CHAPTER V

AN ACCIDENT

HAREBELL arrived first at the little cottage the next day. It was a picture, with its thatched roof, and beehives against the wall, and spring bulbs pushing themselves out of the ground. An old bed-ridden woman lived there, with a niece who looked after her.

The oak was magnificent, and spread its branches in all directions. Tom appeared, still smoking his pipe. He looked heavy-eyed and rather surly, but could not keep away from Harebell, and when she presented her rhyme to him, he read it slowly through, weighing every word.

She drew up her pony on the secluded side of the oak-tree. Tom leant against the old trunk, and scratched his head as he slowly read the verses.

"Hum!" he remarked, "I don't understand this here!"

"So never no more Will I cross the door Where beer is sold Till I'm dead and cold."

"Will I be doin' it after I'm dead, d'you mean?"

"Oh no," said Harebell earnestly. "I hope you'll be in heaven then. You see 'cold' goes with 'sold'; if people are dead they're quite cold—my ayah told me they were. It means you'll never go into a public-house for all your life."

"That do seem hard," said Tom thoughtfully; then he read the last two lines and brightened up.

"Aye, that be it, missy. 'I'll go and get a wife.' First-rate poet you be!"

He chuckled and repeated several times:

"Beer, beer, you've spoilt my life, And now I'll go and get a wife."

"Then you'll have a dear little cottage and some work," said Harebell. "Will you promise me you'll say this over, while you walk outside the 'Black Swan' to-day? It's a spell—it will work, I know it will."

Tom rubbed his head again.

Harebell continued:

"You must get the wife you meant to get. She will forgive you. Where is she?"

"Bless yer heart, she married five years ago and is in Canada now, I hear tell, wi' a long fam'ly!"

Harebell's face dropped.

"Well, we must find another. Which shall we find first, Tom? The cottage, or the wife, or the work? Isn't it a pity, people are living here. Oh, look! There's a woman coming out!"

The cottage door had opened, and a young woman came down the path; she had a pleasant smiling face, and carried a basket on her arm. When she reached the gate, she paused. It was in a rotten condition, and one of the hinges was off. She had to untie a piece of rope. Tom looked on with interest.

"Afternoon, Mr. Triggs," the young woman said brightly.

"Arternoon!" was the gruff response. "Seems as if a bit o' carpentering were wanted there."

"I wish you'd come and do it for us. My aunt would be so glad to have it mended."

Tom said nothing.

She waited for a moment, smiled at Harebell, then walked away towards the village. Harebell bent over from her pony and touched Tom's shoulder.

"You've got your work, Tom; you must mend that gate, and give up beer, and next week marry that woman, and then come and live in this cottage! Oh, it's turning out lovely!"

She clapped her hands gaily. Chris started at once for home, but Harebell pulled him in.

"Tom, promise me you will!" she cried. "Promise!"

Tom shook his head. He bent his eyes upon her paper.

"Beer and I can't do without each other!" he muttered.

Then Harebell grew serious.

"Do you know the old woman who lives there? Let's go and see her."

"No, no, I bain't acquainted, I couldn't make so free of her door!"

Harebell was silent; then suddenly her eyes glowed.

"Oh, Tom! Of course there's a better way for you. The door reminds me—you must get through the Door of the Kingdom, and then you'll belong to God, and He will help you. God can do anything, you know."

Tom looked at her in a puzzled sort of way.

Then Harebell began her explanation:

"It's like this," she said, "there's a Door we can't see, but it's wide open and it leads into God's Kingdom. We've all got to go through it. Your sister knows about it, for she told me—and I think I'm through. If you're through you're a subjec'—a King's subjec'—and no King's subjec' could ever get drunk—it would be so disgraceful, wouldn't it? You just walk through, Tom—now at once, where you are—it doesn't take any time."

"I don't know what you be driving at!" said Tom. "What door?"

Harebell bent her head and whispered:

"I must say it very soft to be respeck'ful. It's the Lord Jesus Christ, Tom. I learnt the text, 'I am the Door,' He said, 'by Me, if any man enter in, he shall be saved.' You've got to shut your eyes and hold your arms out, and say very soft: 'Take me through, Jesus, I come to You, and I ask You to take me through!' I did it in bed a few nights ago. I stood right up in bed and did it. And I feel—I feel I'm through!"

Tom gazed at her in silence.

