The Highwayman.

Timaru Herald, Volume XIIC, Issue 13939, 26 June 1909, Page 1 (Supplement)

The Highwayman.

(By Harold Begbie.)

"Most of us," said Mr ToMer, scratching the back of his neck with a hoof pick, "regarded Sangster'in the Christian light of a lunatic. But when he took to courting Mrs Pumpas, the police-man's widow, we ail of us declared as one man, enemy contrasceiity, that lie'was off his rocker.

"If there was one 'woman, for thirty mile round,, what any man with' common sense would rather go without his b>?er than be mixed, up with, that woman was Fanny Pumpas. A little woman, not more than live foot, and thin and flat :as a salted .herring. Btit more than a match, 1 promise you, for. any man living; yes, Haekeiisehmidt or the German Emperor. She-wiped the floor with P. C. Pumpas. A line portly figure of a. man, he was. when he married the vixen ; and he died ten stone, three—worn/to a shadder on a blind window. Him, too, who kept law and order for near upon twelve square miles, and won the abject respect of all the magistrates on the bench. A man twice the man f'ang.'iter .wfls or jever could be. But Fanny got through him in less than five years, and took his pension without a tear.

" Well, we was nil wrong in taking Sangster for a fool, as you shall hear in due course. In a manner of speaking, he was a fool, and he came to sonsiderab.lo harm by his tric::s; but he wasn't such an outright clean-boil-ed lunatic as we took him for in courting Fanny Pumpas. i" The first time he goes up to her cottage she looks him over with an eye. that would have shook the cork out of a vinegar bottle, and 'Well,' she says, 'what do you want?' 'Ho,' says he, grinning like a tom-cat, 'l've only just come along to see how you be letting on in the garden.' 'I dare say,' she says, speaking right down irony, 'as how my potaters will flower as soon as vourn, and as for broccoli,' she says, 'if I can't' count three to every one of vours, Caleb Sangster, I'll .»at-me-tal "polish for 'a fortnit.' 'What for ever makes you so ugly to me ; Mrs Pumpas?' says Sangster; 'I aren't come along a-peeping and a-pry.ug at what von has growing, and at what von has not growing; I've come nlong just to offer you the friendly help of a little digging, seeing as how you re alone, and seeing as how youi- hands was made for delicater work than spade shifting.' • . , ~ 'Don't von go for to think said Mr Toiler,' "that this comph nent knocked Fanny Pumpas silly. Sot it. ' Caleb Sangster,' she says, ' d .you it like to feel mv hands, to see if they m hard enough, you're welcome .Which, ear shall it be?' 'Ho,' says Sangster, beginning to look-broken hearted, you won't let a feller show a bit. of neighbourly feeling, not. to speak of other sentiments. Here have I been for the P a?t month or more fair busting ot myself to come up and otter you a hand in the rough work, and when 1 do screw up my courage, and come akin" what do von offer but to clout, mv head for me. Well, better that than nothing, Mrs Pumpas; I II take it on th° left ear, if you please, lor it s nearer the heart, as the saying it." '•The little viper didn't, hit him, but. her eyes darted fire like a ferret's. •Caleb Sangster,' 'are you daring to speak soft to me?' 'Look here,' he i *nys. putting on a bold face, 'what I'm daring and »rhat I'm not daring is

one thing; ivliat I means to do is another. Now, I'll tell ■ you \vhat I means to do. I means to weed and dig. your garden for you. I means to pump the water for you. And I means to fetch in your wood for you. What you say to,-me won't make no difference.. I'm not going to have y lit doing horse's work. Every time Ive seen you pump water, my heart lias pumped blood. I can't stand it. , It'll kill me., So there.' And with ih?it he pulls off his coat, chucks it with a dash-me-buttons air on. the "round, and starts pumping as if he were saving an Atlantic liner. "'His boldness fairly overcame Fanny. She let him pump. And •when he left off pumping, and went in among her cabbages as. if he was going to knock their heads off, he was so angry, she just stood and witched him. with a twisted face like a chewed toffee-drop. As soon as he'd done off he goes, with never a .word to her. and with never a word from hei--=-just like a man who was working (ft a whole blessed boiler full of rage. "-Day after day he continues his courting, pumping more water than she required by five or six /a.'lon.s, bringing her in enough wood to build a Crystal Palace with, and weeding and digging her garden til the soil looked more like mincemeat than good healthy loom. And all the time lever a word she says to him, and never n word to' speaks to her; but whereas lij kept his eyes on the job she ontmuously had her eyes' on him, and day by day they began to thaw, till they looked almost damp. "Presently she comes to him one evening in the garden and asks if he won't come inside, and take a cup o( tea. 'No, I won't' he answers; 'I take no reward for my work. " Its done from the heart, and not from the pocket. I'm a man, I am.' ' Y'os. you are,' she says in a voice of admiration; 'the first man as ever I set eyes oh'' 'Ho, no: I'm not!' he answers; don't you come trying to reward me with soft speeches. . I'm nothing more itlian a 1 blazing torn fool, that's what J am.' ' All I know is,' she answers, ' that a woman could take a. licking from you and feel self-respectful all the time' At that, he stops in his work, and orders her indoors sharp. ' You go "inside.!' he cries angrily;, 'do you hear what I say? You go inside,'' And then as she went away he said to himself, m a voice like a hungry bull:: 'Coming here tempting a man like that! ()lighter'he ashamed of herself.'

