I could journey on all night in this way."

I was vastly gratified by this brave speech. But for myself, although I too had no weariness, and to be sure I could not have confessed to it if I had, I was yet being bitten very severely by the pangs of hunger. All day I had taken nothing beyond a glass or two of wine. Therefore I now felt a pressing need.

"At least," says I, "I hope you are hungry?"

"Well, since you mention it," says she, "I think I am."

"That is well," says I, "for I am most abominably so. I believe I never was so hungry in my life before; and I am sure I never had scantier means of appeasing it. Only conceive of twelvepence halfpenny to the two of us for our board and lodging."

It now became our business to find an inn of the meaner sort, in which we might invest this munificent sum. But as we had long since left the bricks and mortar of the town behind, a house for our entertainment was not so easily come by.

We walked on and on, but still no welcome inn appeared; and presently the lamps of the great city itself had vanished, till we were left in the utter darkness of the country lanes. There was no evidence of a human habitation anywhere about, and we knew not where we were.

By this time both of us were tired as well as most bitterly hungry. Poor little Cynthia hung so heavily on my arm, that I knew fatigue had mastered her. Yet so brave she was, that despite all the pains and difficulties she endured, she would not admit that she was weary. Indeed, when I asked her to confess it, says she: "Nay, not I," as stoutly as she would have done three hours before. Yet when we came to a bank of earth beside the way, and I bade her rest upon it for a little while she could raise no very great objection.

I suppose two persons could never have taken their repose with more singular feelings than did we upon that bank of earth. Whither we were going that night, and what was to become of us we did not know. There was the sum of twelvepence halfpenny between us and destitution, but even this could not avail us in such a solitary darkness, in the absence of a house and human aid. Happily the night was wonderfully mild, and we in our coats and stout boots were warmly clad. Otherwise we might have perished where we sat. The pains of fatigue, allied to the pangs of hunger, had bereft us of both the energy and the inclination to proceed. We must have tarried on that bank considerably beyond an hour, mutually consoling one another. For my part little Cynthia's courage almost reconciled me to these present circumstances, but you may be sure I was bitterly distressed for her. I had admitted her into my care, foolishly no doubt, and because there was scarcely an alternative; and this was the sort of provision I had to offer. Come what may, something must be done. The child could never be left to suffer thus. I must find food and a sanctuary of some sort for her.

However, even as I pondered on our case, hunger and weariness did their worst.

For some time I had known by Cynthia's failing answers and the heaviness with which she leant against me, that she was becoming more and more completely overborne. And I'll swear so monstrous brave she was that never a word of complaint passed her lips, nor yet a tear escaped her. And then her little head nestled up to my coat-sleeve, and the next moment she sighed and was dead asleep upon it. In spite of her resolution, the excitements, the distresses and the pains of that long day had overpowered her. Yet I dare not have her pass the night in this exposure on a moist bank of earth, with the night-wind playing on her face, and the clouds that had banked themselves over the moon for ever increasing and threatening to descend upon us in a drenching rain. Therefore, dire as my own case was, I roused myself to a desperate attempt to discover a meal and a lodging for the night.

I had not the heart to try to arouse the poor child, as you may suppose; wherefore, disturbing her as little as I could, I gathered her in my arms, for after all her fine spirit she was but a feather of a thing, and carried her before me along the lane. It was an effort of despair, for the never-ending darkness revealed no glimpse of what I sought. Every now and then the wind brought a spatter of the expected rain; but this, when it came upon my lips, carried a kind of refreshment in it. I doggedly set my teeth and marched along with my warm burden, and I think the weight of responsibility that was in my arms, added to the one upon my heart, fostered a grim determination in me to succeed in my search at any cost. The lanes seemed interminable, and every one the same. All my limbs were one strange, numb ache; I had become so faint with hunger that I moved in a kind of delirium; and in the end every step I took became so mechanical a thing as to be an effort of the will without the co-operation of the senses.

Heaven knows what the hour was when one of these lanes I had been eternally taking all night long ended in a partly-unhinged gate. My first instinct was to snatch an instant's rest upon it; but this I dared not do. I could never have set my paralysed limbs in motion again had I done so. Indeed it was but the presence of poor little Cynthia in my arms that prevented my sinking to the earth as I stood. But looking beyond the gate I could indistinctly define various dull masses that I believed to be the outline of haystacks or farm buildings. Brushing through the rickety gate with an accession of new strength that the idea had lent me, I had not proceeded many yards in the stubble-field beyond ere I knew that at last I had come to a farmstead. There was not a glimmer of light to be seen anywhere, nor could I make out in the total darkness which was the house itself. Approaching nearer it grew plain that these were farm buildings. Considering, however, my exhausted condition, the lateness of the hour, and the probability that the house was some distance off, I decided to make the best of what lay before me. No sooner had I taken this resolve, than the moon, as if in recognition of it, showed itself suddenly for the first time that night from out of its wrack of rain clouds. By its aid and the smell issuing from within I was made aware that I stood before the entrance to a cow-hovel.

There was no door to it, therefore I was able to carry Cynthia straight in. The cows in their various stalls paid us hardly any attention as I groped my way past them. The place was of a somewhat considerable extent, and coming to the end of it, I discovered a space in the far corner where the clean straw was stored. Dispersing a bundle of it with my feet, I deposited my poor little one very gently into the warm bed thereby made. Careful as I had been not to disturb her, the change in her position had its effect. She gave the same sigh with which she had gone to sleep, and says:

"Jack, Jack, where are you? I do believe I've been to sleep."

"Then go to sleep again, my prettiness," says I.

"But what is this?" says she. "This is surely not the bank of moist earth in the lane I went to sleep on. Where are we then? What place is this so warm and snug?" A rustle. "Straw!" A sniff. "A cow-shed! Oh dear, I am – ! Oh, could we – ! and, oh, Jack, dear, how did we get here?"

The sound of Cynthia's voice and the knowledge that there was a roof for her head and a couch for her body at last, however mean they might be, did much to lift me out of my own sorry predicament. Faint and numb as I still was, my brain seemed to have its capacity restored. And at least I could gauge by my own sufferings those which Cynthia strove so valiantly to conceal.

"Are you not hungry, little one?" says I.

"Are you?" says she.

"Most damnably so," says I.

"Then I am too."

Now I would have you mark that hunger is a great wit. Cynthia sniffed a second time. "Cows," says she. "Oh, what good fortune!"

"But my dearest prettiness," says I, "hungry as we are I do not exactly see how these cows can help us. Although to be sure I will undertake to knock one down and skin it, and make the fire and such like menial offices, if you will cut it up and cook it."

"Goose that you are," says Cynthia. "You almost deserve to perish of your emptiness. What about the milk?"

"Odslife!" cries I, "to think that I should not have thought of that. Ye gods and little fishes, I must go find a pot, or a pail, or a pan to hold it in!"

The happy prospect of such sustenance endowed us both with new vigour. Without more ado I began groping about in this moonlit hovel to discover these utensils. But it was no such easy matter. Look where I might, inside the place and outside of it, amongst the straw and fodder, or among the cows themselves, there was devil a pail that I could see. Yet so insistent was our case that we could not be put off by any small detail of this sort. We were both of us thoroughly awake by now and fully bent on assuaging our distresses. And Cynthia in particular showed her good resources.

"Jack," says she, "give me your hat. It is bigger than mine."

"To be sure," says I. "I had not thought of that. But I will go and do the milking. I do not choose that you undertake these menial offices, my pretty, like a common dairymaid."