The Vast Abyss

“What nonsense!” he said half aloud; and then he burst into a merry laugh, which ceased as he heard what sounded like a mocking echo, and a long-tailed black and white bird flew out of a fir-tree, with the sun glistening upon its burnished green and purple tail feathers. “Why it’s a magpie!” he cried, and another flew out to follow the first.

As he stood watching them, his eyes rested upon a flashing of water here and there, showing where a stream ran winding through the shallow valley; while a couple of miles beyond it he could trace the railway now by a heavy goods train panting slowly along, with the engine funnel leaving a long train of white flocculent steam behind.

“Oh, it’s lovely,” he said softly. “Who could help being happy down here!”

There was rather a swelling in his throat, for he felt the change for a few moments. But the next minute the exploring desire was strong upon him, and he plunged in amongst the bronze, pillar-like stems of the fir-trees, and began wandering on and on in a kind of twilight, flecked and cut by vivid rays of sunshine, which came through the dense, dark-green canopy overhead. The place was full of attractions to such a newly-released prisoner, and his eyes were everywhere, now finding something to interest him in the thick soft carpet of pine-needles over which his feet glided. Then he caught sight of a squirrel which ran up a fir-tree, and stopped high up to watch the intruder. Then he came to an open place where trees had been felled; the stumps and chips dotted the ground, and bluebells had sprung up abundantly, along with patches of briar and heath revelling in the sunshine.

Here the sandy ground was showing soft and yellow in places, where it had been lately turned over, and in a minute or two he knew what by, for a rabbit sprang up from close to his feet, ran some fifty yards, and disappeared in a burrow; while from the trees beyond came a series of harsh cries, and he caught sight of half-a-dozen jays jerking themselves along, following one another in their soft flight, and showing the pure white patch just above their tails.

“There must be snakes and hedgehogs, and all kinds of wild things here,” thought Tom, with all a boy’s eagerness for country sights and sounds; “and look at that!”

He obeyed his own command, stopping short to watch, as he heard first a peculiar squealing sound, and directly after saw another rabbit come loping into sight, running in and out among the pine stumps, and keeping up the pitiful squealing sound as it ran.

“Must have been that,” he thought; and he was about to run after it, when he suddenly saw something small and elongated appear among the bluebells. For a moment it appeared to be a large snake making its way unnaturally in an undulating, vertical way, instead of horizontally; but he directly after made out that it was a weasel in pursuit of the rabbit, going steadily along, evidently hunting by scent, and the next minute it had disappeared.

“I must not go much further,” thought Tom after a while. “I ought to be back punctually to breakfast, and get my boots cleaned first.”

He looked down at them, to see that the dew and sand had taken off all the polish, and stepping out now, he hurried for a mound, intending to make it the extent of his journey, and walk back from there to the village.

The mound was pine-crowned, and he had nearly reached the top, noting that the sand was liberally burrowed by rabbits, when all at once one of the little white-tailed creatures darted over the top into sight and rushed towards him; there was another rush, a big dog came into sight, overtook the rabbit before it could take refuge in a hole; there was a craunch, a squeal, and the dog was trotting back with the little animal drooping down on each side from its steel-trap jaws, quite dead.

“Poor rabbit,” muttered Tom. “Why, it’s that boy’s dog.”

He increased his pace, following the dog up the sandy mound; while the animal paid no heed to him, but went steadily on, with its thin, greyhound-like, bony tail hanging in a curve, till reaching the highest part of the eminence, the forepart with the rabbit disappeared, and then the tail curved up for a moment in the air and was gone.

Tom Blount felt interested, and hurried up now over the sand and fir-needles, till his head was above the top of the slope; and the next minute he was looking down at the back of the dog’s master, as he was calmly stuffing the body of the defunct rabbit inside the lining of his coat, a slit in which served for a pocket. The dog was looking on, and just in front lay another rabbit, while a couple of yards away there was a hole scratched beneath the root of a tree, and the clean yellow sand scattered all about over the fir-needles.

The next moment Tom’s sharp eyes detected that a couple of holes near at hand were covered with pieces of net, one of which suddenly began to move, and the dog drew its master’s attention by giving a short low bark.

