Into The Highways And Hedges - free ebook by F. F. (Frances Frederica) Montrésor

Into the Highways & Hedges

SEVENTH EDITION London 1896 HUTCHINSON &amp; CO. 34 PATERNOSTER ROW "Let a man contend to the uttermost for his life's set prize, be it what it will." Dedicated TO MY MOTHER...

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PREFACE.

This is not meant to be a controversial novel. I by no means agree with all Barnabas Thorpe's opinions. Nevertheless I believe that the men who fight for their ideals have been, and always will be, the saving element in a world which happily has never yet been left without them. Before and since the days when Socrates found that it was "impossible to live a quiet life, for that would be to disobey the deity," there have always been some souls who have counted it worth while to lose all else, if

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CHAPTER I.

The woman whose story is written here, was in the fulness of her youth some fifty years ago. She is dead now, and so are the two men who loved her best, who would each, according to his lights, have given his life for her happiness. Her name is inscribed in the family Bible, that holds on its flyleaf the generation of Deanes, but there is a thick stroke through it, which almost obliterates the delicate characters, and there is no record either of her marriage or of her death. She made a great mi

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CHAPTER II.

The madman saith he says so—It is strange! Margaret was not brought out till she was nearly twenty. "She was ridiculously young for her age," her aunt said; "besides, three unmarried nieces were too many, and Margaret was so unsteady that the least taste of excitement turned her head." There was reason in all her remarks. A very little change excited Meg, as a very little champagne will excite habitual water-drinkers, and she was remarkably youthful in her enthusiasms. Laura and Kate became enga

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CHAPTER III.

Dover was unusually gay in the year when Barnabas Thorpe held his revival meetings there. Mr. Deane gave a large ball at Ravenshill, all the county magnates attended, and the guests danced in the old picture gallery. It was a remarkably pretty entertainment, and the host and his three daughters were worthy descendants of the ruffled and powdered Deanes who looked down on them from the walls. They were a stately family. Mrs. Russelthorpe herself was a most dignified woman, and Kate and Margaret h

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CHAPTER IV.

It was Meg's twenty-first birthday. She woke early, and went into the garden while the dew was still thick on the grass, and there was a wet haze, precursor of a broiling day, over everything. "How old I am growing!" she thought, as she shut the door softly behind her and smiled with pleasure, and a most youthful sense of adventure, at being out at that hour. She buried her nose in a cluster of seven-sister roses, and their fragrant wet little faces covered hers with dew. Meg was too fond of flo

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CHAPTER V.

So Margaret Deane was numbered amongst Barnabas Thorpe's converts; and of all the inexplicable miracles that the man was said to work, society counted that the most extraordinary. Mrs. Russelthorpe was not a popular woman, and she was too proud to elicit much sympathy; but, on the whole, public opinion sided with her, rather than with her niece. Barnabas Thorpe was essentially the people's preacher; and even his greatest admirers felt that it was unbecoming of him "to try and convert the gentry"

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CHAPTER VI.

Uncle Russelthorpe sat alone in his library on the evening of the ball: the habit of shuffling out of family gatherings had grown on him, his queer slip-shod figure was seldom seen beyond its own precincts now. His distaste for his wife increased with increasing age, and her loud voice and rather aggressive strength jarred more on him. Perhaps, after all, Meg's was not the saddest tragedy in that house; for it is better to burn than to rot, and it is doubtful whether the over-hasty actors who br

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CHAPTER VII.

The events of that evening followed on each other so quickly that it seemed to Meg afterwards as if she had been impelled by some power outside herself, though whether of Heaven or hell she doubted later in life. She heard the crunch of gravel under the carriage wheels, as her aunt drove away to the ball over which they had had such contention; then she dried her eyes and drew a breath of relief. Meg always felt happier when Mrs. Russelthorpe was out of the house; and her antipathy was the more

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CHAPTER I.

Ravenshill was shut up after its brief season of gaiety, and the Deanes came back to it no more. Margaret's father felt very bitterly the blow that had fallen on him. Both his affection and his pride were outraged; and he was wanting in neither quality, though, in the first shock of the news, the latter seemed to outweigh the former. That Meg, his special pet, his favourite daughter, of whose beauty he had been so proud, whose very failings were so like his own that he had felt them a subtle for

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CHAPTER II.

She has tied a knot with her tongue that she'll not undo with her teeth. Caulderwell Farm is built on the edge of the "flats". All round it, in the days of which I write, was unreclaimed land—broad salt marshes, where the water crept slowly up at high tide, oozing between the rank grass and the sand banks, where the wild ducks nested and the frogs croaked. Fresh-water springs there were too, making tender green splotches in the midst of the redder salt-fed vegetation, and deep black pools, that

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CHAPTER III.

