Aylwin Part 52

'What part was the party buried in?'

'The pauper part,' I said.

'Oh,' said he, losing suddenly his respectful tone. 'When was she buried? I suppose it was a she by the look o' you.'

'When? I don't know the date.'

'Rather a wide order that, but there's the pauper part.' And he pointed to a spot at some little distance, where there were no gravestones and no shrubs. I walked across to this Desert of Poverty, which seemed too cheerless for a place of rest. I stood and gazed at the mounds till the black coffins underneath grew upon my mental vision, and seemed to press upon my brain. Thoughts I had none, only a sense of being another person.

The man came slowly towards me, and then looked meditatively into my face. I shall never forget him. A tall, sallow, emaciated man he was, with cheek-bones high and sharp as an American Indian's, and straight black hair. He looked like a wooden image of Mephistopheles, carved with a jack-knife.

'Who are you?' The words seemed to come, not from the gravedigger's mouth, but from those piles of lamp-blacked coffins which were searing my eyes through four feet of graveyard earth. By the fever-fires in my brain I seemed to see the very faces of the corpses.

'Who am I?' I said to myself, as I thought, but evidently aloud; 'I am the Fool of Superst.i.tion. I am Fenella Stanley's Fool, and Sinfi Lovell's Fool, and Philip Aylwin's Fool, who went and averted a curse from one of the heads resting down here, averted a curse by burying a jewel in a dead man's tomb.'

'Not in this cemetery, so none o' your gammon,' said the gravedigger, who had overheard me. 'The on'y people as is fools enough to bury jewels with dead bodies is the Gypsies, and _they_ take precious good care, as I know, to keep it mum _where_ they bury 'em. There's bin as much diggin' for them thousand guineas as was buried with Jerry Chilcott in Foxleigh Parish, where I was born, as would more nor pay for emptying a gold mine; but I never heard o'

Christian folk a-buryin' jewels. But who are you?'

I felt a hand upon my shoulder, and looking round, I found Sinfi by my side.

'Does he belong to you, my gal?'

'Yis,' said Sinfi, with a strange, deep ring in her rich contralto voice. 'Yis, he belongs to me now--leastways he's my pal now--whatever comes on it.'

'Then take him away, my wench. What's the matter with him? The old complaint, I s'pose,' he added, lifting his hand to his mouth as though drinking from a gla.s.s.

Sinfi gently put out her hand and brushed the man aside.

'I've bin a-followin' on you all the way, brother,' said Sinfi, as we moved out of the cemetery, 'for your looks skeared me a bit. Let's go away from this place.'

'But whither, Sinfi? I have no friend but you; I have no home.'

'No home, brother? The kairengros [Footnote] has got about everythink, 'cept the sky an' the wind, an' you're one o' the richest kairengros on 'em all--leastways so I wur told t'other day in Kingston Vale. It's the Romanies, brother, as 'ain't got no home 'cept the sky an' the wind. Howsumever, that's nuther here nor there; we'll jist go to the woman they told me on, an' if there's any truth to be torn out of her, out it'll ha' to come, if I ha' to tear out her windpipe with it.'

[Footnote: The house-dwellers.]

We took a cab and were soon in Primrose Court.

The front door was wide open--fastened back. Entering the narrow common pa.s.sage, we rapped at a dingy inner door. It was opened by a pretty girl, whose thick chestnut hair and eyes to match contrasted richly with the dress she wore--a dirty black dress, with great patches of lining bursting through holes like a whity-brown froth.

'Meg Gudgeon?' said the girl in answer to our inquiries; and at first she looked at us rather suspiciously, 'upstairs, she's very bad--like to die--I'm a-seein' arter 'er. Better let 'er alone; she bites when she's in 'er tantrums.'

'We's friends o' hern,' said Sinfi, whose appearance and decisive voice seemed to rea.s.sure the girl.

'Oh, if you're friends that's different,' said she. 'Meg's gone off 'er 'ead; thinks the p'leace in plain clothes are after 'er.'

We went up the stairs. The girl followed us. When we reached a low door, Sinfi proposed that she should remain outside on the landing, but within ear-shot, as 'the sight o' both on us, all of a suddent, might make the poor body all of a dither if she was very ill.'

The girl then opened the door and went in. I heard the woman's voice say in answer to her,

'Friend? Who is it? Are you sure, Poll, it ain't a copper in plain clothes come about that gal?'

The girl came out, and signalling me to enter, went leisurely downstairs. Leaving Sinfi outside on the landing, I entered the room.

There, on a sort of truckle-bed in one corner, I saw the woman. She slowly raised herself up on her elbows to stare at me. I took for granted that she would recognise me at once; but either because she was in drink when I saw her last, or because she had got the idea of a policeman in plain clothes, she did not seem to know me. Then a look of dire alarm broke over her face and she said,

'P'leaceman, I'm as hinicent about that air gal as a new-born babe.'

'Mrs. Gudgeon,' I said, 'I only want you to tell a friend of mine about your daughter.'

'Oh yis! a friend o' yourn! Another or two on ye in plain clothes behind the door, I dessay. An' pray who said the gal wur my darter?

What for do you want to put words into the mouth of a hinicent dyin'

woman? I comed by 'er 'onest enough. The pore half-starved thing came up to me in Llanbeblig churchyard.'

'Llanbeblig churchyard?' I exclaimed, drawing close up to the bed.

'How came you in Llanbeblig churchyard?' But then I remembered that, according to her own story, she had married a Welshman.