"In the end it came to Fanny Pum-pas-courting Caleb Sangster, for he really made the little leaiirrihbwl feri-e mad'about him, just,keeping lmr off. speaking, fierce to her, and working for her like a Chinese'/ Indent. She aettooally came to, dote on Caleb. Ye.?; she did everything a person does when they're dyihg of love, exeep' lose flesh, which was a .fizzyeal impossibility. for her to do- ' And bit .by bit Cal--b relented, till- he came to -taking tea with her as . reggeler as six- o'clock. Rut, mind you, he was always fiei-ee and quarrelsome with her. never snt't. " One night"he gets up sudd'ri; of? his chair, and starts glowering rqund the room. 'I can't'stand it,", he viies. •with a purple face, arid. I v.-on't. Where are the mementoes of that goose-livered, fat-headed,, cauliflo'.vere'd faced Pumpas? Where are they I says.' ' Gracious, Caleb!' cries f'ann.V,- ' what's ' the matter with . you ? You look as thou ah you were to kick a hole in a steel dust-bin.,' . 'So T am!' he cries;..' in twenty steel dust-bins! 'What right have they here, boiling my brain with jealousy ? Where are they? T rays. Let me have them.' 'You shall have anything, Caleb,' she says, 'if you .'only'put the. name to it.'' 'I refers,' he says, 'to the mementoes of your last lover; that sheep of a man, that pig of a husband, that cow of a nolioeman, Thomas'Pumpas. Where's his uniform, where's h;is .ljelniet? ._;• Give 'em me. D'yon hear what T pay?. T.et me smash them. Let me tear them. Le.t me carry 'em away and burn 'em.' ...... ...--■-...-

"You never' see a man m such. *> passion. Nothing the widow could sav or do would quiet him. H p broke out into awful language. stamping with his f°et, clutching at his hair with both hands, and gurgling in his'throat like a man dreaming of being banged. He said it choked him to breathe the same air as the policeman's uniform. He said* the helmet .poisoned the atmosphere for him for miles around. He ■s->id*'the' widow 'must' choose between him' and the.uniform.. One or the other.

"So sito gave bim the helmet. a"d the tunic, and the trousers; and he gathered them under his arms in a bundle, fierce as a ti<"er. 'Come on,' he says, ' let''s bave the lot. Where's' his penny.-: whistle?' And when' shehad fetched that; 'Come on, he cries, 'whore's-his belt?' • And as soon as he'd got-that too,' 'Come on,' he says again, ', whore.-'s bis cloak 9 ' 'Mercy to goodness!' she cries, giving him the cloak, 'you ,seem to have thought of everything!' 'Haven't T o r thesp.here relics for nights and 'nights"?' be demanded angri'v; ' haven't T seen Thomas Pumnas handcuffing my;■'_'future .happiness in vision after Wsion, and vision after that? . Tf T haven't, who has? Tell me that?' ' Ml T begs of you,' says Fannv, 'is that you won't do ' anything desperate . with them. Promise me vou won't." 1 ' Tf. 1 was going to commit soodlecide.' saysCaleb, .'l'd do it like a gentleman. These hero noliceman mementoes aren't fit to kill a flea'with!' and he bounded out of the house. "Well, said Mr Toller stretching his legs, and running either hand slowIv down his thighs till thev came to the knees, where they played a leisurely and rather lonelv crame of pat-a-eake; "our friend Caleb all the time was laving nlans vou'd never guess for a month of Sundays. What do you thinlt they was? Nothing, more or less than legal highway robbery. How it. come .into his head was plain ennuch He'd read in the paners of motorists being took nn day after day for exceeding the limit of speed, and he'd heard tell of the enormous fines which was being laid on at the local bench So he thinks to himself, ' Why shouldn't some of the money come my way. and then he comes to the conclusion, 'Air that I wants is a uniform!' "A long-headed fellow! Yes, he was weeks and weeks diddling Fanny Pumpas, solelv for the sake of getting hold of a uniform. Think what he must have put up with from the, vixin before he got it, not to say nothing of the -'water-pumping, and the woodchopping, and the wood-fetehing, and the dicing and weeding. You may well sav. A man of that character might have been Prime Minister if only be'd been handled different in infancy. But I .must tell you. . "Sangster's trick was (this. ■ Ky cutting ac-oss fields he could get to the main turnpike without being seen in something less' than half an hour from bis mother's cottage. He struck it at a point where there was a turn hie down cottage, and under the boards ot the kitchen floor he stored away the policeman's uniform after he had done with it. He used to go up there soon after dark, change into policeman-s uniform, and then sneak out into the main road. There he would hover about !with a darX lantern tdl he heard the hum of a motor-car, and then, just as it came whizzing round the bend, out into the middle of the road he flies —waving! his arms, and flashing bis lantern, and calling on the motor-car to stop. , ' ' "Most of them stopped, and then Sangster would produce a pocket-book as solemn as a judge, wet a pencil at his lips, and, after taking the number

