Mrs.Bester unexpectedly burst into tears.There was an element in the female villagers' temperament which Betty had found was frequently unexpected in its breaking forth.
"He's down, miss," she said."He's down with it crool bad.There'll be no savin' of him--none."Betty laid her package of sewing cotton and knitting wool quietly on the blue and white checked tablecloth.
"Who--is he?" she asked.
"His lordship--and him just saved all Dunstan parish from death--to go like this!"In Stornham village and in all others of the neighbourhood the feminine attitude towards Mount Dunstan had been one of strongly emotional admiration.The thwarted female longing for romance--the desire for drama and a hero had been fed by him.A fine, big young man, one that had been "spoke ill of" and regarded as an outcast, had suddenly turned the tables on fortune and made himself the central figure of the county, the talk of gentry in their grand houses, of cottage women on their doorsteps, and labourers stopping to speak to each other by the roadside.Magic stories had been told of him, beflowered with dramatic detail.No incident could have been related to his credit which would not have been believed and improved upon.Shut up in his village working among his people and unseen by outsiders, he had become a popular idol.
Any scrap of news of him--any rumour, true or untrue, was seized upon and excitedly spread abroad.Therefore Mrs.Bester wept as she talked, and, if the truth must be told, enjoyed the situation.She was the first to tell the story to her ladyship's sister herself, as well as to Mrs.Welden and old Doby.
"It's Tom as brought it in," she said."He's my brother, miss, an' he's one of the ringers.He heard it from Jem Wesgate, an' he heard it at Toomy's farm.They've been keepin' it hid at the Mount because the people that's ill hangs on his lordship so that the doctors daren't let them know the truth.They've been told he had to go to London an' may come back any day.What Tom was sayin', miss, was that we'd all know when it was over, for we'd hear the church bell toll here same as it'd toll at Dunstan, because they ringers have talked it over an' they're goin' to talk it over to-day with the other parishes--Yangford an' Meltham an' Dunholm an' them.
Tom says Stornham ringers met just now at The Clock an' said that for a man that's stood by labouring folk like he has, toll they will, an' so ought the other parishes, same as if he was royalty, for he's made himself nearer.They'll toll the minute they hear it, miss.Lord help us!" with a fresh outburst of crying."It don't seem like it's fair as it should be.When we hear the bell toll, miss----""Don't!" said her ladyship's handsome sister suddenly.
"Please don't say it again."
She sat down by the table, and resting her elbows on the blue and white checked cloth, covered her face with her hands.
She did not speak at all.In this tiny room, with these two old souls who loved her, she need not explain.She sat quite still, and Mrs.Welden after looking at her for a few seconds was prompted by some sublimely simple intuition, and gently sidled Mrs.Bester and her youngest into the little kitchen, where the copper was.
"Her helpin' him like she did, makes it come near," she whispered."Dessay it seems as if he was a'most like a relation."Old Doby sat and looked at his goddess.In his slowly moving old brain stirred far-off memories like long-dead things striving to come to life.He did not know what they were, but they wakened his dim eyes to a new seeing of the slim young shape leaning a little forward, the soft cloud of hair, the fair beauty of the cheek.He had not seen anything like it in his youth, but--it was Youth itself, and so was that which the ringers were so soon to toll for; and for some remote and unformed reason, to his scores of years they were pitiful and should be cheered.He bent forward himself and put out his ancient, veined and knotted, gnarled and trembling hand, to timorously touch the arm of her he worshipped and adored.
"God bless ye!" he said, his high, cracked voice even more shrill and thin than usual."God bless ye!" And as she let her hands slip down, and, turning, gently looked at him, he nodded to her speakingly, because out of the dimness of his being, some part of Nature's working had strangely answered and understood.
