Chapter 6

After a little while she pulled herself up and wiped her eyes. Her head ached and Twelve Pound Wood was blurry with her tears. The sun struck down upon her back, baking, aching, mocking her with the thick yellow light in which the flies danced and the pollen hung. She wanted to creep into the shade.

But she must go home and save her face. It was dinner-time, and she must join her family with her old bravery, or they would suspect her humiliation. She rose to her feet, smoothed her dress, dusted off the bennet flowers and goose-foot burrs and the rub of pollen from the foxgloves, pushed back the straggling hair under her [177] hat, wiped her eyes again, and hoped the stains and blotches of her weeping would fade before she came to Worge. Then she set out for the opening of the wood. A man’s shadow lay across it, though she could not see him as he stood behind an ash-stump. Her breathing became shallow, and her heart thudded.... He had come back, to find her in her weakness—he was waiting for her.... No, it was not he, this smaller man, crouched like a fox against the stump.

“Jerry,” she cried, as she turned the elbow of the path, and met him face to face.

He was drunk; his eyes showed it with their gleam of bleared stars, his flushed cheeks and dark swelled veins, his hair hanging in a fringe over his brow, his mouth both fierce and loose.... He lurched towards her, and she just managed to brush past him, tumbling ungracefully over the hurdle that shut off the wood. He must have just come, for he had missed Seagrim—he might have stumbled over her as she lay and cried among the grasses.

She did not fall as she jumped the hurdle, but her ankle turned, making her stagger, and by the time she could right herself, Jerry stood before her, blocking the way to the Street. Then she saw for the first time that he had a hammer in his hand. Ivy gave a loud scream, and darted sideways, scrambling through the hedge into Twelve Pound field. Jerry was after her, without a word, no longer the furtive, padding animal she had despised, but the armed and terrible beast of prey that would kill and devour the foolhardy huntress who had roused him. She staggered up the field, too breathless to cry, but he drew even with her in a few strides, and grabbed her by the arm.

[178]

“Stop, Ivy, and say your prayers. I’m going to kill you.”

She could not speak, for her throat was dried up. Jerry’s eyes were more of a threat than his word. They were on fire—his skin was on fire—liquor and madness had set him alight; and in his hand was a hammer to hammer out her brains. She could neither cry to his mercy nor appeal to his reason—her physical powers were failing her, and both mercy and reason in him had been burnt up.

He gave her a violent push, and she fell on her knees.

“That’s right. Say your prayers. I’m a clergyman’s son, and you shan’t die without asking pardon for your sins. I saw you go into the wood with him, as you wouldn’t with me.... I’ll kill you quick, you shan’t have any pain.... I loved you once, I reckon.”

He swung up the hammer, but he was too drunk to take aim, and the action woke her out of the trance of fear into which he had plunged her. She felt something graze bruisingly down her hip—then she was scrambling on her feet again, rushing for the hedge.

The hedge of Twelve Pound field is a thick hedge of wattles and thorn. Ivy, too mad to look for a gap, tried to force her way through it. Her head and arms stuck, and she heard Jerry running. Then at last loud screams broke from her—scream after scream, as he seized her by the feet and pulled her backwards through the brambles, leaving shreds of blue gown and yellow hair on every twig. He pulled her out, and flung her rolling on the grass; then the hammer swung again....

But the field was full of shoutings and voices, of feet trampling round her head. Then two hands came under her armpits, dragging her up, and she saw her father. She saw her brother Harry, looking very green and scared, and last of all Jerry plunging in the lock of two huge arms, which gripped him powerless and belonged to the Reverend Mr. Sumption.

[179]

“Take her away,” said the minister. “I’ll keep hold of the boy.”

“I wouldn’t have hurt her,” moaned Jerry. “I’m a clergyman’s son—I’d have killed her without any pain.”

“Come hoame, Ivy,” said Mus’ Beatup, and began to lead her away.

“Is it dinner-time?” asked Ivy stupidly.

Harry gave a nervous guffaw.

“I’ll be round and see you, neighbour,” said Sumption, “soon as I’ve got this poor boy safe.”

“’Pore boy’ indeed!” grunted Mus’ Beatup. “’Pore boy’ as ud have bin murdering my daughter if Harry and I hadn’t had the sperrit to break your valiant Sabbath in the Street field. Look at his gurt big murdery hammer.”

“He would not have used it—for the Angel of the Lord led me to him, and it was the Angel of the Lord who saved both him and the girl, despite your Sabbath-breaking.”

“Then the Angel of the Lord can saave him another wunst—when I have him brung up for murdering. Come along, do, Harry.”

Jerry was silent now, nor was he struggling. He looked suddenly very ill, and as Ivy stumbled blindly down the field on her father’s arm, she had a memory of his drawn white face lolling sideways on the minister’s shoulder.