of the car, demand the name -of the owner,'and the driver.' In nine eases out of ten the gentleman would ask whether the thing couldn't be squared, and in the tenth Sangster himself used to tell 'em that it could. He had* a way witli .him which . was marvellous ; he took the money with a. shake of'his head, as; if to say, 'I. shall never be Lord Lieutenant of the country after this,'.and fairly made, his victims' hearts bleed for his good-nature. ' I've never done it before,' he used to say, .'and I hope I may, never do it. again! Duty's duty; but there, gentlemen will be geiu tlemen.' And he saluted as thev tootled off.. ; . ••

" This mlist have gono on for something more than six weeks when Fanny Puinpns grew .suspicious. His visit's were . not only fewer, but thev got briefer and/briefer. He pumped the water as if he'd liko to drown her in it. He 'dug the garden as if he'd like to bury her in it. He fetched the wood as if he'd like to lay it across her back, a stick at a time. And when he was sitting with her he was always melancholy absent-minded's the proper word. Used to sit there as if he was alone on a desert island thinking of. his next meal. " One ,night she taxed him with it. 'What's come over you?' she says; 'yon ain't the man I took you for, not bv a long chalk, you ain't." How's that, Caleb?' "'How is it?' demanded lie. 'How isn't it! That's what you've got to settle.'

"'Once you was so saucy,' she said, 'it was a pleasure to be, in the same room with you F '"Not at all!' he says. "' Certainly you was,' she answered. ■ _ . :

"'And \vhy was I?' he demanded, fiercely. ' Because I hadn't got Thomas Pumpas' sitting on mv chest-at night, and making such faces at me as would turn a pumpkin into a parsnin.' '"'Why don't you shake him off?' she cried. . . •

" ' Shake him off! I've, come to. love him. I can't do without him. He haunts me. ■', He's' more to me now than ever I've been to myself since; I back to life, I'd. die to-morrow., Aiid was a little liiWper. • Listen to me! If d.yingj'would bring Thomas Pumpas then yort talk about shaking him off. You. don't know, what love is!'

"He frightened her, lie went on so strange; but a week' or two after common sense came back, and she determined to have justice out of Caleb Sangster. ' . "It was a black windy night, but with moonlight struggling through the cl->nds every five minutes or so, when Fanny Pumpas started out cum evening to keen an eye on her haunted lover. She bided in the field alongside of his cottage, and presently she sees him sneak out by the back domain! rim Ice across the very field she was ■in. She, had to let him go on ahead., but it was easy work following .him up. .for his feet had worn a regular track across the grass coming and going on his; wicked business. As. luck would have it the moon came out just as he entered the deserted cottage, and Mrs Piimpns pulled up when sbe reached the hedge beside. the turnpike to see what would happen. "In less than ten minutes, ■ for he'd heard a motor-car wheezzing in the distance, out'came Caleb, buttoning his belt, and blowing like a grunipi.is, and hurries into the' middle.' if the. road, where he 'started, lighting, his bull's eve. ' . .

V Mrs Pumpas was knocked nil .of a heap! There was Caleb 'dressed in the uniform of her hu«band, standing like a ghost of the dead man in. the middle of;the: forsaken turnpike'. She ,-:buloTn'fc understand- what it rill meant Shi? wasn't a fainting woman, nor yet a hysterical woman, but she as near give a shriek and executed a war dance at that particular moment as any woman iii th" four kingdoms.

