Suddenly, all the pent-up misery and fear of the last thirty years seemed to be loosening in Master Nathaniel's heart - he was sobbing, and Hempie, with triumphant tenderness, was stroking his hands and murmuring soothing words, as she had done when he was a little boy.
When his sobs had spent themselves, he sat down on a stool at her feet, and, leaning his head against her knees, said, "Sing to me, Hempie."
"Sing to you, my dear? And what shall I sing to you? My voice isn't what it once was well, there's that old song - `Columbine,' I think they call it - that they always seem singing in the streets these days - that's got a pretty tune."
And in a voice, cracked and sweet, like an old spinet, she began to sing:
"When Aubrey did live there lived no poor,
The lord and the beggar on roots did dine
With lily, germander, and sops in wine.
With sweet-brier,
And bon-fire,
And strawberry-wire,
And columbine."
As she sang, Master Nathaniel again heard the Note. But, strange to say, this time it held no menace. It was as quiet as trees and pictures and the past, as soothing as the drip of water, as peaceful as the lowing of cows returning to the byre at sunset.
Chapter XI
A Stronger Antidote than Reason
Master Nathaniel sat at his old nurse's feet for some minutes after she had stopped singing. Both his limbs and his mind seemed to be bathed in a cool, refreshing pool.
So Endymion Leer and Hempie had reached by very different paths the same conclusion - that, after all, there was nothing to be frightened about; that, neither in sky, sea, nor earth was there to be found a cavern dark and sinister enough to serve as a lair for IT - his secret fear.
Yes, but there were facts as well as shadows. Against facts Hempie had given him no charm. Supposing that what had happened to Prunella should happen to Ranulph? That he should vanish for ever across the Debatable Hills.
But it had not happened yet - nor should it happen as long as Ranulph's father had wits and muscles.
He might be a poor, useless creature when menaced by the figments of his own fancy. But, by the Golden Apples of the West, he would no longer sit there shaking at shadows, while, perhaps, realities were mustering their battalions against Ranulph.
It was for him to see that Dorimare became a country that his son could live in in security.
It was as if he had suddenly seen something white and straight - a road or a river - cutting through a sombre, moonlit landscape. And the straight, white thing was his own will to action.
He sprang to his feet and took two or three paces up and down the room.
"But I tell you, Hempie," he cried, as if continuing a conversation, "they're all against me. How can I work by myself! They're all against me, I say."
"Get along with you, Master Nat!" jeered Hempie tenderly. "You were always one to think folks were against you. When you were a little boy it was always, `You're not cross with me, Hempie, are you?' and peering up at me with your little anxious eyes - and there was me with no more idea of being cross with you than of jumping over the moon!"
"But, I tell you, they are all against me," he cried impatiently. "They blame me for what has happened, and Ambrose was so insulting that I had to tell him never to put his foot into my house again."
"Well, it isn't the first time you and Master Ambrose have quarrelled - and it won't be the first time you make it up again. It was, `Hempie, Brosie won't play fair!' or `Hempie, it's my turn for a ride on the donkey, and Nat won't let me!' And then, in a few minutes, it was all over and forgotten. So you must just step across to Master Ambrose's, and walk in as if nothing had happened, and, you'll see, he'll be as pleased as Punch to see you."
As he listened, he realized that it would be very pleasant to put his pride in his pocket and rush off to Ambrose and say that he was willing to admit anything that Ambrose chose - that he was a hopelessly inefficient Mayor, that his slothfulness during these past months had been criminal - even, if Ambrose insisted, that he was an eater of, and smuggler of, and receiver of, fairy fruit, all rolled into one - if only Ambrose would make friends again.
Pride and resentment are not indigenous to the human heart; and perhaps it is due to the gardener's innate love of the exotic that we take such pains to make them thrive.
But Master Nathaniel was a self-indulgent man, and ever ready to sacrifice both dignity and expediency to the pleasure of yielding to a sentimental velleity.
"By the Golden Apples of the West, Hempie," he cried joyfully, "you're right! I'll dash across to Ambrose's before I'm a minute older," and he made eagerly for the door.
On the threshold he suddenly remembered how he had seen the door of his chapel ajar, and he paused to ask Hempie if she had been up there recently, and had forgotten to lock it.
But she had not been there since early spring.
"That's odd!" said Master Nathaniel.
And then he dismissed the matter from his mind, in the exhilarating prospect of "making up" with Ambrose.
It is curious what tricks a quarrel, or even a short absence, can play with our mental picture of even our most intimate friends. A few minutes later, as Master Ambrose looked at his old playmate standing at the door, grinning a little sheepishly, he felt as if he had just awakened from a nightmare. This was not "the most criminally negligent Mayor with whom the town of Lud-in-the-Mist had ever been cursed;" still less was it the sinister figure evoked by Endymion Leer. It was just queer old Nat, whom he had known all his life.
Just as on a map of the country round Lud, in the zig-zagging lines he could almost see the fish and rushes of the streams they represented, could almost count the milestones on the straight lines that stood for roads; so, with regard to the face of his old friend - every pucker and wrinkle was so familiar that he felt he could have told you every one of the jokes and little worries of which they were the impress.
Master Nathaniel, still grinning a little sheepishly, stuck out his hand. Master Ambrose frowned, blew his nose, tried to look severe, and then grasped the hand. And they stood there fully two minutes, wringing each other's hand, and laughing and blinking to keep away the tears.
And then Master Ambrose said, "Come into the pipe-room, Nat, and try a glass of my new flower-in-amber. You old rascal, I believe it was that that brought you!"
A little later when Master Ambrose was conducting Master Nathaniel back to his house, his arm linked in his, they happened to pass Endymion Leer.
For a few seconds he stood staring after them as they glimmered down the lane beneath the faint moonlight. And he did not look overjoyed.
That night was filled to the brim for Master Nathaniel with sweet, dreamless sleep. As soon as he laid his head on the pillow he seemed to dive into some pleasant unknown element - fresher than air, more caressing than water; an element in which he had not bathed since he first heard the Note, thirty years ago. And he woke up the next morning light-hearted and eager; so fine a medicine was the will to action.