"You get through to-night, Tom. I'm sure Jesus will let you through; He says 'any man,' you see, and I wasn't a man at all, and yet I feel I'm through. You're the proper sort he wants."

Tom turned round.

"Good arternoon, missy—I'll read your po'try, I promise you!"

Harebell looked after his retreating figure wistfully.

"I've muddled it all up, Chris—and I'm sure God can help him better than my spell."

She did not know that her words, "You're the proper sort he wants," rang in poor Tom's ears all that day and night.

"Harebell," said her aunt that same evening, when she was sitting by her side hemming a towel, "I hear you have been seen talking to a man called Tom Triggs, a rough bad man. I shall not be able to let you ride about alone, if you pick up undesirable acquaintances. What possessed you to speak to such a man at all?"

"Oh, Aunt Diana, I'm getting so fond of him! He is so nice to me—and we talk about such interesting things—cottages, and wives, and work, and beer—and even the Kingdom's Door!"

Mrs. Keith looked with cold hard eyes at the little girl.

"Explain yourself more clearly and don't talk so fast. When did you first meet him?"

"He belongs to Miss Triggs. He's her brother, and Mrs. Triggs was angry when I called him wicked. I don't think he's really wicked, Aunt Diana; he wants to give up drinking beer, but he can't. You see, he was going to have a wife once, but she wouldn't marry him, and then he—he went to the devil!"

Harebell's voice sank to an awed whisper.

"I don't know quite what that means but he won't be with the devil any longer if he gets through the Door. I told him about it, and then he went away from me—and I gave him a spell to say about beer—I made it up myself. Would you like to hear it?"

"I cannot have you talking to such men. You must have nothing more to do with him."

"Oh, please let me, Aunt Diana—I'm so very very interested in him! Please don't say I'm not to speak to him. Why, we've thought of a cottage, and a wife, and some work—and if he never touches beer again you'll let me have him for a friend—"

Mrs. Keith's lips compressed themselves together very tightly.

"I never argue. You are never to speak to him again."

Harebell had up to this moment been such a quiet sedate little girl in her aunt's presence that Mrs. Keith hardly realized how deeply things touched her.

Her cheeks crimsoned now and her eyes flashed. She brought down one of her feet on the floor with an angry stamp.

"I shall speak to him! I shall run away from you! I don't like you at all. You aren't a bit kind to me, like Tom Triggs, and I like him ever so much better than I do you!"

Then she dashed down her work and fled from the room, banging the door passionately behind her.

Mrs. Keith sat quite still for a few minutes, then she rang the bell.

Andy appeared with a scared face.

"Send Goodheart to me—"

So Goody was summoned.

"Find Miss Harebell and put her straight to bed. She has been very naughty."

Then Mrs. Keith took up a library book and tried to dismiss her small niece from her mind.

Harebell meanwhile was in the stable, sobbing passionately, with her arms round her pony's neck.

Andy found her and brought her back to the house. She sobbed on till she reached her bedroom, and then flung herself down on the soft woolly rug before the fire, refusing to speak to Goody or to be comforted.

"Whatever have you been doing? You're to go to bed at once," said Goody, looking quite worried, as she drew Harebell towards her and begun brushing out her hair.

"Oh, Aunt Diana is so cruel! She's just breaking my heart, and Tom will never be made good—never, never! Me and him were going to plan it all out, and she says I'm never to speak to him again. I shall! I shall!"

"If it's Tom Triggs you're speaking of, your aunt is quite right. He's not fit to be with a little girl like you!"

"But he's going to be different."

"It's high time he was, but he'll never alter, never!"

Harebell sobbed on miserably.

When Goody told her to say her prayers, she shook her head.

"I don't want to. I feel so wicked, and I won't be good yet. I—I hate Aunt Diana! I wish I had never known her!"

"You're a very naughty little girl," said Goody severely. She did not leave her till she was in bed; then Harebell lay quite still in the dark, and from being very angry, she now began to feel very lonely and frightened.

"God has turned His back on me; I know He has. I believe he has put me outside the Door of His Kingdom. He won't come near me to-night, and He'll take His angels away, and then the devil will come and get hold of me. Oh, what shall I do! I must say my prayers, but I expect I shan't be listened to, as I've been so naughty."

"Say you're sorry and ask to be forgiven," whispered Harebell's conscience.

But she was not ready yet to say that she was sorry.

She began to pity herself.