The warning had its effect, for the lad rose from his knees, stepped to the hole, and picked up something which Tom saw at once to be a long, reddish, writhing ferret. This snaky animal the lad thrust into his breast, stuffed the little piece of net into his pocket, picked up three more scraps from the mouths of other holes, and finally took the rabbit from the ground to pack inside his jacket lining, when the dog caught sight of Tom, and gave a sharp, angry bark.

The boy looked round, saw that he was observed, and started to run. But realising the next moment who it was, he hesitated, stopped, and hurriedly getting the second rabbit out of sight, put on a defiant air.

Tom smiled to himself.

“Poaching, or he wouldn’t have begun to run. – I say,” he said aloud, “whose wood is this?”

“What’s that got to do with you?” cried the lad insolently. “’Tain’t yours. And just you lookye here, if I ketches you sneaking arter and watching me again, I’ll give you something as’ll make that other side o’ your face look swelled.”

Tom involuntarily raised his hand to a tender spot on his right cheek, left from his encounter with his cousin, and the lad grinned.

“No, not that side, t’other,” said the fellow. “Now then, just you hook it. You ’ain’t no business here.”

“As much business as you have,” said Tom stoutly, for the lad’s manner made his blood begin to flow more freely.

“No, you ’ain’t; you’re only a stranger, and just come.”

“Anybody must have a right to come through here so long as he isn’t poaching.”

The lad gave a sharp look round, and then turned menacingly to Tom, with his fist doubled, and thrust his face forward.

“Just you say as I’ve been poaching agen, and I’ll let you know.”

His manner was so menacing that the dog read war, and set up a few hairs on the back of his neck, and uttered a low snarl.

“Yes, and I’ll set the dog at yer too. Who’s been poaching? Just you say that again.”

“You look as if you had,” said Tom stoutly, but with a very uncomfortable feeling running through him, for the dog’s teeth were white and long, and looked just the kind to get a good hold of a running person’s leg.

“Oh, I do, do I?” said the lad. “I’ll soon let you know about that. Just you tell tales about me, and I’ll half smash yer. I don’t know as I won’t now.”

His manner was more menacing than ever, and Tom was beginning to feel that he would be compelled to place himself upon his defence, and signalise his coming to Furzebrough with another encounter, when, faintly-heard, came the striking of a church clock, borne on the soft morning breeze, arousing Tom to the fact that he must be a good way on towards an hour’s walk back to his uncle’s, and bringing up memories of his punctuality.

“Mustn’t be late the first morning,” he thought, just as the young rabbit poacher gave him a thrust back with his shoulder, and turning sharply he darted among the trees, and began to run toward his new home.

“Yah! coward!” was yelled after him, and a lump of sandy iron-stone struck him full in the back, making him wince; but he did not stop, only dodged in and out among the pine-trees, taking what he believed to be the right direction for the village. Then he ran faster, for he heard his assailant’s voice urging on the dog.

“Ciss! Fetch him, Bob!” and glancing over his shoulder, he saw that the mongrel-looking brute was in full pursuit, snarling and uttering a low bark from time to time.

Tom’s first and natural instinct was to run faster, in the hope that the dog would soon weary of the pursuit, and faster he did run, suffering from an unpleasant feeling of fear, for it is by no means pleasant to have a powerful, keen-toothed dog at your heels, one that has proved its ability to bite, and evidently intending to repeat the performance.

Tom ran, and the dog ran, and the latter soon proved that four legs are better for getting over the ground than two; for the next minute he was close up, snapping at the boy’s legs, leaping at his hands, and sending him into a profuse perspiration.

“Ciss! fetch him down, boy!” came from a distance, and the dog responded by a bark and a snap at Tom’s leg, which nearly took effect as he ran with all his might, and made him so desperate that he suddenly stopped short as the dog made a fresh snap, struck against him, and then from the effort rolled over and over on the ground.