But the living out was difficult. Meg awoke at the farm. After the strange and wonderful journey by the side of the preacher; after the days of wandering over hill and dale, with exhausted body, but with mind so fixed on the vision beautiful, that she would not have been surprised at any moment had the clouds parted, and the second coming of the Lord blazed forth; after that curious "intoxication" of the soul that such natures as hers seem liable to,—she "came to herself" in the old house among

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CHAPTER IV.

The churchyard of Lupcombe joins the vicarage garden, and slopes downhill to it. First comes the church on the top of the hill, with its squat square tower, weather-beaten and sturdy; then the churchyard, the God's acre, in which a large proportion of the graves bear the date of the terrible fever year; then the parson's house and the doctor's; and then the irregularly flagged village street which runs to the bottom of the hill. The parson stood by the grave of his first-born, one May afternoon.

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CHAPTER V.

"A small piece of good fortune having fallen to Mrs. Thorpe's share, it's really time that her old acquaintances should ask what has become of her, isn't it?" said Mr. Sauls. He was standing in Laura Ashford's drawing-room, whither he had come to extract any knowledge she might possess as to her sister's whereabouts. Unfortunately she knew nothing. "I am very glad that my poor old uncle has left Meg that money," said Laura; "and that you mean to see that she gets it. Her cause is in good hands."

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CHAPTER VI.

Mrs. Tremnell sat in her room staring at a bit of a letter that lay before her, an expression of half horror, half doubt on her face. She had never said in her heart that she disliked Margaret; she was not the kind of person to look at her feelings boldly, or to own to experiencing either love or hate in undue degree. She had never consciously gone further than "not thinking much of the preacher's wife," or "hoping that Barnabas would not have cause to repent"; but Meg's reserve had chafed her,

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CHAPTER VII.

Tom had taught Meg to drive a little; she managed to harness Molly with some difficulty, and started on the long, lonely road across the marshes, without any fears. She was never afraid of bodily danger. She was not a good driver, her wrists were too weak; they ached painfully before she was a quarter of the way to N——town, and Molly began to feel them "give," and pulled the harder, recognising that the person at the other end of the reins had not so tight a hand as Tom. Another hour passed; Meg

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CHAPTER VIII.

As for Meg, she turned her face towards the farm again, and of that journey back she never liked to think so long as she lived. There are griefs we outlive, whose dead faces we can bear to look on, recognising that they are dead; but there are some hours of pain we can never look at overmuch, even through the merciful veil of many years, as there are some joys which we know will be ours always, so long as we are ourselves, those sharpest pains and joys which touch the eternal in us, and make us

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CHAPTER IX.

It was the last day of August. The London plane trees were beginning to shed their leaves, that were choked with the season's dust; the air was still and hot, the West End nearly deserted. The hatchment, that had been put up on Mr. Russelthorpe's death, still hung in Bryanston Square, but fresh straw was laid down in the street. This time, at least, all that the living could do to keep out death was being done. Mr. Deane had had a relapse after the journey to London. Two nurses were in attendanc

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CHAPTER X.

It takes two to speak truth—one to speak and another to hear. It was mid-day when Margaret woke; the day after her fruitless expedition to her father, after the terrible night which had left its traces on both her soul and body. She had slept for twelve hours and woke refreshed, but still aching from the effects of cold and exposure. She felt as if she had been beaten violently, and she dressed herself with some difficulty. Mrs. Tremnell had brought a cup of tea to her room, and tried to persuad

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CHAPTER XI.

After the storm there was a calm. Margaret lay on the settle in the farm kitchen recovering slowly from a sharp attack of marsh fever, and declaring in apparent jest, that had more than a substratum of truth, that she was in no hurry to get well. "Some people hate being waited on and made a fuss over," she said; "but I really like it; I like it when Tom brings me books, and Mr. Thorpe flowers, and Cousin Tremnell tats lace caps for me. You are all so nice when I am ill, that I don't see why I sh

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CHAPTER XII.

"What had the fellow meant?" George puzzled over that point on his way back to N——town. It had been more than a mere ranting denunciation of the "rich man" as a "rich man". The indignation had been evidently personal to himself. "If I'd been here, I'd not ha' let my wife sit at table wi' ye! It passes me that ye are not ashamed to come to this county again." How did the man know that he had ever been before? To tell the truth, Mr. Sauls had once or twice felt in Meg's presence a little ashamed o

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CHAPTER I.

Barnabas Thorpe stood preaching by the river. He had preached in northern manufacturing towns, where the struggle for life is hard; he had preached by the sea shore, and in little outlying hamlets in the mining districts; but he had spoken nowhere as he spoke to-day in London. This city, of great wealth and great poverty; of idlers and slaves; these churches, where the rich man sat on cushioned seats, and the poor man on benches hard as charity; these women, with hoarse voices and hungry eyes, w

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CHAPTER II.