"Then round the . comes the motor-car, with a great hoot-toot like an ano-py" elephant, and with threo .whopping hip; lights blazing in its head like volcanies.. Sangster turns on his hull's eye, waves his arms about, and shouts at the car to stop; but it was going a bit too fast for him, > nd instead of pulling' up where he stood,, it pulled up thirty vards past him, near on a level with Mrs Pumpas."'lt must be Mundv,' laughs a voice in the ear,, arid Mrs Pumnas. roco"nised the voice as old Squire Lovoll's ol' Cloverton. 'l'll soon settle him,' ha laughs; 'excellent good fe'lr lojv, M-mdy.' ''■'.'".

"And then u\\ comes Caleb, opening his "ocl'°t-book! and wetting his pencil at bis lips, and breathing more like a than a Chrislian mam, "'Ts that, .yon, Mundy?' challenges the Squire, expecting to see our constable, come rounjil to the front of thfa car. . ..... ' . . "'■ • "At that Caleb came to a dead stop. .... . ' . . "'You're quite right, mv good fellow,'- savs the Squire. ' Ynn'ro orii.v doing your duty. Come ■ round here and take my name and address'!'. "./' "Rut Caleb didn't accent I he.in vitation. He turned tail, .and ran for his life. ' Hullo.!' .'calls' tho. Squire, 'what's this? Something,')! up. Quick!! After him!' . " The driver back the car, swung it. Un the side of the hedge, got it. ,-onnil with a sudden whizz, and then let it. fly after the escaping policeman. . I snnpnse that never before has a )>ioto>7 car chased a policeman, though I don't/ say as how it don't happen again, seeing that .highway robhery is. bound, to come into fashion i nee more. But in this case Caleh was too clever t'or th 4 car; he scrambled over the first gate he came to ronnrl (he bend, 'ot the car go by him with a swish, and then, as fast, as lu's legs c- uld carry him, made for a come. He lay there till the car returned, and waited till it was miles out of sight and hearing. Then he picks himself up and, chuckling quietly to himself, made his way. back to the deserted cottage.

"But. when lip got I there, to his horror he. found no clothes. The boards were laid up, just as he ' had left them, hut his elothes, which he had thrown down in his hurry, were nowhere to he seen. He made sure by that he was a doomed man, and, taking off the uniform, he carries ib , under his arm to the well at the hack of the garden, and drops it in hel- .-, met. bull's-eye, whistle, and all. "Then he stands there in his underclothing considering what he shall do -with- himself.

"A voice brought his heart : nto his mouth.

." 'Caleb Snngstcr,' snys Fanny rumpas, 'you're the nastiest rogue .s ever I come across.' " ' Who's saying I weren't?' he says, shivering more with the cold than with, fright. " ' You'll go to prison for this.' sne says, coming a step nearer. '"'And- who'll care?' he demands angrily. 'You won't!' "'Me! I'll i'ive evidence against

you.' "'lt was that which made me do it,' he said. ■I. knew you did'nt love me.'

" iKive you!' she cries. 'I waa making a fool'of you all the time. Marry vral Marry my grandmother:' '"Think I didn't know it, Fannyihe cries, in a voice that, wouid have cracked stones. ' I knew it from th& fust. I knew you was hard. I knew v<m hated mel 1 thought I could break you; I thought I could twist your cruel heart and snap it till yon rame to love me. But I was a fool-. You never cared for me, and never could. Look at you now. You kno,v I'm

catching: my death *»f c °ld standing hero pretty nigh naked. But what do you carer' "Ho, you can havo your I orri-l ; clothes I' she answers. 'They're «i|» the chimney keeping warm fur you." "'And when you're giving evidence against me,' |ie *ays, 'you'll Fie »l»i« to laugh at the toots and blaeUs on

' YVr.'H talk, ahont cvi-Icnf-afterwards,' sh« M>ys; 'yon u." ;hi»! put the cMlh's i-ii Ix-foru yon at<li coW.' . ;

;*'What's the usi- «»f my putting or clothes, if you won't wait for leer' dc mands Caleb.

.." f I'll wait for you,' she say* " Yes, catching your death of coKI just to spito me,' he answers. "'l'm all right,' she says; 'you go in and pop on your clothes.' , "Ami. will you believe itj," said Mr ■Toller, •* she waited till hj« had dressed, and then walked home with him, spooning bini all the way' like a girl.of eighteen. The more hitter hr> was, the {.welter was she. Thpy worked by contrairies, and she believed; everything lie said. Yes, fair demented on him, she was, and he simply twisted the crazed thing *ound his little finger. But she had her revence in the end; trust her!

"Yes,'sir: she ;narricd him."