BARNABY

A NOVEL

BY

R. RAMSAY

AUTHOR OF "THE KEY OF THE DOOR," "THE STRAW," ETC.

London: HUTCHINSON & CO.
Paternoster Row

1910

BY THE SAME AUTHOR

In Cloth Gilt, 6s.

THE KEY OF THE DOOR

"The story fascinates; it contains some of the best descriptions of fox-hunting we have met with, and there is a crispness in the delineation of all the characters which proves that the author is no commonplace dabbler in fiction."—Pall Mall Gazette.

"One of the most humorous and lively books that have appeared this year. It contains some fine descriptions of hunting, and a vivid picture of county society. The whole book is written with vivacity and dash."—Country Life.

"Told with a literary skill and a mature judgment which promise well for future work from the author."—Times.

THE STRAW

"Miss R. Ramsay has written but two novels, but if her future work fulfils the promise of these, or even maintains their standard, her public should be large and enthusiastic. She describes fox-hunting from the true sportsman's point of view, but with a dashing vivacity and humour. There is rare matter in even the best of contemporary sporting novels, but there is more in Miss Ramsay's. There is no doubt that Miss Ramsay possesses exceptional literary gifts."—Gentlewoman.

"It is a jovial story, vigorously and vivaciously written. The book is invigorating, fresh, and quite excellent in its descriptions of hunting scenes, hunting country, and hunting weather."—Manchester Guardian.

"This story, briskly written, has plenty of exhilarating pictures of the hunting field in its lively course. It has plenty of fresh, breezy humour in the delineation of people who hunt, is clever in construction, and written with a literary skill that keeps the story always going."—Scotsman.

TO THE MEMORY OF
MY FATHER

BARNABY

CHAPTER I

The lamp flickered and jumped at the stamping in the bar.

There was a frantic quality in that noise, laughter and exclamation mixed with a wild shouting that made the crazy partition quiver. It was a mad reaction from the common weight of despair.

From the bed in the room behind you could watch the door....

Paradise Town was a broken link in the chain of civilization; it might have been written in letters of rusted blood on the map. Its pioneers had forsaken it cursing, its trees had been burned for firewood, its earth had been riddled in vain for gold. All that was left of it was huddled near the shanty where men could buy drink and blur the spell of awful loneliness that shut them away from life. It was worse at night. With the darkness fell a heavier sense of the distance of human help, and Paradise was an island in a black sea of haunted land. East and west, wide and silent, the unknown emptiness lapped it in.

Ill-luck and some bitter trick had stranded the M'Kune Tragedy Company in this dreadful place. Night after night they played in a shingle hut with their useless scenery stacked outside; night after night M'Kune broke it to his scared company that they hadn't yet got their fares. Fear and a kind of superstition worked in their minds until they were seized with panic. In the daylight the men hung about the bar, muttering; and the women herded by themselves, packed like hens in a strange run, hysterically afraid. Prisoners in a desert, when night had fallen they wandered away to the railroad track and watched. Towards midnight would rise a red gleam on the far horizon, and they would hear a distant rumbling, gathering to a roar, till the darkness was split by a whizzing bar of light. By it went, the great, glaring thing full of life, terrible in its rush, and leaving the night immeasurably darker. Among the watchers the men would affect to whistle. If they couldn't board her to-night they might manage it to-morrow.... But the women caught each other's hands fast, and shuddered. Latterly they had felt as if the train were a devil that counted and kept them there.

But their desperate plight inspired them. Never in their lives had these poor mummers so hurled themselves into their parts; never again would they murder and cheat and punish with such passionate realism. Their fate hung upon it. Penniless and trapped, their solitary chance of rescue lay in witching all Paradise to stare at them and furnish the wherewithal.

"Keep it up," urged M'Kune when a tired actress flagged. The hut was full and airless, but a few men were sullenly hanging back in the doorway, drawn thither, but arguing if it was worth it to step inside. "Keep it up!" hissed M'Kune.

And the heroine flung herself between the hero and the villain's knife, slipped as she ran, and was hurt, but struggled up and cried out her tottering defiance, bringing the house down before she dropped on her face.

That was the last night of crazed endeavour. The curtain came rocking down, and the villain—M'Kune—cheated the gallows to run feverishly through his receipts. All Paradise was vociferating behind that flapping rag, but amidst the din the players had heard their manager's yell of triumph. They had made up their fares at last.

The Tragedy Company scattered and fled, each in search of his own belongings; but they had little to gather, and the night wind blew them together like drifting leaves. They durst not squander their means of escaping, durst not loiter. The train, thundering by in its midnight passage, must lift them out of this nightmare town. Waiting they filled the bar, singing and shouting like lunatics, beside themselves with joy.

The door in the partition rattled, but stayed shut, and on the inner side was silence. Nobody lifted the latch, though the bursts of noise shook it from time to time. A selfish panic had left no room for any other feeling. Probably they had all forgotten that one of the Tragedy Company who could not escape out of Paradise; and it was all in vain that the crazy bedstead was turned in its corner to face the door.

She lay without moving. It seemed as if there were nothing of her but the long black hair covering the pillow. In their hurry those who had carried her in had not taken out all the pins, and a few glistened in it still. Looking closer, one saw that her hands were clenched tight against her breast, as if to keep her heart quiet.

How fast the minutes went! It must be nearly train time. And surely there was a vast thing, pulsing, pulsing, like an engine, far away in the night? She could bear the hubbub of voices, but not the dread of silence. Was it quite impossible to rise up and struggle to them, and reach a human face? ... Suddenly she took a panting breath, short like a sob, still gazing.

The door had opened at last, and a woman looked in hastily, and, flinging a word over her shoulder to the rest, stepped forward, shutting out the streak of light and the voices in the bar. Then she paused, irresolute. It was so dim in here, the atmosphere was so anxious.... And nothing stirring ... just a glimmer of wild black hair.

"You poor little thing!" she said.

Her voice was warm with the cheap kindness of a nature tuned to play with emotion, but incapable of feeling it from within. Her sympathy smacked of the stage, but as far as it went was ready to proffer easy help.

"Like the Flight out of Egypt, isn't it?" she said. "It's a shame to leave you behind. If M'Kune would hear reason, and any of us had a cent to spare, I'd make a bundle of you, and carry you on to the train myself. But it won't run to it. I asked him. We're nothing but