CHAPTER VI.

FIVE YEARS.

SO five years went on, and still Ishmael was not a man. There was little hope now of his even making a strong, hardy, capable man. The privations he was compelled to undergo had told upon his undersized, thin, and feeble frame. But still more had the anxieties and the mortifications he had to endure borne down his spirit.

No one but his mother cared for him. Suspicion dogged him, and the doubtful companions necessity forced upon him strengthened suspicion. He was losing heart, and growing hopeless. His mother had called him Ishmael, because the Lord had heard her affliction; but she might have called him Ishmael because every man's hand was against him. Would the day come, dreaded by his mother, when his hand would be against every man?

The last few years had weighed more heavily upon Ruth than ten might have done if Ishmael had been at home. She could no longer help her old husband up the ladder when he came home drunk; and many a night he had lain on the damp floor, groaning with rheumatic pains, for want of a strong young arm such as Ishmael's would have been. Still every Sunday brought her a gleam of gladness. As yet Ishmael had not gone astray amid his manifold temptations; and she was comforted for her own sorrow and his. But what would become of him when she was no longer there?

It was a hard trial to her, when she heard Ishmael's call, plaintive and low, sounding round and round the hut through the stillness of a winter's night, and she could not answer it. It would come nearer and nearer, until it seemed as if it were under the very eaves; but if her husband was crouching over the fire, she dared not even open the door to look out. In the black darkness outside the little casement, she could see for a moment the dim outline of her boy's white face gazing through the lattice-panes; and then the long, low, plaintive cry grew fainter, and died away in the woods behind.

"I must tell Nutkin of that owl," said old Humphrey, peevishly.

At last Ruth could go out no more to her hard work, but lay still and almost helpless in her close loft, scarcely able to creep down the ladder to the hearth below.

Old Humphrey could not understand that she was no longer the willing drudge she had been so long. That she should get free from him by death never once crossed his dull brain, soddened by drink. Many a moan he made over his wife's idleness in the sanded kitchen of the Labour in Vain, where he sat now on a corner of a bench farthest from the fire, having only a few pence to spend; he who in better days had been welcome to the best seat, and been most lavish with his money.

But whenever Sunday came, new life seemed to visit Ruth. Whence the strength arose she could not tell; but it never failed her when she got up from her bed, and crept downstairs, and out into the spring sunshine to meet Ishmael. Everybody knew now, except Humphrey, that Ishmael haunted the old home where his mother was dying, but they took no notice except by carrying food, as they said, for old Ruth, though they knew well she could not eat it. Some of the women offered to do any washing they could for her, and made no remark when Ishmael's clothing was among it.

For when we are going down visibly into the dark valley of the shadow of death, those around us look upon us with other eyes, and press upon us some of the kindliness and tenderness which would have made all the pilgrimage of life only a happy journey. Ruth, so long a solitary and sorrowful woman, wondered at the friendliness which gathered about her in her last days.

"It makes home seem sweeter," she said to Ishmael, "to have plenty o' friends, and plenty o' everything else. But if it had always been so, I might never ha' thought as dyin' was like goin' home. I always think as if heaven were home now, Ishmael," she added, a faint smile lighting up her wrinkled face.

She was sitting beside him on the old door-sill for the last time, though that they did not know. For when death is drawing near to any one of us, we do not always know that the last time is come for the old familiar duties and habits of every-day life. It had been a long sunny day in May, but now the twilight was coming on, and every minute made her beloved face more thin and shadowy.

"It feels a'most," she went on falteringly, "like when I was a little girl, and 'ud hear father callin' me in from my play. I'm partly afeared to say it, Ishmael; but it's sometimes as if I could hear the blessed Lord callin', 'Ruth, come to Me, and ye shall find rest.'

"And last night I answered Him out loud, 'Lord, I can't rest because of my lad Ishmael.'

"And it seemed to me as if there came a low quiet voice whispering to me, 'Leave Ishmael to Me. He is My son.'

"And I said to myself, 'The Lord has heard my affliction again.'"

Ishmael sat silent, with his eyes fastened on the pale yellow light in the sky behind the tops of the trees, across which a bat was flitting to and fro; but he did not see the sunset light or the flight of the bat.

"Ay!" she said, almost joyously. "And to-day I knew He'd heard; for Mrs. Clift and Miss Elsie came to see me; and Ishmael, my lad, they brought grand news for thee. They're going away across the seas, to that country where folks go for a better chance than they've got here; and they've promised to take thee with them; for Mrs. Clift said, 'It was all along of Elsie that Ishmael got into trouble and disgrace; and folks won't think badly of him there; and I'll be like a mother to him,' said Mrs. Clift. And I knew then that God had heard my affliction again."

"Oh, mother!" cried Ishmael, "I couldn't leave thee, never; not if the Queen of England sent for me to go!"

"But oh, my lad," she answered, "if the Lord doesn't take me home afore the time comes for thee to go, thee must leave me. Ay, and I should die happier, knowin' thee were safe away, and havin' a chance to be a good man, than leavin' thee here to be tempted and drove into sin. Ishmael, promise me thee 'll go, whether I'm alive or dead, when the time comes. Oh, my dear, dear lad, promise to obey me!"

"I cannot, mother, I cannot!" he sobbed. "I'll go gladly if thee are dead; but so long as thee can speak to me, and I can look at thee, I cannot go."

"They're not goin' afore hay-harvest," she said softly; "and, please God, I may be dead by then."

But as she lay awake at night, thinking of Ishmael, who was sleeping soundly in his old shelter, the cave in the limestone rock, she wondered what would become of him if she could not prevail upon him to leave her for ever, whilst she was still living. There would be no one who loved her to close her dying eyes, and hold her dying hand, and whisper last words of love into her dying ear, if Ishmael were gone. But, oh, how gladly would she rather die in utter loneliness if she knew that he was safe, and would have a new start in life!

The days passed slowly away; and the grass grew in the fields around, and blossomed, and ripened for the scythe: but still life seemed to cling to Ruth, weary as she was to die and set Ishmael free. She could no longer come down the ladder which led to the loft, where she lay in darkness; but whenever Humphrey was away, Ishmael was beside her in the darkness, within reach of her hand, as in the old time when he was a child. There was no stint of food for him now, for Mrs. Clift came every day with Elsie, and Mrs. Chipchase sent from the farm, or called in to see Ruth herself, and neither of them came empty-handed. It was only when the time came each day for him to escape out of the way of his father that he felt himself still an exile from his home.

"I'll not leave thee to-night," he said, one evening when she seemed worse than he had ever seen her before; "I can't leave thee to-night. Maybe thou 'rt dyin'."

"Nay," she answered with a long, low, sad sigh, "nay, Ishmael, there mustn't be a fight 'twixt thy father and thee over my dyin' bed."

"He'll come home drunk," he said almost fiercely; "and I can't leave thee alone with him."

"I'm not afeared to be left alone with thy father," she replied. "He was a good husband to me once, and he'll not be hard with me when I'm dyin'. I wasn't always as good a wife as I might ha' been: and I've a many things to say to him. Hark! They're running to tell thee he's comin' up the lane. Go, Ishmael; kiss me, and go quickly."

"I cannot go!" he cried; clinging to her. "P'r'aps I shall never see thy face again, never! Oh, mother, I cannot go!"

But as he still held her in his arms, and she pushed him feebly away, Elsie's clear young voice was heard in the kitchen below, calling hurriedly.

"Ishmael," she cried, "little Willie Nutkin is lost in the old quarry behind the cave, and we want you. Nutkin, and the squire, and everybody; we all want you."