A week had gone by, and Margaret was still at Bryanston Square. She had lost count of time; she could not have told how long ago she had left the preacher on the threshold of the old house in which her childhood and girlhood had been passed. "Ye'll find me when ye want me. Ye'd best stay wi' him till th' end," Barnabas had said. He had caught a glimpse of the grand hall, of the painted walls and ceilings; then the door had shut between them, and he had turned away rather grimly. Those heathen go

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CHAPTER III.

While Mr. Deane's life was ebbing slowly away in Bryanston Square, George Sauls was making a good fight for his at the farm. Tom Thorpe had found him on the afternoon of the preacher's departure, the sun shining down pitilessly on the upturned face, the arms spread wide. Lifting him up, Tom found the wound at the back of the head, made with a bill-hook or hatchet. Whoever had done that, had also turned his victim over to rifle the pockets; for a man hit from behind would naturally fall on his fa

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CHAPTER IV.

Meg sat in the nursery in Laura's home, with Laura's child on her lap. The child had been ailing, but had finally fallen asleep with his head on her shoulder. Margaret was fond of children, and little boys especially generally took to her. This year-old baby, who was too young to regard her with wonder or pity, was a comfort to her, and she felt most at ease in his society. Laura was kind, but brimming over with unspoken questions; and Laura's husband obviously patronised the "poor thing" who ha

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CHAPTER V.

It was on a close breathless day in September that Meg first saw Newgate. Nearly fifty years have wrought many changes for the better (as well as some few for the worse) in London. The Holborn Tom and Meg Thorpe walked down was more unsavoury, noisier, and far less regulated as to traffic than the Holborn of to-day. The immense flow of people, the street cries, the jostling and bustling, were new to Meg; for, though she had lived in London half her life, she had never seen this side of it before

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CHAPTER VI.

Mr. Sauls returned to town, looking a great deal the worse for his expedition into the wilds of L——shire. Had he followed his natural inclination, he would have held his tongue on the subject of the sensational episode that had led to the preacher's arrest; but, seeing that the tale must become public property, he took the initiative himself, spreading the version he wished to be popular. Mr. Sauls' deserved success in life had always been largely owing to the fact that he never hesitated to thr

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CHAPTER VII.

Barnabas Thorpe had been blessed all his life with a physique that was strong enough to bear the exactions of his spirit. In this respect he had been remarkably fortunate. But, after all, his body was made of flesh and blood; and flesh and blood give way at last. It was a great source of grief to him that he could no longer heal as he had once healed; that strange power seemed to have, in a large measure, left him. "May be it's because I am not fit to ha' it," he said sadly. "One who hates his b

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CHAPTER VIII.

Mr. Sauls took the doctor's hint, and risked no broken bones. "I might have a remarkable piece of evidence as to the excellence of that charming family's temper," he remarked; "but it's not worth while being mobbed for that. I wonder Tom Thorpe is such a fool!" "Mrs. Thorpe sent you the warning," said the doctor. "Did she?" said George, rather surprised. "Ah! she saw if Mr. Tom broke my head afresh, he'd help to damn the preacher." He opined justly enough. Love and hate had arrived for once at t

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CHAPTER IX.

Lead me, O Zeus, and thou, Destiny, whithersoever ye have appointed me to go, and may I follow fearlessly. But, if in an evil mind I be unwilling, still must I follow. — Epictetus. But honest men's words are Stygian oaths, and promises inviolable. — Sir Thomas Browne. George Sauls was enjoying himself in Newgate. Not that he had either fallen foul of the law, or been seized with the prevailing fashionable craze that made the old prison a sensational sight for fine ladies and gentlemen just then.

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CHAPTER X.

"I thought I'd ha' to die without this," said Barnabas. "Now—I am content." He was sitting on the bench under the narrow barred window, which was high above their heads. The winter sun was setting through a lifting haze of fog; it threw a faint red gleam on the stone wall, and touched the heads of the man and woman who were making love in the condemned cell. Is there any place, short of the grave, where men have never made love? "Hush!" said Meg. " We have met life, not death, to-day." The last

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THE END.

A FEW PRESS OPINIONS ON INTO THE HIGHWAYS and HEDGES Academy. "This book is so admirably conceived and written that Mr. Montrésor's next venture must excite unusual interest." Speaker. "This book will undoubtedly rank high amongst the notable novels of 1895." Athenæum. "Whoever wrote 'Into the Highways and Hedges' wrote no common novel. A touch of idealism, of nobility of thought and purpose, mingled with an air of reality and well-chosen expression, are the most notable features of a book that

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