Before it could gather itself up for a fresh attack Tom, in his desperation, stooped down and picked up the nearest thing to him – to wit, a good-sized fir-cone, which he hurled at the dog with all his might. It was very light, and did not hit its mark, but the young poacher’s dog was a bad character, and must have known it. Certainly it had had stones thrown at it before that morning, and evidently under the impression that it was about to have its one eye knocked out or its head split, it uttered a piercing whining cry, tucked its thin tail between its legs, and began to run back toward its master as fast as it could go, chased by another fir-cone, which struck the ground close by it, and elicited another yelp.

Tom laughed, and at the same time felt annoyed with himself.

“Why didn’t I do it at first?” he said; “and that isn’t the worst of it – that fellow will think I ran away because I was afraid of him.”

This last thought formed the subject upon which Tom dwelt all the way back, and he was still busy over an argument with himself as to whether he had been afraid of the young poacher or no, when, after missing the way two or three times among the firs, he caught sight of the church clock pointing to a quarter to eight.

“Just time to get in,” he said, as he increased his pace; and then – “Yes, I suppose it was afraid of him, for he is a good deal bigger and stronger than I am.”

“Hullo, Tom! been for a walk?” saluted him, as he was hurrying at last along the lane which divided his uncle’s grounds from the new purchase.

Tom looked up quickly, and found that Uncle Richard was looking over the wall of the mill-yard.

“That’s right,” continued his uncle. “What do you think of the place?”

“Glorious!” said Tom.

“Hungry?”

“Terribly, uncle.”

“That’s right. Come along, Mrs Fidler’s waiting for us by now.”

Chapter Ten

Directly after breakfast Tom followed his uncle to the coach-house, and from there up a ladder fastened to the side into the loft, where he looked around wonderingly, while his companion’s face relaxed into a grim smile.

“It was originally intended for botanical productions, Tom,” he said; “for a sort of hortus siccus, if you know what that means.”

“Hortus– garden; siccus– I don’t know what that means, uncle, unless it’s dry.”

“That’s right, boy. Glad you know some Latin beside the legal. Dry garden, as a botanist calls it, where he stores up his specimens. But only a few kinds were kept here: hay, clover, oats, and linseed, in the form of cake. Now, you see, I’ve turned it into use for another science.”

“Astronomy, uncle?”

“To be sure; but it’s very small and inconvenient. But wait till we get the windmill going.”

“Is this your telescope?” cried Tom.

“Yes, Tom; but it’s too small. You’ll have to work hard on my big one.”

“Yes, uncle,” said Tom, with quiet confidence, as he eagerly examined the glass with its mounting, and the many other objects about the place, one of which was a kind of trough half full of what seemed to be beautifully clear water, covered with a sheet of plate-glass.

“There, as soon as you’ve done we’ll go to the mill, for I don’t want to lose any time.”

“I could stay here for hours, uncle,” said Tom. “I want to know what all these things are for, and how you use them; but I’m ready now.”

“That’s right. The men are coming this morning to begin clearing away.”

“So soon, uncle?”

“Yes, so soon. Life’s short, Tom; and at my age one can’t afford to waste time. Come along.”

Tom began thinking as he followed his uncle, for his words suggested a good deal, inasmuch as he had been exceedingly extravagant with the time at his disposal, and much given to wishing the tedious hours to go by.

“Here they are,” said Uncle Richard; for there was the sound of a horse’s hoofs, and the crushing noise made by wheels in the lane.

“But I thought you were going to make the place into an observatory yourself, uncle, with me to help you?”

Uncle Richard smiled.

“It would be wasting valuable time, Tom,” he said, “even if we could do it; but we could not. I’ve thought it over, and we shall have to content ourselves with making the glass.”

On reaching the mill-yard it was to find half-a-dozen people there with ladders, scaffold-poles, ropes, blocks, and pulleys. There was a short consultation, and soon after the men began work, unbolting the woodwork of the sails, while others began to disconnect the millstones from the iron gearing.

This business brought up all the idlers of the village, who hung about looking on – some in a friendly way, others with a sneering look upon their countenances, as they let drop remarks that contained anything but respect for the owner of the place. But though they were careful not to let them reach Uncle Richard’s ears, it seemed to Tom that more than once an extra unpleasant speech was made expressly for him to hear; and he coloured angrily as he felt that these people must know why the mill was being dismantled.