"Aunt Diana was very provoking, she made me angry; she's unkind; she likes to tell me not to do what I want to do; and me and Tom were going to try to be good, together. She doesn't want Tom to be good, she wants him to be wicked, and she makes me wicked too!"

"She is your aunt and is grown-up; and you're only a little girl, and must do what she tells you," said conscience.

"I won't!" said Harebell, and she said it out loud.

Then the door creaked and slowly opened, and in a panic of fright Harebell hid her head under the clothes.

She heard a slow steady footstep across the room, and then a hand touched the bed. Harebell was beside herself with terror.

"Go away, devil!" she screamed. "I'm going to be good! Oh, God! God, come to me! I'm sorry, I'm sorry! I will be good! Take the devil away!"

The bedclothes were firmly taken away from her head, and Harebell saw through half-shut eyes, her aunt standing with a candle in her hand.

The trembling child put out her hand.

"Oh, please forgive me, Aunt Diana! I'm sorry I was naughty. I'm so glad you're not the devil. I thought it was him!"

Mrs. Keith put her hand on Harebell's forehead; it was moist with perspiration, and the child's face was a deathly white. Her terror had been very real. She clung hold of her aunt's hand.

"Just stay with me. I'm so frightened. I have been so wicked, and I wouldn't say my prayers, and then of course God went away and left me. Do ask him to come back."

"I'm glad to hear you say you are sorry," said Mrs. Keith in a low even tone, "for you quite shocked me by your passion."

"Do forgive me."

"I will let it pass. We will say no more about it."

"Will God forgive me?"

"Ask Him."

"Don't go away just yet. I won't be long."

Mrs. Keith sat down, and Harebell began to whisper in a shaky voice. Then she got out of bed and knelt down, and said her evening prayer.

When she was back in bed again, her aunt stooped down and kissed her.

"Good-night, Harebell. Go to sleep."

Harebell took hold of her hand.

"Do you think God is taking care of me again?"

"Yes."

"Oh, I'm so glad."

Her curly head dropped back on her pillow. Exhausted by her grief and fright, she fell asleep.

The next day found her bright and happy again. She went to her lessons as usual, but just as she was leaving the Rectory, Mr. Garland called her.

"I think you're interested in Tom Triggs, aren't you?" he said. "He has met with an accident, and would like to see you. Would your aunt let you come with me to see him this afternoon? He has been taken to the Cottage Hospital!"

"Oh, poor Tom! What's the matter with him?"

"Well, it seems that he was quite sober. In fact, he had been mending a gate for old Mrs. Crake, and had told her niece he had knocked off the drink altogether. On his way back, a motor swung round the corner and nearly killed a child. He saved the child, but got knocked over himself, and has a leg badly broken."

Tears came into Harebell's eyes.

"Aunt Diana won't let me speak to him ever again. Poor Tom! Is he going to die?"

"I hope not. Shall I come round this afternoon and ask your aunt to let you come with me to see him? I quite understand her not wishing you to be making friends with him, as for some time he has not borne the best of characters. But he is ill now. It makes a difference."

"Please come. I should love to see him!"

"Very well. I shall call about three o'clock."

Harebell returned home partly comforted.

She told her aunt of the accident at dinner-time.

"I hope it may do him good," said Mrs. Keith unsympathetically; "at all events, it will stop his drinking for a time. That poor little sister of his has had a dreadful life of it!"

"He's not going to drink any more," said Harebell with an assured little nod. "Me and him settled he wouldn't."

"You are too small to have anything to say about such things," said Mrs. Keith in her cold lifeless tone.

Harebell was silent. She did not mention the Rector's proposed call, but she ran out to the stable and told Chris the whole story.

"I wish, Chris, that I was grown-up! It must be so lovely to do whatever you like without asking any one! If Aunt Diana doesn't let me go and see him, I shall cry buckets. I feel it coming already!"

The Rector came at three o'clock, and after an interview with Mrs. Keith, Harebell was summoned to the drawing-room.

"You may go to the Cottage Hospital with the Rector," her aunt said. "I do not mind this in the least, but you are not to go again without permission."

So Harebell eagerly promised she would not, and ran off joyfully to get her hat and coat. She chattered incessantly to the Rector the whole way to the hospital, and told him all the conversation she had had with Tom. She even repeated her "spell," as she called it, and Mr. Garland found her very entertaining company.

