"Why, how do you know I live there?" and Helmsley smiled as he put the question.
"Oh, well, all the village knows that!--and though I"m quite new to the village--I"ve only been here a week--I know it too. You"re old David, the basket-maker, aren"t you?"
"Yes." And Helmsley nodded emphatically--"That"s me!"
"Then I know all about you! My name"s Angus Reay. I"m a Scotchman,--I am, or rather, I _was_ a journalist, and as poor as Job! That"s _me_!
Come along!"
The cheery magnetism of his voice and look attracted Helmsley, and almost before he knew it he was leaning on this new friend"s arm, chatting with him concerning the village, the scenery, and the weather, in the easiest way possible.
"I came on here from Minehead,"--said Reay--"That was too expensive a place for me!" And a bright smile flashed from lips to eyes with an irresistible sunny effect; "I"ve got just twenty pounds in the world, and I must make it last me a year. For room, food, fuel, clothes, drink and smoke! I"ve promptly cut off the last two!"
"And you"re none the worse for it, I daresay!" rejoined Helmsley.
"Not a bit! A good deal the better. In Fleet Street the men drank and smoked pretty heavily, and I had to drink and smoke with them, if I wanted to keep in with the lot. I did want to keep in with them, and yet I didn"t. It was a case of "needs must when the devil drives!""
"You say you were a journalist. Aren"t you one now?"
"No. I"m "kicked off"!" And Reay threw back his head and laughed joyously. ""Off you go!" said my editor, one fine morning, after I had slaved away for him for nearly two years--"We don"t want any canting truth-tellers here!" Now mind that stone! You nearly slipped. Hold my arm tighter!"
Helmsley did as he was told, quite meekly, looking up with a good deal of curiosity at this tall athletic creature, with the handsome head and masterful manner. Reay caught his enquiring glance and laughed again.
"You look as if you wanted to know more about me, old David!" he said gaily--"So you shall! I"ve nothing to conceal! As I tell you I was "kicked off" out of journalism--my fault being that I published a leaderette exposing a mean "deal" on the part of a certain city plutocrat. I didn"t know the rascal had shares in the paper. But he _had_--under an "alias." And he made the devil"s own row about it with the editor, who nearly died of it, being inclined to apoplexy--and between the two of them I was "dropped." Then the word ran along the press wires that I was an "unsafe" man. I could not get any post worth having--I had saved just twenty pounds--so I took it all and walked away from London--literally _walked_ away! I haven"t spent a penny in other locomotion than my own legs since I left Fleet Street."
Helmsley listened with eager interest. Here was a man who had done the very thing which he himself had started to do;--"tramped" the road.
But--with what a difference! Full manhood, physical strength, and activity on the one side,--decaying power, feebleness of limb and weariness on the other. They had entered the village street by this time, and were slowly walking up it together.
"You see,"--went on Reay,--"of course I could have taken the train--but twenty pounds is only twenty pounds--and it must last me twelve solid months. By that time I shall have finished my work."
"And what"s that?" asked Helmsley.
"It"s a book. A novel. And"--here he set his teeth hard--"I intend that it shall make me--famous!"
"The intention is good,"--said Helmsley, slowly--"But--there are so many novels!"
"No, there are not!" declared Reay, decisively--"There are plenty of rag-books _called_ novels--but they are not real "novels." There"s nothing "new" in them. There"s no touch of real, suffering, palpitating humanity in them! The humanity of to-day is infinitely more complex than it was in the days of Scott or d.i.c.kens, but there"s no Scott or d.i.c.kens to epitomise its character or delineate its temperament. I want to be the twentieth century Scott and d.i.c.kens rolled into one stupendous literary t.i.tan!"
His mellow laughter was hearty and robust. Helmsley caught its infection and laughed too.
"But why,"--he asked--"do you want to write a novel? Why not write a real _book_?"
"What do you call a real book, old David?" demanded Reay, looking down upon him with a sudden piercing glance.
Helmsley was for a moment confused. He was thinking of such books as Carlyle"s "Past and Present"--Emerson"s "Essays" and the works of Ruskin. But he remembered in good time that for an old "basket-maker" to be familiar with such literary masterpieces might seem strange to a wide-awake "journalist," therefore he checked himself in time.
"Oh, I don"t know! I believe I was thinking of "Pilgrim"s Progress"!" he said.
""Pilgrim"s Progress"? Ah! A fine book--a grand book! Twelve years and a half of imprisonment in Bedford Jail turned Bunyan out immortal! And here am I--_not_ in jail--but free to roam where I choose,--with twenty pounds! By Jove! I ought to be greater than Bunyan! Now "Pilgrim"s Progress" was a "novel," if you like!"
"I thought,"--submitted Helmsley, with the well-a.s.sumed air of a man who was not very conversant with literature--"that it was a religious book?"