The work went on day after day, and first one great arm of the mill was lowered in safety, the others following, to make quite a stack of wood in a corner of the yard, but so arranged that one side touched the brickwork, as there was no need to leave room now for the revolution of the sails.

By this time the building had assumed the appearance of a tower, whose sides curved up to the wooden dome top, and the resemblance was completed as soon as the fan followed the sails.

Meanwhile the iron gearing connected with the stones had been taken down inside; then the stones had followed, being lowered through the floors into the basement, and from thence carefully rolled, to be leaned up against the wall.

“Hah!” said Uncle Richard, “at the end of a week,” as he went up to the top-floor of the mill with his nephew.

“Is it only a week, uncle?” said Tom. “Why, it seems to me as if I had been here for a month.”

“So long and tedious, boy?”

“Oh no, uncle,” said Tom confusedly. “I meant I seem to have been here so long, and yet the time has gone like lightning.”

“Then you can’t have been very miserable, my boy?”

“Miserable!” cried Tom.

That was all; and Uncle Richard turned the conversation by pointing to the roof.

“There,” he said, “that used to swing round easily enough with the weight of those huge sails, which looked so little upon the mill, but so big when they are down. It ought to move easily now, boy.”

Tom tried, and found that the whole of the wooden top glided round upon its pivot with the greatest ease.

“Yes, that’s all very well,” said his uncle, “but it will have to be disconnected from the mill-post. I shall want that to bear the new glass.”

“That?” said Tom, gazing at the huge beam which went down through the floor right to the basement of the mill.

“Yes, boy; that will make a grandly steady stand when wedged tight. To a great extent this place is as good as if it had been built on purpose for an observatory. I shall be glad though when we get rid of the workmen, and all the litter and rubbish are cleared away.”

That afternoon a couple of carpenters began work, devoting themselves at first to the wooden dome-like roof, which they were to furnish from top to bottom with a narrow shutter, so formed that it could be opened to turn right over on to the roof, leaving a long slip open to the sky.

That night, after he had gone up to his bedroom, Tom threw open his window, to sit upon the ledge, reaching out so as to have a good look at the sky which spread above, one grand arch of darkest purple spangled with golden stars. To his right was the tower-like mill, and behind it almost the only constellation that he knew, to wit, Charles’s Wain, with every star distinct, even to the little one, which he had been told represented the boy driving the horses of the old northern waggon.

“How thick the stars are to-night,” he thought, as he traced the light clusters of the Milky Way, noting how it divided in one place into two. Then he tried to make out the Little Bear and failed, wondered which was the Dog Star, Venus, Jupiter, and Saturn, and ended by giving his ear a vicious rub.

“A fellow don’t seem to know anything,” he thought. “How stupid I must seem to Uncle Richard. But I mean to know before I’ve done. Hark!”

He listened attentively, for in the distance a nightingale was singing, and the sweet notes were answered from somewhere beyond, and again and again at greater distances still, the notes, though faint, sounding deliciously pure and sweet.

“Who would live in London?” he said to himself; and a curiously mingled feeling of pleasure and sadness came over him, as he dwelt upon his position now, and how happy life had suddenly become.

“And I thought of running away,” he said softly, as he looked down now at the dimly-seen shrubs about the lawn. “Uncle Richard doesn’t seem to think I’m such a fool. Wonder whether I can learn all about the stars.”

Just then he yawned, for it was past ten, and the house so quiet that he felt sure that his uncle had gone to bed.

“Yes, I’ll learn all about them and surprise him,” he said. “There are plenty of books in the study. Then I shall not seem so stupid when we begin. What’s that?”

He had put out his candle when he opened the casement to look at the stars, so that his room was all dark, and he was just about to close the window, and hurry off his clothes, when a faint clinking sound struck upon his ear.

The noise came from the mill-yard to his right, where he could dimly make out the outlines of the building against the northern sky; and it sounded as if some of the ironwork which had been taken down – bolts, nuts, bands, and rails – and piled against the wall had slipped a little, so as to make a couple of the pieces clink.

“That’s what it is,” thought Tom, and he reached out to draw in his casement window, when he heard the sound again, a little louder.

