Sabina Dinnett found that her mind was not so indifferent to her fortunes as she supposed.  Upon examining it, with respect to the problem of leaving Bridetown for Abel’s sake, which Ernest had now raised, she discovered a very keen disinclination to depart.  Here was the only home that she, or her child, had ever known, and though that mattered nothing, she shrank from beginning a new life away from ‘The Magnolias’ under the increased responsibility of sole control where Abel was concerned.  Moreover, Mr. Churchouse had more power with Abel than anybody.  The boy liked him and must surely win sense and knowledge from him, as Sabina herself had won them in the past.  She knew that these considerations were superficial and the vital point in reason was to separate the son from the father; so that Abel’s existing animus might perish.  Both Estelle and Ernest Churchouse had impressed the view upon her; but here crept in the personal factor, and Sabina found that she had no real desire to mend the relationship.  Considerations of her child’s future pointed to more self-denial, but only that Abel might in time come to be reconciled to Raymond and accept good at his hands.  And when Sabina thought upon this, she soon saw that her own indifference, where Ironsyde was concerned, did not extend to the future of the boy.  She could still feel, and still suffer, and still resent certain possibilities.  She trusted that in time to come, when Mr. Churchouse and Miss Ironsyde were gone, the measure of her son’s welfare would be hers.  She was content to see herself depending upon him; but not if his own prosperity came from his father.  She preferred to picture Abel as making his way without obligations to that source.  She might have married and made her own home, but that alternative never tempted her, since it would have thrust her off the pedestal which she occupied, as one faithful to the faithless, one bitterly wronged, a reproach to the good name perhaps, even a threat to the sustained prosperity of Raymond Ironsyde.  She could feel all this at some moments.

She determined now to let the matter rest, and when Ernest Churchouse ventured to remind her of the subject and to repeat the opinion that it might be wise for Sabina to take the boy away from Bridetown, she postponed decision.

“I’ve thought upon it,” she said, “and I feel it can very well be left to the spring, if you see nothing against.  I’ve promised to do some braiding in my spare time this winter for a firm at Bridport that wants netting in large quantities.  They are giving it out to those who can do it; and as for Abel, he’ll go to his day-school through the winter.  And it means a great deal to me, Mister Churchouse, that you are as good and helpful to him as you were to me when I was young.  I don’t want to lose that.”

“I wish I’d been more helpful, my dear.”

“You taught me a great many things valuable to know.  I should have been in my grave years ago, but for you, I reckon.  And the child’s only a child still.  If you work upon him, you’ll make him meek and mild in time.”

“He’ll never be meek and mild, Sabina any more than you were.  He has plenty of character; he’s good material excellent stuff to be moulded into a fine pattern, I hope.  But a little leaven leavens the whole lump of a child, and what I can do is not enough to outweigh other influences.”

“I don’t fear for him.  He’s got to face facts, and as he grows he must use his own wits and get his own living.”

“The fear is that he may be spoiled and come to settled, rooted prejudices, too hard to break down afterwards.  He is a very interesting boy, just as you were a very interesting girl, Sabina.  He often reminds me of you.  There are the possibilities of beauty in his character.  He is sentimental about some things and strangely indifferent about others.  He is a mixture of exaggerated kindness in some directions and utter callousness in others.  Sentimental people often are.  He will pick a caterpillar out of the road to save it from death, and he will stone a dog if he has a grudge against it.  His attitude to Peter Grim is one of devotion.  He actually told me that it was very sad that Peter had now grown too old to catch mice.  Again, he always brings me the first primrose and spares no pains to find it.  Such little acts argue a kindly nature.  But against them, you have to set his unreasoning dislike of human beings and a certain shall I say buccaneering spirit.”

“He feels, and so he’ll suffer as I did.  The more you feel, the more you suffer.”

“And it is therefore our duty to prevent him from feeling mistakenly and wanting to make others suffer.  He may sometimes catch allusions in his quick ears that cause him doubt and even pain.  And it is certain that the sight of his father does wake wrong thoughts.  Removed from here, the best part of him would develop, and when the larger questions of his future begin to be considered in a few years time, he might then approach them with an open mind.”

“There can be no harm in leaving it till the spring.  He’d hate going away from here.”

“I don’t think so.  The young welcome a change of environment.  There is nothing more healthy for their minds as a rule than to travel about.  However, we will get him used to the idea of going and think about it again in the spring.”

So the subject was left, and when the suggestion of departing from Bridetown came to Abel, he belied the prophecy of Mr. Churchouse and declared a strong objection to the thought of going.  His mother influenced him in this.

During the autumn he had a misfortune, for, with two other members of the ‘Red Hand,’ he was caught stealing apples at the time of cider-making.  Three strokes of a birch rod fell on each revolutionary, and not Ernest Churchouse nor his mother could console Abel for this reverse.  He gleaned his sole comfort at a dangerous source, and while the kindly ignored the event and the unkindly dwelt upon it, only Levi Baggs applauded Abel and preached privi-conspiracy and rebellion.  Raymond Ironsyde was much perturbed at the adventure, but his friend Waldron held the event desirable.  As a Justice of the Peace, it was Arthur who prescribed the punishment and trusted in it.