"So it is. A religious novel. And a splendid one! But humanity"s gone past that now--it wants a wider view--a bigger, broader outlook. Do you know--" and here he stopped in the middle of the rugged winding street, and looked earnestly at his companion--"do you know what I see men doing at the present day?--I see them rushing towards the verge--the very extreme edge of what they imagine to be the Actual--and from that edge getting ready to plunge--into Nothingness!"
Something thrilling in his voice touched a responsive chord in Helmsley"s own heart.
"Why--that is where we all tend!" he said, with a quick sigh--"That is where _I_ am tending!--where _you_, in your time, must also tend--nothingness--or death!"
"No!" said Reay, almost loudly--"That"s not true! That"s just what I deny! For me there is no "Nothingness"--no "death"! s.p.a.ce is full of creative organisms. Dissolution means re-birth. It is all life--life:--glorious life! We live--we have always lived--we _shall_ always live!" He paused, flushing a little as though half ashamed of his own enthusiasm--then, dropping his voice to its normal tone he said--"You"ve got me on my hobby horse--I must come off it, or I shall gallop too far! We"re just at the top of the street now. Shall I leave you here?"
"Please come on to the cottage,"--said Helmsley--"I"m sure Mary--Miss Deane--will give you a cup of tea."
Angus Reay smiled.
"I don"t allow myself that luxury,"--he said.
"Not when you"re invited to share it with others?"
"Oh yes, in that way I do--but I"m not overburdened with friends just now. A man must have more than twenty pounds to be "asked out"
anywhere!"
"Well, _I_ ask you out!"--said Helmsley, smiling--"Or rather, I ask you _in_. I"m sure Miss Deane will be glad to talk to you. She is very fond of books."
"I"ve seen her just once in the village,"--remarked Reay--"She seems to be very much respected here. And what a beautiful woman she is!"
"You think so?" and Helmsley"s eyes lighted with pleasure--"Well, I think so, too--but they tell me that it"s only because I"m old, and apt to see everyone beautiful who is kind to me. There"s a good deal in that!--there"s certainly a good deal in that!"
They could now see the garden gate of Mary"s cottage through the boughs of the great chestnut tree, which at this season was nearly stripped of all its leaves, and which stood like a lonely forest king with some scanty red and yellow rags of woodland royalty about him, in solitary grandeur at the bending summit of the hill. And while they were yet walking the few steps which remained of the intervening distance, Mary herself came out to the gate, and, leaning one arm lightly across it, watched them approaching. She wore a pale lilac print gown, high to the neck and tidily finished off by a plain little muslin collar fastened with a coquettish knot of black velvet,--her head was uncovered, and the fitful gleams of the sinking sun shed a russet glow on her shining hair and reddened the pale clear transparency of her skin. In that restful waiting att.i.tude, with a smile on her face, she made a perfect picture, and Helmsley stole a side-glance at his companion, to see if he seemed to be in any way impressed by her appearance. Angus Reay was certainly looking at her, but what he thought could hardly be guessed by his outward expression. They reached the gate, and she opened it.
"I was getting anxious about you, David!"--she said; "you aren"t quite strong enough to be out in such a cold wind." Then she turned her eyes enquiringly on Reay, who lifted his cap while Helmsley explained his presence.
"This is a gentleman who is staying in the village--Mr. Reay,"--he said--"He"s been very kind in helping me up the hill--and I said you would give him a cup of tea."
"Why, of course!"--and Mary smiled--"Please come in, sir!"
She led the way, and in another few minutes, all three of them were seated in her little kitchen round the table and Mary was busy pouring out the tea and dispensing the usual good things that are always found in the simplest Somersetshire cottage,--cream, preserved fruit, scones, home-made bread and fresh b.u.t.ter.
"So you met David on the seash.o.r.e?" she said, turning her soft dark-blue eyes enquiringly on Reay, while gently checking with one hand the excited gambols of Charlie, who, as an epicurean dog, always gave himself up to the wildest enthusiasms at tea-time, owing to his partiality for a small saucer of cream which came to him at that hour--"I sometimes think he must expect to pick up a fortune down among the sh.e.l.ls and seaweed, he"s so fond of walking about there!"--And she smiled as she put Helmsley"s cup of tea before him, and gently patted his wrinkled hand in the caressing fashion a daughter might show to a father whose health gave cause for anxiety.
"Well, _I_ certainly don"t go down to the sh.o.r.e in any such expectation!" said Reay, laughing--"Fortunes are not so easily picked up, are they, David?"
"No, indeed!" replied Helmsley, and his old eyes sparkled up humorously under their cavernous brows; "fortunes take some time to make, and one doesn"t meet millionaires every day!"
"Millionaires!" exclaimed Reay--"Don"t speak of them! I hate them!"
Helmsley looked at him stedfastly.
"It"s best not to hate anybody,"--he said--"Millionaires are often the loneliest and most miserable of men."