ABOUT THE Pa.s.sOVER OF THE BRUTE

Mary soon forgave her brother for his failure over the electric light business, and they became as good friends as ever, except when Peter demanded sums of money for services which Mary could not remember he had rendered. Peter had a trick of benefiting himself, and charging the cost to his sister. They were settled for the winter; Peter had turfed up the c.h.i.n.ks in the walls, adding a solid plaster of clay; had repaired the thatch of gorse where it had rotted, laying on big stones to prevent the removal of any portion by the gales; and had cut the winter supply of fern. He sent in the bill to Mary, and she had taken it to Master, and Master had put on silver spectacles and golden wisdom and revised the costs so thoroughly, that Peter had to complain he had not received the price of the tobacco smoked during the work of restoration.

Mary still mourned for Old Sal, knowing she would never see "the like o'

he again," while Peter cooked his mommet and cursed Pendoggat. Peter was a weak little creature, who could only revenge himself by deeds of witchcraft. He was not muscular like his sister, who would have stood up to any man on Dartmoor, and made some of them sorry for themselves before she had done with them. Mary believed in witchcraft, because she was to a certain extent religious; she had been baptised, for instance, and that was an act of witchcraft pure and simple, as it was intended to protect the child from being overlooked by the devil; but, if any man had insulted her, she would not have made a mommet of him, or driven a nail into his footprint; she would have taken her stick, "as big as two spears and a dag," and whacked him well with it.

The prospect of winter encouraged Peter to turn his mind towards literary pursuits. There were days of storm and long evenings to be occupied; and the little savage considered he might fill those hours with work for which his talents seemed to qualify him, and possibly bequeath to posterity some abiding monument of his genius. Peter had a weekly paper and studied it well. He gathered from it that people still wrote books; apparently every one wrote thern, though only about one in every hundred was published. Most people had the ma.n.u.scripts of their books put away in cupboards, linhays, and old teapots, waiting the favourable moment to bring them forth and astonish the world. This was something of a revelation to Peter. Where was his book! Why had he remained so long a mute inglorious scholar? Possibly the commoners who met him in daily intercourse had their books completed and stored away safely in their barns, and he was certainly as learned as any of them.

Peter went off to Master, and opened to him the secret of his mind.

Master was entirely sympathetic. He gave it as his opinion that any one could write a book. When the art of forming letters of the alphabet had been acquired, nothing indeed remained, except pen, ink, and paper; and, as he reminded Peter, Mother Cobley sold ink at one penny the bottle, while pen and paper could be obtained from the same source for an additional twopence. Genius could therefore startle the world at threepence a head.

Peter was profoundly interested. He indicated the big tomes, which Master kept always lying beside him: a copy of the _Arcadia_, a Bible dictionary, a volume of Shakespeare, and a few books of poetry, most of them presents from a former rector long deceased, and suggested that Master was accountable for the lot. The old man beamed through his spectacles, coughed uneasily, and generally a.s.sumed that att.i.tude of modesty which is said to be one of the most marked traits of literary men.

"You can spell turnips," Master reminded.

"Sure 'nuff," said Peter. "I can spell harder words than he. I can spell hyacinth, and he'm a proper little brute."

He proceeded to spell the word, making only three mistakes. Master advised him to confine himself for the present to more simple language, and went on to ask what was the style and subject of Peter's proposed undertaking.

"I wants yew to tell me," was the answer.

Master had an idea that genius ought to be inspired from within and not from without, but he merely answered: "Nothing's no trouble, varmer,"

and suggested that Peter should compose a diary. "'Tis what a man does every day," he explained. "How he gets up, and how he goes to bed, and how he yets his dinner, and how his belly feels."

Peter considered that the idea was brilliant. Such an item as how he drank his beer would certainly prove entertaining, and might very well be original.

"Then he ses things about other volk, and about the weather," Master went on. "He puts down all he can think of, so long as it be decent.

Mun't put down anything that bain't decent 'cause that would shock volks."

"Nothing 'bout Varmer Pendoggat and Chegwidden's maid?" the other suggested, in rather a disappointed voice.

"Hark ye, Peter," said Master decidedly, "you had best bide quiet about that. Volks wun't tak' your word against his, and if he purty nigh murders ye no one wun't try to stop 'en. A man bain't guilty till he be found out, and Varmer Pendoggat ain't been found out."

"He can't touch I. Mary wun't let 'en, and I've made a mommet of 'en tu," said the little man.

"Made a mommet, ha' ye? Aw, man, that be an awful thing to du. It be calling in the devil to work for ye, and the devil wun't work wi'out pay, man. He'll come sure 'nuff, and say to yew: 'I wants your soul, Peter. I've a bought 'en wi' that mommet what yew made.' I be main cruel sorry for yew, Peter."

"It be done now," said Peter gloomily.

Master wagged his head until his silver spectacles dropped off his nose, added a little wisdom, then returned to his subject.

"Yew mun write things what you wun't be ashamed to let folk read. When 'tis a wet day yew ses so, and when it be fine you ses it be butiful.

When yew gets thoughts yew puts 'em all down."

"What du'ye mean?" asked the aspirant.