When they were ushered into the small ward, Harebell's spirits subsided. There were four white beds in a row, and four heads were raised simultaneously to gaze at the visitors. Tom Triggs' bed was farthest off against the wall. He looked quite a different Tom Triggs to Harebell's old friend. This man had a very clean face and tidy hair; but his eyes, as they rested on the little girl's face, had the old familiar twinkle in them.

"Eh, but you're a good little lady to come and see my smash up!" he said.

"Now, Tom," said the Rector pleasantly, "I'm going to read to old Mrs. Green in the next ward; I will leave Miss Harebell to talk to you."

He went away. A sudden fit of shyness seized Harebell. She sat down on a chair by the bedside, and for a moment there was silence.

"Does it hurt very much?" she asked at length.

"Pretty bad just now," was Tom's reply, "but 'tisn't the hurt, 'tis bein' tied by the leg—and having slops to drink, does for me! Now if only you could hand me a tankard o' frothy ale, I'd be spry enough!"

Harebell looked at him gravely.

"But you aren't going to drink any more, Tom?"

"Must drink something—an' tea be just p'ison to my system!"

"You're not going to take any more beer, Tom; we settled you wouldn't!"

"Ay! Don't you call the name to me, for my mouth be fair clamouring for it."

"I expect God made you break your leg!" said Harebell thoughtfully. "He did it to keep you from going to the 'Black Swan'!"

"The cruellest thing that ever happened to me," said Tom, a little surlily.

"Oh no," Harebell said cheerfully; "you'll soon be better, won't you? And then it won't take very long to find a cottage and a wife. I can be doing that while you're in bed. It will be so nice to think about, Tom. What shall you wear for the wedding?"

Tom began to smile.

"White waistcoat!" he said. "And white gloves!"

"And a blue tie," said Harebell. "Sky blue, you know, and a rose in your buttonhole."

"I shall be a reg'lar toff!" said Tom.

Harebell beamed with delight.

"And your wife must be in white, of course. People are always married in white; only I should like a wreath of pink roses round her waist, like a sash, you know. Wouldn't they look pretty?"

"That they would."

"And now, who shall she be?" went on Harebell, a serious gleam coming into her eyes.

"Ah!" said Tom with a little groan. "No lass 'ud have me. That be all past wi' me. Beer be my best and only friend."

He seemed to be in the depths of despair now.

"You mustn't talk like that," remonstrated Harebell. "You're never going to touch beer again."

"I shall die if I don't!"

"Oh, Tom, that's really wicked! Have you got through the Door yet?"

"No, nor never shall!" groaned Tom.

Harebell looked down upon him in silence.

Then she said:

"I'm not to speak to you ever again Aunt Diana says, when you get well; it will be dreadful. She doesn't mind to-day when you're ill. What shall we do, Tom?"

"Why ain't you to speak to me?"

"Because you drink beer, I s'pose."

"But if I ain't going to touch of it agen?"

"If you had a wife and a cottage," said Harebell craftily, "I'm sure I could come and see you then. You will let me find them for you, Tom, won't you?"

"Oh, I'll give you leave to look for 'em!" Tom's eyes were twinkling again. He added:

"My little sister come to see me this morning!"

"Oh, did she? I quite forgot about her, and what does your mother think of your accident?"

"She's proper upset. Hessie be too good for her'n me. Mother says she'd like to get away from her times, and that's what I feels, too!"

"I love Miss Triggs! I think she's sweet!"

Harebell was very loyal to her friends. Then, with a child's pertinacity, she came back to the subject that never left her thoughts.

"You must get through that Door, Tom; you can get through, as you lie in bed."

Tom's eyes looked wistful, but his lips smiled.

"That there Door you talk of so much is locked agen me!"

"Oh no, I'm sure it isn't! It's wide open and you'll never want to drink beer, if you're through," said Harebell.

"Now don't you want to be bad at times?" said Tom.

The colour rose in Harebell's cheeks.

"Yes, and I am bad, too. It's dreadful of me, but I'm usually sorry after, and you know God does forgive people."

"If I went right into heaven to-day," said Tom solemnly, "I should want my beer."

"You're disgustin'!" said Harebell, with emphatic scorn.

Tom looked ashamed of himself.

Their talk was over, for the Rector came in; he had a word or two with Tom, and then brought Harebell away. She was very downhearted.

"Tom will never be good. He doesn't want to be—"

"He's like a crooked tree," said the Rector. "He has been crooked so long that no one can make him straight."

"Nobody but God."

"No one but God, little one. You are right. You must pray for him."

Harebell nodded and did not speak much till she reached home.