Strange Music

I slept well in my strange little bedroom, although I was awakened early by the sunlight streaming in at the window. I jumped up and looked out. The sun was rising over the sea, and a flood of golden light was streaming across it.

I dressed quickly and went out. Very few people were about, for the fishermen had not yet returned from their night’s fishing. The cliff looked even more beautiful than the night before, for every bit of coloring stood out clear and distinct in the sunshine. “I shall get my best effects in the morning,” I said to myself, “and I had better choose my subject at once, so that after breakfast I may be able to begin without delay.”

How many steps I went up, and how many I went down, before I came to a decision, it would be impossible to tell; but at last I found a place which seemed to me to be the very gem of the whole village. An old disused boat stood in the foreground, and over this a large fishing net, covered with floats, was spread to dry. Behind rose the rocks, covered with tufts of grass, patches of gorse, tall yellow mustard plants and golden ragwort, and at the top of a steep flight of rock-hewn steps stood a white cottage with red-tiled roof, the little garden in front of it gay with hollyhocks and dahlias. A group of barefooted children were standing by the gate feeding some chickens and ducks, a large dog was lying asleep at the top of the steps, and a black cat was basking in the morning sunshine on the low garden wall. It was, to my mind, an extremely pretty scene, and it made me long to be busy with my brush.

I hurried back to my lodging, and found Polly preparing my breakfast, while little John looked on. He was sitting in his nightgown, curled up in his father’s armchair. “I’m Daddy,” he called out to me as I came in.

There was a little round table laid ready for me, and covered with a spotlessly clean cloth, and on it was a small black teapot, and a white and gold cup and saucer, upon which I saw the golden announcement, “A present from Whitby,” while my plate was adorned with a remarkable picture of Whitby Abbey in a thunderstorm.

There were herrings, of course, and Polly had made some pancakes, the like of which are never seen outside Yorkshire. These were ready buttered, and were lying wrapped in a clean cloth in front of the fire. Polly made the tea as soon as I entered, and then retired with little John in her arms into the bedroom, while I sat down with a good appetite to my breakfast.

I had not quite finished my meal when I heard a great shout from the shore. Women and children, lads and lasses, ran past the open door, crying, “The boats! the boats!” Polly came flying into the kitchen, caught up little John’s red cap, thrust it on his head, and ran down the steps. I left my breakfast unfinished, and followed them.

It was a pretty sight. The fishing boats were just nearing shore, and almost everyone in the place had turned out to meet them.

Wives, children, and visitors were gathered on the small landing place. Most had dishes or plates in their hands, for the herrings could be bought straight from the boats. The family from York were there, and they greeted me as an old friend.

When the little village had been abundantly supplied with fish, the rest of the herrings were packed up and sent off by train to be sold elsewhere. It was a pretty animated scene, and I wished I had brought my sketchbook with me. I thought the arrival of the fishing boats would make a splendid subject for a picture.

Duncan was too busy even to see me till the fish were all landed, counted, and disposed of, but he had time for a word with little John, and as I was finishing my breakfast he came in with the child perched on his shoulder.

“Good morning, sir,” he said. “And how do you like our bay this morning?”

My answer fully satisfied him, and while he sat down to his morning meal I went out to begin my work. It was a lovely day, and I thoroughly enjoyed the prospect before me. I found a shady place just under the wall of a house, where my picture would be in sunlight and I and my easel in shadow. I liked the spot I had chosen even better than I had done before breakfast, and I was soon hard at work.

I had sketched in my picture, and was beginning to paint, when I became conscious of the sound of voices just over my head, and I soon became equally conscious that they were talking about me.

“It’s just like it,” said one voice. “Look—do look. There’s Betty Green’s cottage, and Minnie the cat, and the seat, and the old boat.”

“Let me see, Marjorie,” said another voice. “Is it the old one with white hair and a long, long beard?”

“No, it’s quite a young one. His hair’s black, and he hasn’t got a beard at all.”

“Let me look. Yes, I can see him. I like him much better than the old one. Hasn’t he got nice red cheeks?”

“Hush! he’ll hear,” said the other voice. “You naughty boy! I believe he did hear; I saw him laugh.”

I jumped up at this, and looked up, but I could see nothing but a garden wall and a thick bushy tree, which was growing just inside it.

“Hello, who’s there?” I called.

But there was dead silence. As no one appeared, and nothing more happened, I sat down and went on with my picture.

Many people passed by as I was painting, and tried to look at what I was doing. Some glanced out of the corners of their eyes as they walked on; others paused behind me and silently watched me; a few made remarks to one another about my picture. One or two offered suggestions; they thought I should have had a better view lower down the hill, or hoped that I would make the coloring vivid enough. The children with whom I had traveled seemed to feel a kind of partnership in my picture.

“Let’s go and look at our artist,” Bob would say to Harry. “His picture is going to be the best of the lot.”

They were so fond of watching me, and so much excited over what I was doing, that, as time went on, I was often obliged to ask them to move further away, so eager were they to watch every movement of my brush.

I thoroughly enjoyed my morning’s work that first day, and went back very hungry, and quite ready for the comfortable little dinner which Polly had prepared for me. In the afternoon the light would be all wrong for my picture. But I determined to sketch in the foreground, and prepare for my next morning’s work.