Thus he, too, incurred Abel’s enmity.  The company of the ‘Red Hand’ was disbanded to meet no more, and if his fellow sufferers gained by their chastisement, it was certain that Sabina’s son did not.  Insensate law fits the punishment to the crime rather than to the criminal, as though a doctor should only treat disease, without thought of the patient enduring it.

Neither did Abel’s mother take the reverse with philosophy.  She resented it as cruel cowardice; but it reminded her of the advantages to be gained by leaving her old home.

Then fell an unexpected disaster and Mr. Churchouse was called to suffer a dangerous attack of bronchitis.

The illness seemed to banish all other considerations from Sabina’s mind and, while the issue remained in doubt, she planned various courses of action.  Incidentally, she saw more of Estelle and Miss Ironsyde than of late, for Mr. Churchouse, whose first pleasure on earth was now Estelle, craved her presence during convalescence, as Raymond in like case had done; and Miss Ironsyde also drove to see him on several occasions.  The event filled all with concern, for Ernest had a trick to make friends and, what is more rare, an art to keep them.  Many beyond his own circle were relieved and thankful when he weathered danger and began to build up again with the lengthening days of the new year.

Abel had been very solicitous on his behalf, and he praised the child to Jenny and Estelle, when they came to drink tea with him on a day in early spring.

“I believe there are great possibilities in him and, when I am stronger, I shall resume my attack on Sabina to go away,” he said.  “The boy’s mind is being poisoned and we might prevent it.”

“It’s a most unfortunate state of affairs,” declared Miss Ironsyde.  “Yet it was bound to happen in a little place like this.  Raymond is not sensitive, or he would feel it far more than he does.”

“He can’t do more and he does feel it a great deal,” declared Estelle.  “I think Sabina sees it clearly enough, but it’s very hard on her too, to have to go from Mister Churchouse and her home.”

“Nothing is more mysterious than the sowing and germination of spiritual seed,” said the old man.  “The enemy sowed tares by night, and what can be more devilish than sowing the tares of evil on virgin soil?  It was done long ago.  One hesitates to censure the dead, though I daresay, if we could hear them talking in another world, we should find they didn’t feel nearly so nice about us and speak their minds quite plainly.  We know plenty of people who must be criticising.  But truth will out, and the truth is that Mary Dinnett planted evil thoughts and prejudices in Abel.  He was not too young, unfortunately, to give them room.  A very curious woman obstinate and almost malignant if vexed and quite incapable of keeping silence even when it was most demanded.  If you are going to give people confidences, you must have a good memory.  Mary would confide all sorts of secrets to me and then, perhaps six months afterwards, be quite furious to find I knew them!  She came to me for advice on one occasion and I reminded her of certain circumstances she had confided to me in the past, and she lost her temper entirely.  Yet a woman of most excellent qualities and most charitable in other people’s affairs.”

“The question is Abel, and I have told Sabina she must decide about him,” said Jenny.  “We are all of one mind, and Raymond himself thinks it would be most desirable.  As soon as you are well again, Sabina must go.”

“I shall miss her very much.  To find anybody who will fall into my ways may be difficult.  When I was younger, I used to like training a domestic.  I found it was better to rule by love than fear.  You may lose here and there, but you gain more than you lose.  Human character is really not so profoundly difficult, if you resolutely try to see life from the other person’s standpoint.  That done, you can help them and yourself through them.”

“People who show you their edges, instead of their rounds, are not at all agreeable,” said Miss Ironsyde.  “To conquer the salients of character is often a very formidable task.”

“It is,” he admitted, “yet I have found the comfortable, convex and concave characters often really more difficult in the long run.  You must have some hard and durable rock on which to found understanding and security.  The soft, crumbling people may be lovable; but they are useless as sand at a crisis.  They are always slipping away and threatening to smother their best friends with the debris.”

He chattered on until a fit of coughing stopped him.

“You mustn’t talk so much,” warned Estelle.  “It’s lovely to hear you talking again; but it isn’t good for you, yet.”

Then she turned to Miss Ironsyde.

“The first time I came in and found him reading a book catalogue, I knew he was going to be all right.”

“By the same token another gift has reached me,” he answered; “a book on the bells of Devon, which I have long wanted to possess.”

“I’m sure it is not such a perfect book as yours.”

“Indeed it is very excellently done.  The bell mottoes in Devonshire are worthy of all admiration.  But a great many of the bells in ancient bell-chambers are crazed a grave number.  People don’t think as much of a ring of bells in a parish as they used to do.”

Miss Ironsyde brought the conversation back to Abel; but Ernest was tired of this.  He viewed Sabina’s departure with great personal regret.

“Things will be as they will, my dears,” he told them, “and I have such respect for Sabina’s good sense that I shall be quite content to leave decision with her.  It would not become me to dictate or command in such a delicate matter.  To return to the bells, I have received a rather encouraging statement from the publishers.  Four copies of my book have been sold during the last six months.”