“Cat walking over the iron,” thought Tom; but the noise came again, only a faint sound, but plain enough in the stillness of the night.

All at once a thought came which sent the blood flushing up into the boy’s cheeks, and nailed him, as it were, to the window.

“There’s some one in the yard stealing the old iron.”

The lad’s heart began to beat heavily, and thoughts came fast. Who could it be? Some one who knew where it all was, and meant to sell it. Surely it couldn’t be David!

Tom leaned out, gazing in the direction of the sounds, which still continued, and he made out now that it was just as if somebody was hurriedly pulling bolts and nuts out of a heap, and putting them in a bag or a sack.

Hot with indignation, as soon as he had arrived at this point, against whoever it could be who was robbing his uncle, Tom half turned from the window to go and wake him.

No, he would not do that. It must be some one in the village, and if he could find out who, that would be enough, and he could tell his uncle in the morning.

Tom had only been a short time at Furzebrough, but it was long enough to make him know many of the people at sight, and, in spite of the darkness, he fancied that he would be able to recognise the marauder if he could get near enough.

He did not stop to think. There was a heavy trellis-work covered with roses and creepers all over his side of the house, and the sill of his window was not much over ten feet from the flower-beds below.

He had no cap up-stairs, and he was in his slippers, but this last was all the better, and with all a boy’s activity he climbed out of the window, got a good hold of the trellis, felt down with his feet for a place, and descended with the greatest ease, avoided the narrow flower border by a bit of a spring, and landed upon David’s carefully-kept grass.

Here for a moment or two he paused.

The gate would be locked at night, and it would be better to get out at the bottom of the garden.

Satisfied with this, he set off at a trot, the velvety grass deadening his steps. Then, getting over the iron hurdle, he passed through a bit of shrubbery, found a thick stick, and got over the palings into the lane.

Here he had to be more cautious, for he wanted to try and make out who was the thief without being seen, and perhaps getting a crack over the head, as he put it, with a piece of iron.

The lane would not do, and besides, the gate would be locked, and the wall awkward to climb.

Another idea suggested itself, and stopping at the end of the mill-yard, he passed into a field, and with his heart increasing its pulsations, partly from exertion, as much as from excitement, he hurried round on tiptoe to the back of the mill-yard, and cautiously raising himself up, peered over the top of the wall, and listened.

To his disappointment, he found that though he could look over the top of the wall, it was only at the mill – all below in the yard was invisible, but the place was all very still now. Not a sound fell upon his ear for some minutes, and then a very faint one, which sounded like a load being lifted from the top of the wall, but right away down by where he had entered the field.

Tom stole back, bending low the while, but saw nothing, nobody was carrying a burden, and he was getting to be in despair, when all at once there was the sound of a stifled sneeze, evidently from far along the lane.

That was enough. Tom was back in the lane directly, keeping close to the hedge, and following, he believed, some one who was making his way from the village out toward the open country.

At the end of a minute he was sure that some one was about thirty yards in front of him, and perfectly certain directly after that whoever it was had turned off to the right along a narrow path between two hedges which bounded the bottom of his uncle’s field.

The path led round to the outskirts of the village, where there were some scattered cottages beyond the church, and feeling sure that the thief – if it was a thief – was making for there, Tom followed silently, guided twice over by a faint sniff, and pausing now and then to listen for some movement which he heard, the load the marauder carried brushing slightly against the hedge.

Then all at once the sounds ceased, and though Tom went on and on, and stopped to listen again and again, he could hear nothing. He hurried on quickly now, but felt that nobody could be at hand, and hurried back, peering now in the darkness to try and make out where the object of his search had struck off from the narrow way.

But in the obscurity he could make out nothing, for he was very ignorant about this track, never having been all along it before; and at last, thoroughly discouraged, he went back, growing more and more annoyed at his ill-success, and wishing he had made a rush and seized the thief at once.

And now, feeling thoroughly tired, as well as damped in his ardour, Tom reached the paling, climbed over into the shrubbery, reached the lawn, over which he walked slowly toward the darkened house, where he paused, and reached over to grasp the stout trellis, and spare David’s flower-bed.