"Why, you think as how it be a proper feeling when you'm good, and yew ses so. That be a thought."

"S'pose yew bain't feeling good?" suggested Peter quite naturally.

"Then yew writes about what it feels like to be bad," explained Master.

"Yew puts it down this sort o' way: 'I feels bad to-day. I don't mean I feels bad in my body, for that be purty middling, but I feels bad in my soul. It be a cruel pity, and I hopes as how I wun't feel so bad to-morrow.' All them be thoughts, Peter; and that be the way books are written."

"Thank ye kindly, master. It be proper easy," said Peter.

"You'm welcome, varmer. Nothing's no trouble."

Peter bought the articles necessary for fame, and went home. Mary was forking manure, pausing only to spit on her hands; but she stopped for another reason when Peter told her he was going to keep a diary.

"What be yew talking about?" she cried, amazed at such folly. "Us ha'

got one as 'tis. What du us want wi' another?"

Peter had to explain that the business of his diary had nothing to do with such base commerce as cream and b.u.t.ter, but consisted in recording the actions of a blameless life upon a pennyworth of paper for the instruction and edification of those who should come after them. Mary grasped her fork, and told him he was mazed.

Peter was not sure that Mary had spoken falsely when he came to test his 'prentice hand. In theory the art of writing was so simple, and consisted in nothing more difficult than setting down what he would otherwise have spoken, adding those gems of thought with which his mind was occasionally enriched under the enn.o.bling influence of moderate beer. But nothing appeared upon the sheet of paper except dirt. Even the simplest art requires practice. Not every man can milk a cow at the first attempt. After much labour he recorded the statement: "This be a buke, and when 'tis dun 'twill be a dairy. All volks write bukes, and it bain't easy till you'm yused to it." There he stopped for the day. As soon as he left the paper all sorts of ideas crowded into his mind, and he hurried back to put them down, but directly he took up the pen his mind was a blank again. The ideas had been swept away like b.u.t.terflies on a windy day. Mary called him "a proper old vule," and her thought was probably quite as good as any that were likely to occur to him. "'Tis bravish times us lives in. Us mun keep up wi' em," was Peter's answer.

The next day he tried again, but the difficulties remained. Peter managed to place on record such imperishable facts as there was snow and more would come likely, and he had got up later than usual, and he and Mary were tolerably well, and the fare for the day was turnips and bacon--he wanted to drag in turnips because he could spell the word, and he added a note to inform posterity that he had taught Master how to do so--but nothing came in the way of thoughts, and without them Peter was persuaded his book could not properly be regarded as belonging to the best order of literature. At the end of his second day of creation Peter began to entertain a certain feeling of respect, if not of admiration, for those who made a living with the pen; but on the third day inspiration touched his brain, and he became a literary soul. The old gentleman who shared his house, so called out of courtesy, as it contained only one room, was making more noise than usual, as if the cold had got into his chest. The diarist kept looking up to peer at Grandfather's worn features, wondering what was wrong, and at last the great idea came to him. "Dalled if Gran'vaither bain't a telling to I,"

he exclaimed; and then he got up and went cautiously across the room, which was the same thing as going from one side of the house to the other, his boots rustling in the fern which covered the floor.

"Be'ye alright, Gran'vaither?" he asked, lapping the old fellow's chest with great respect. He was accustomed to chat with the clock, when alone, as another man higher in the scale of civilisation might have talked to his dog. Peter noticed that it was getting dark around him, although it was still early in the afternoon.

"I be cruel sick," a voice answered.

Peter cried out and began to shiver. He stared at the window, the panes of which were no longer white, but blue. Something was taking place outside, not a storm, as the moor was unusually silent, and there seemed to be no wind. Peter tried to collect his thoughts into a form suitable for publication. He shivered his way to the other side of the room and wrote laboriously: "Gran'vaither be telling to I. Ses he be cruel sick."

Then he had another attack of shivers.

"Who was that a telling to I?" he shouted, the noise of his voice making him bolder.

"'Twas me," came the answer at once; and Peter gulped like a dying fish, but managed to put it down in the diary.

"Who be ye?" he called.

"Old Gran'vaither."

Peter stood in the fern, biting his fingers and sweating. He was trembling too much to write any more. So Grandfather was a living creature after all. He had always supposed that the clock had a sort of existence, not the same as his own, but the kind of life owned by the pixies, and now he was sure of it.

"Why didn't ye tell to I avore?" he asked reproachfully.

Grandfather appeared to regard the question as impertinent, as he gave no answer.

"Yew was making creepy noises last night. I heard ye," Peter went on, waxing bold. "Seemed as if yew was trying to crawl out o' your own belly."

"I was trying to talk," the clock explained.

Peter had some more shivers. It seemed natural enough to hear old Grandfather talking, and he tried to persuade himself it was not the voice which frightened him, but the queer blue light that seemed to be filling the hut. He remembered that pixies always go about with blue lanterns, and he began to believe that the surrounding moor was crowded with the little people out for a frolic at his expense. Then he thought he would go for Mary, but remembered she had gone to Lewside Cottage with dairy produce. That reminded him of the diary. What a wonderful work he would make of it now!

"Gran'vaither," he called.