I was very busy upon this, when suddenly I became conscious of music, if music it could be called. It was the most peculiar sound, and at first I could not find out from whence it came. It was evidently not caused by a wind instrument. I felt sure it was not a concertina or an accordion. This sound would go on for a minute or two, and then stop suddenly, only to begin again more loudly a few seconds later. At times I distinguished a few bars of a tune, then only disjointed notes followed. Could it be a child strumming idly on a harmonium? But no, it was not at all like an instrument of that kind. It was an annoying, worrying sound, and it went on for so long that I began to be vexed with it, and stamped my foot impatiently when, after a short interval, I heard it begin again. The sound seemed to come from behind the garden wall of the house near which I was sitting, and it was repeated from time to time during the whole of the afternoon.

At length, as the afternoon went on, I began to distinguish what tunes were being attempted. I made out a bar or two of the old French Republican air, “The Marseillaise,” and then I was almost startled by what came next, for it was a tune I had known well since I was a very little child. It was “Home, Sweet Home,” and that was my mother’s favorite tune. In fact, I never heard it without thinking of her. Many and many a time had she sung me to sleep with that tune. I had scarlet fever when I was five years old, and my mother had nursed me through it, and when I was weary and fretful she would sing to me—my pretty fair-haired mother. Even as I sat before my easel I could see her, as she sat at the foot of my bed, with the sunshine streaming upon her through the half-darkened window, and making her look, to my boyish imagination, like a beautiful angel. And I could hear her voice still, and the sweet tones in which she sang that very song to me, “Home, sweet home, there’s no place like home.”

I remembered one night especially, in which she knelt by my bed and prayed that she might meet her boy in the bright city, the sweet home above the sky which was the best and brightest home of all. I wonder what she would think of me now, I said to myself, and whether she ever will see me there. I very much doubt it; it seemed to me that I was a long way off from Home, Sweet Home now.

My mother had died soon after that illness of mine, and I knew that she had gone to live in that beautiful home of which she had so often spoken to me. And I had been left behind, and my aunt, who had brought me up, had cared for none of these things. I had learned to look at the world and at life from her worldly standpoint, and had forgotten to seek first the Kingdom of God. Oh! if my mother only knew, my pretty, beautiful mother, I said to myself that day. And then there came the thought, perhaps she does know, and the thought made me very uncomfortable. I wished, more than ever, that that cracked old instrument, whatever it was, would stop.

But, in spite of all my wishes, the strange sound went on, and again and again I had to listen to “Home, Sweet Home,” and each time that it came it set my memory going, and brought back to me the words and the looks which I thought I had forgotten. And it set something else going too—the still, small voice within, accusing me of forgetfulness, not so much of my mother as of my mother’s God.

I began to wish most heartily that I had chosen some other spot for my picture. But it was working out so well that I felt it would be a great mistake to change, and I hoped that the individual, man, woman, or child, who had been making that horrible noise might find some other employment tomorrow, and might leave me in peace.

The next day my wishes were fulfilled, for I was not disturbed, and very little happened except that my picture made progress. Then came two wet days, on which I had to paint in my little chamber, and did not get back to my seat under the wall.

I saw a good deal of Duncan during those wet days. He would come and sit beside me as I painted, and would tell me stories of storms and shipwrecks, and of the different times when the lifeboat had been sent out, and of the many lives she had saved.

“Have ye seen her, sir? You must go and have a look at our boat. She lies in a house down by the shore, as trim and tight a little boat as you could wish to see anywhere!”

“I suppose you’ve been in many a storm yourself, Duncan,” I said.

“Storms, sir! I’ve very near lived in them ever since I was born. Many and many’s the time I’ve never expected to see land again. I didn’t care so much when I was a young chap. You see, my father and mother were dead, and if I went to the bottom there was nobody, as you might say, to feel it. But it’s different now, sir, you see.”

“Yes,” I said, “there’s Polly and little John.”

“That’s just where it is, sir, Polly and little John, bless ’em; and all the time the wind’s raging, and the waves is coming right over the boat, I’m thinking of my poor lass at home, and how every gust of wind will be sweeping right over her heart, and how she’ll be kneeling by little John’s bed, praying God to bring his daddy safe home again. And I know, sir, as well as I know anything, that when God Almighty hears and answers her prayer, and brings me safe to land, Polly and little John will be standing on yon rocks a-straining their eyes for the first sight of the boats, and then a-running down almost into the water to welcome me home again. Yes, it makes a sight o’ difference to a married man, sir; doesn’t it, now? It isn’t the dying, ye understand, it’s the leaving behind as I think of. I’m not afraid to die,” he added humbly and reverently, as he took off his oilskin cap. “ ‘I know whom I have believed.’* (2 Timothy 1:12)”

“You’re a plucky fellow, Duncan,” I said, “to talk of not being afraid to die. I’ve just been at a death-bed, and—”

“And you felt you wouldn’t like to be there yourself,” Duncan went on, as I stopped. “Well, maybe not; it comes nat’ral to us, sir. We’re born with that feeling, I often think, and we can no more help it than we can help any other thing we’re born with. But what I mean to say is, I’m not afraid of what comes after death. It may be a dark tunnel, sir, but there’s light at the far end!”