'How did I come in Llanbeblig churchyard?' said the woman in a tone in which irony and fear were strangely mingled. 'Well, p'leaceman, I don't mean to be sarcy: but seein' as all my pore dear 'usband's kith and kin o' the name o' Goodjohn was buried in Llanbeblig churchyard, p'raps you'll be kind enough to let me go there sometimes, an' p'raps be buried there when my time comes.'

'But what took you there?' I said.

'What took me to Llanbeblig churchyard?' exclaimed the woman, whose natural dogged courage seemed to be returning to her. 'What made me leave every fardin' I had in the world with Poll Onion, when we ommust wanted bread, an' go to Carnarvon on Shanks's pony? I sha'n't tell ye. I comed by the gal 'onest enough, an' she never comed to no 'arm through me, less mendin' 'er does for 'er, and bringin' 'er to London, and bein' a mother to 'er, an' givin' 'er a few baskets an'

matches to sell is a-doin' 'er any 'arm. An' as to beggin' she _would_ beg, she loved to beg an' say texes.'

'Old kidnapper!' I cried, maddened by the visions that came upon me.

'How do I know that she came to no harm with a wretch like you?'

The woman shrank back upon the pillows in a revival of her terror.

'She never comed to no 'arm, p'leaceman. No, no, she never comed to no 'arm through me. I'd a darter once o' my own, Jenny Gudgeon by name--p'raps you know'd 'er, most o' the coppers did--as was brought up by my sister by marriage at Carnarvon, an' I sent for 'er to London, I did, pl'eaceman--G.o.d forgi'e me--an' she went wrong all through me bein' a drinkin' woman an' not seein' arter 'er, just as my son Bob tookt to drink, through me bein' a drinkin' woman an' not seein' arter _him_. She tookt and went from bad to wuss, bad to wuss; it's my belief as it's allus starvation as drives 'em to it; an' when she wur a-dyin' gal, she sez to me, "Mother," sez she, "I've got the smell o' Welsh vi'lets on me ag'in: I wants to be buried in Llanbeblig churchyard, among the Welsh child'n an' maids, mother. I wants to feel the snowdrops, an' smell the vi'lets, an'

the primroses, a-growin' over my 'ead," sez she; "but that can't never be, mother," sez she, a-sobbin' fit to bust; "never, never, for such as me," sez she. An' I know'd what she meant, though she never once blamed me, an' 'er words stuck in my gizzard like a thorn, p'leaceman.'

'But what has all this to do with the girl you kidnapped?'

'Ain't I a-tellin' on ye as fast as I can? When my pore gal dropped off to sleep, I sez to Polly Onion, "Poll," I sez, "to-morrow mornin'

I'll pop every-think as ain't popped a'ready, an' I'll leave you the money to see arter 'er, an' I'll start for Carnarvon on Shanks's pony. I knows a good many on the road," sez I, "as won't let Jokin'

Meg want for a crust and a sup, an' when I gits to Carnarvon I'll ax 'er aunt to bury 'er (she sells fish, 'er aunt does,"' sez I, "and she's got a pot o' money), an' then I'll see the parson or the s.e.xton or somebody," sez I, "an' I'll tell 'em I've got a darter in London as is goin' to die, a Carnarvon gal by family, an' I'll tell 'im she ain't never bin married, an' then they'll bury 'er where she can smell the primroses and the vi'lets." That's what I sez to Poll Onion, an' then Poll she begins to pipe, an' sez, "Oh Meg, Meg, ain't I a Carnarvon gal too? The likes o' us ain't a-goin' to grow no vi'lets an' snowdrops in Llanbeblig churchyard." An' I sez to her, "What a d--d fool you are, Poll! You never 'adn't a gal as went wrong through you a-drinkin', else you'd never say that. If the parson sez to me, 'Is your darter a vargin-maid?' d'ye think I shall say, 'Oh no, parson'? I'll swear she is a vargin-maid on all the Bibles in all the churches in Wales." That's jis' what I sez to Polly Onion, G.o.d forgi'e me. An' Poll sez, "The parson'll be sure to send you to h.e.l.l, Meg, if you do that air." An' I sez, "So he may, then, but I _shall_ do it, no fear." That's what I sez to Poll Onion (she's downstairs at this werry moment a-warmin' me a drop o' beer); it was 'er as showed you upstairs, cuss 'er for a fool; an' she can tell you the same thing as I'm a-tellin' on you.'

'But what about her you kidnapped? Tell me all about it, or it will be worse for you.'

'Ain't I a-tellin' you as fast as I can? Off to Carnarvon I goes, an'

every futt o' the way I walks--Lor' bless your soul, there worn't a better pair o' pins nowheres than Meg Gudgeon's then, afore the water got in 'em an' bust 'em; an' I got to Llanbeblig churchyard early one mornin', and there I seed the pore half-sharp gal. So you see I comed by 'er 'onest enough, p'leaceman, though she worn't ezzackly my own darter.'

'Well, well,' I said; 'go on.'

'Yes, it's all very well to say "go on," p'leaceman; but if you'd got as much water in your legs as I've got in mine, an' if you'd got no more wind in your bellows than I've got in mine, you'd find it none so easy to go on.'

'What was she doing in the churchyard?'

'Well, p'leaceman, I'm tellin' you the truth, s'elp me Bob! I was a-lookin' over the graves to see if I could find a nice comfortable place for my pore gal, an' all at once I heered a kind o' sobbin' as would a' made me die o' fright if it 'adn't a' bin broad daylight, an' then I see a gal a-layin' flat on a grave an' cryin', an' when I got up to her I seed as she wur covered with mud, an' I seed as she wur a-starvin'.'