The Roadmender | Page 5

King Cnut could stay the sea until it had reached the appointed place, so little can we raise a barrier to the wave of progress, and say, "Thus far and no further shalt thou come."
What then? This at least; if we live in an age of mechanism let us see to it that we are a race of intelligent mechanics; and if man is to be the Daemon of a machine let him know the setting of the knives, the rise of the piston, the part that each wheel and rod plays in the economy of the whole, the part that he himself plays, co-operating with it. Then, when he has lived and served intelligently, let us give him of our flocks and of our floor that he may learn to rest in the lengthening shadows until he is called to his work above.
So I sat, hammering out my thoughts, and with them the conviction that stonebreaking should be allotted to minor poets or vagrant children of nature like myself, never to such tired folk as my poor mate at the cross-roads and his fellows.
At noon, when I stopped for my meal, the sun was baking the hard white road in a pitiless glare. Several waggons and carts passed, the horses sweating and straining, with drooping, fly-tormented ears. The men for the most part nodded slumberously on the shaft, seeking the little shelter the cart afforded; but one shuffled in the white dust, with an occasional chirrup and friendly pressure on the tired horse's neck.
Then an old woman and a small child appeared in sight, both with enormous sun-bonnets and carrying baskets. As they came up with me the woman stopped and swept her face with her hand, while the child, depositing the basket in the dust with great care, wiped her little sticky fingers on her pinafore. Then the shady hedge beckoned them and they came and sat down near me. The woman looked about seventy, tall, angular, dauntless, good for another ten years of hard work. The little maid--her only grandchild, she told me-- was just four, her father away soldiering, and the mother died in childbed, so for four years the child had known no other guardian or playmate than the old woman. She was not the least shy, but had the strange self-possession which comes from associating with one who has travelled far on life's journey.
"I couldn't leave her alone in the house," said her grandmother, "and she wouldn't leave the kitten for fear it should be lonesome"- -with a humorous, tender glance at the child--"but it's a long tramp in the heat for the little one, and we've another mile to go."
"Will you let her bide here till you come back?" I said. "She'll be all right by me."
The old lady hesitated.
"Will 'ee stay by him, dearie?" she said.
The small child nodded, drew from her miniature pocket a piece of sweetstuff, extracted from the basket a small black cat, and settled in for the afternoon. Her grandmother rose, took her basket, and, with a nod and "Thank 'ee kindly, mister," went off down the road.
I went back to my work a little depressed--why had I not white hair?--for a few minutes had shown me that I was not old enough for the child despite my forty years. She was quite happy with the little black cat, which lay in the small lap blinking its yellow eyes at the sun; and presently an old man came by, lame and bent, with gnarled twisted hands, leaning heavily on his stick.
He greeted me in a high, piping voice, limped across to the child, and sat down. "Your little maid, mister?" he said.
I explained.
"Ah," he said, "I've left a little darlin' like this at 'ome. It's 'ard on us old folks when we're one too many; but the little mouths must be filled, and my son, 'e said 'e didn't see they could keep me on the arf-crown, with another child on the way; so I'm tramping to N-, to the House; but it's a 'ard pinch, leavin' the little ones."
I looked at him--a typical countryman, with white hair, mild blue eyes, and a rosy, childish, unwrinkled face.
"I'm eighty-four," he went on, "and terrible bad with the rheumatics and my chest. Maybe it'll not be long before the Lord remembers me."
The child crept close and put a sticky little hand confidingly into the tired old palm. The two looked strangely alike, for the world seems much the same to those who leave it behind as to those who have but taken the first step on its circular pathway.
"'Ook at my kitty," she said, pointing to the small creature in her lap. Then, as the old man touched it with trembling fingers she went on--"'Oo isn't my grandad; he's away