'Then I saw—then, they say, she had to brace back same as if she was wadin' in tide–water; for the Pharisees just about flowed past her—down the beach to the boat, I dunnamany of 'em—with their wives an' childern an' valooables, all escapin' out of cruel Old England. Silver you could hear chinkin', an' liddle bundles hove down dunt on the bottom–boards, an' passels o' liddle swords an' shields raklin', an' liddle fingers an' toes scratchin' on the boatside to board her when the two sons pushed her off. That boat she sunk lower an' lower, but all the Widow could see in it was her boys movin' hampered–like to get at the tackle. Up sail they did, an' away they went, deep as a Rye barge, away into the off–shore mists, an' the Widow Whitgift she sat down an' eased her grief till mornin' light.'
'I never heard she was all alone,' said Hobden.
'I remember now. The one called Robin, he stayed with her, they tell. She was all too grievious to listen to his promises.'
'Ah! She should ha' made her bargain beforehand. I allus told my woman so!' Hobden cried.
'No. She loaned her sons for a pure love–loan, bein' as she sensed the Trouble on the Marshes, an' was simple good–willin' to ease it.' Tom laughed softly. 'She done that. Yes, she done that! From Hithe to Bulverhithe, fretty man an' maid, ailin' woman an' wailin' child, they took the advantage of the change in the thin airs just about as soon as the Pharisees flitted. Folks come out fresh an' shinin' all over the Marsh like snails after wet. An' that while the Widow Whitgift sat grievin' on the Wall. She might have belieft us—she might have trusted her sons would be sent back! She fussed, no bounds, when their boat come in after three days.'
'And, of course, the sons were both quite cured?' said Una.
'No–o. That would have been out o' Nature. She got 'em back as she sent 'em. The blind man he hadn't seen naught of anythin', an' the dumb man nature–ally he couldn't say aught of what he'd seen. I reckon that was why the Pharisees pitched on 'em for the ferryin' job.'
'But what did you—what did Robin promise the Widow?' said Dan.
'What did he promise, now?' Tom pretended to think. 'Wasn't your woman a Whitgift, Ralph? Didn't she ever say?'
'She told me a passel o' no–sense stuff when he was born.' Hobden pointed at his son. 'There was always to be one of 'em that could see further into a millstone than most.'
'Me! That's me!' said the Bee Boy so suddenly that they all laughed.
'I've got it now!' cried Tom, slapping his knee. 'So long as Whitgift blood lasted, Robin promised there would allers be one o' her stock that—that no Trouble 'ud lie on, no Maid 'ud sigh on, no Night could frighten, no Fright could harm, no Harm could make sin, an' no Woman could make a fool of.'
'Well, ain't that just me?' said the Bee Boy, where he sat in the silver square of the great September moon that was staring into the oast–house door.
'They was the exact words she told me when we first found he wasn't like others. But it beats me how you known 'em,' said Hobden.
'Aha! There's more under my hat besides hair?' Tom laughed and stretched himself. 'When I've seen these two young folk home, we'll make a night of old days, Ralph, with passin' old tales—eh? An' where might you live?' he said, gravely, to Dan. 'An' do you think your Pa 'ud give me a drink for takin' you there, Missy?'
They giggled so at this that they had to run out. Tom picked them both up, set one on each broad shoulder, and tramped across the ferny pasture where the cows puffed milky puffs at them in the moonlight.
'Oh, Puck! Puck! I guessed you right from when you talked about the salt. How could you ever do it?' Una cried, swinging along delighted.
'Do what?' he said, and climbed the stile by the pollard oak.
'Pretend to be Tom Shoesmith,' said Dan, and they ducked to avoid the two little ashes that grow by the bridge over the brook. Tom was almost running.
'Yes. That's my name, Mus' Dan,' he said, hurrying over the silent shining lawn, where a rabbit sat by the big white–thorn near the croquet ground. 'Here you be.' He strode into the old kitchen yard, and slid them down as Ellen came to ask questions.
'I'm helping in Mus' Spray's oast–house,' he said to her. 'No, I'm no foreigner. I knowed this country 'fore your mother was born; an'—yes, it's dry work oastin', Miss. Thank you.'
Ellen went to get a jug, and the children went in—magicked once more by Oak, Ash, and Thorn!
A THREE–PART SONG
10
The Treasure and the Law
Song of the Fifth River