The Barn on the Marsh - Sir Charles GD Roberts

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The Barn on the Marsh by Charles G.D. Roberts.

It had not always stood on the Marsh.

When I was a little boy of seven, it occupied the weir of our neighbour's yard, not a stones

throw from the rectory gate, on one of the windy, sunshiney spurs of South Mountain.

A perpetual eyesore to the rector, but I cannot help thinking, as I view it now, in the concentrated

light of memory, that it did artistic service in the way of a foil to the loveliness of the

rectory garden.

This garden was the rector's delight, but to my restless seven years it was a sort of

gay coloured and ever-threatening bug-bear.

Weeding, and especially such thorough, radical weeding as alone would satisfy the rector's

conscience, was my detestation, and, moreover, just at the time of being called

upon to weed, there was sure to be something else of engrossing importance, which my

nimble little wits had set themselves upon doing.

But I never found courage to betray my lack of sympathy in all its eyes in us.

The sight of the rector's enthusiasm filled me ever with a sense of guilt, and I used

to weed quite diligently, at times.

One morning the rector had lured me out early, before breakfast, while the sun yet hung

low above the shining marshes.

We were working cheerfully together at the carrot meds.

The smell of the moist earth and of the dewy young carrot plants bruised by my hasty fingers

comes vividly upon my senses even now.

Suddenly I heard the rector cry, bother, in a tone which spoke volumes.

I saw he had broken his hoe short off at the handle.

I stopped work with alacrity, and gazed with commiserating interest, while I began wiping

my muddy little fingers on my knickrbockers, in right anticipation of some new departure which

should put a pause to the weeding.

In a moment or two the vexed wrinkles smoothed themselves out of the rector's brow, and

he turned to me with a proposal that we should go over to our neighbours and repair the damage.

One end of the barn, as we knew, was used for a workshop.

We crossed the road, let down the bars, put to flight a flock of pigeons that were feeding

among the scattered straw, and through open the big barn doors.

There, just inside, hung the dead body of our neighbour, his face distorted and purple.

And while I stood sobbing with horror, the rector cut him down with the draw-knife which

he had come to borrow.

Soon after this tragedy, the barn was moved down to the marsh to be used for storing hay

and farm implements.

And by the time the scene had faded from my mind, the rector gave up the dear delights

of his garden, and took us off to a distant city-parish.

Not until I had reached 18, and the dignity of college cap and gown, did I revisit the

salty breezes of South Mountain.

Then I came to see friends who were living in the old rectory.

About two miles away, by the main road, dwelt certain other friends, with whom I was given

to spending most of my evenings, and who possessed some strange charm which would never permit

me to say goodnight at anything like a seasonal hour.

The distance, as I said to these friends, was about two miles if you followed the main

road.

But there was a short cut, a road across the marsh, used chiefly by the hay-makers and

the fishermen, not pleasant to travel in wet weather, but good enough for me at all times

in the frame of mine in which I found myself.

This road, on either hand, was bordered by a high rail fence, along which rose, here and

there, the bleak spire of a ghostly and perishing lombardi poplar.

This is the tree of all least suited to those wind-beaten regions, but none other will

the country people plant.

Close up to the road, at one point, curved a massive sweep of red dyke, and further to

the right, stretched the miles on miles of naked marsh, till they lost themselves in the

lonely, shifting waters of the basin.

About twenty paces back from the fence, with its big doors opening toward the road, a

inspicuous landmark in all my nightly walks stood the barn.

I remembered vividly enough, but in a remote, impersonal sort of way, the scene on that far

off sunny summer morning.

As, night after night, I swung past the ancient doors, my brain in a pleasant confusion,

I never gave the remembrance any heed.

Finally, I ceased to recall it, and the rattling of the wind in the time-walked shingles

fell on utterly careless ears.

One night, as I started homeward upon the verge of twelve, the marsh seemed all alive

with flying gleams.

The moon was past the full, white and high.

The sky was thick with small black clouds, streaming dizzily across the moon's face, and

a moist wind piped steadily in from the sea.

I was walking swiftly, not much alive to outward impressions, scarce noticing even the

strange play of the moon shadows over the marshes, and had got to perhaps a stone's

throw past the barn, when a creeping sensation about my skin, and a thrill of nervous apprehension

made me stop suddenly and take a look behind.

The impulse seized me unawares, or I should have laughed at myself and gone on without

yielding to such a weakness.

But it was too late.

My gaze darted unknowingly to the barn, whose great doors stood wide open.

There, swaying almost imperceptibly in the wind, hung the body of our neighbour, as I

had seen it that dreadful morning long ago.

For a moment I could hear again my childish sobs, and the remembrance of that horror filled

me with self-pity.

Then, as the roots of my hair began to stir, my feet set themselves instinctively for flight.

This instinct, however, I promptly and sternly repressed.

I knew all about these optical illusions, and tried to congratulate myself on this opportunity

for investigating one so interesting and vivid.

At the same time I gave a hasty side-thought to what would have happened had I been one

of the superstitious farm-hands or fishermen of the district.

I should have taken to my heels in desperate terror, and been ever after faithfully persuaded

of having looked upon a very tumble ghost.

I said to myself that the apparition, if I looked upon it steadfastly, would vanish as

I approached, or, more probably, resolve itself into some chance combination of moonlight

and shadows.

In fact, my reason was perfectly satisfied that the ghostly vision was due solely to the

association of ideas.

I was fresh from my classes in philosophy, aided and abetted by my own pretty vivid imagination.

Yet the natural man, this physical being of mine, revolted in every fiber of the flesh

from any closer acquaintance with the thing.

I began with reluctant feet to retrace my steps, but as I did so, the vision only grew so

much the clearer, and a cold perspiration broke out upon me.

Step by step I approached, till I stood just outside the fence, face to face with the

apparition.

I leaned against the fence, looking through between the rails.

And now, at this distance, every feature came out with awful distinctness, all so horrible

in its distortion that I cannot bear to describe it.

As each fresh gust of wind hissed through the chinks, I could see the body swing before

it heavily and slowly.

I had to bring all my philosophy to bear, else my feet would have carried me off in a frenzy

of flight.

At last I reached the conclusion that since my sight was so helplessly deceived, I should

have to depend upon the touch.

In no other way could I detect the true basis of the illusion.

And this way was a hard one.

By much argument and self persuasion, I prevailed upon myself to climb the fence, and

with a sort of despairing doggedness to let myself down on the inside.

Just then the clouds thickened over the face of the moon, and the light faded rapidly.

To get down inside the fence with that thing was, for a moment, simply sickening, and my

eyes dilated with the intensity of my stare.

Then common sense came to the rescue with a revulsion of feeling, and I laughed, though

not very mirthfully, at the furaness of my scare.

With an assumption of callless and defiance I walked right up to the open doors, and

when so close that I could have touched it with my walking stick, the things swayed gently

and faced me in the light of the wee appearing moon.

Could my eyes deceive me?

It certainly was our neighbour.

Probably knowing what I did, I thrust out my stick and touched it, shrinking back as

I did so.

What I touched, plain instantly to my sight, was a piece of wood and iron, some portion

of a mowing machine or reaper, which had been, apparently, repainted and hung up across

the doorpole to dry.

It swayed in the wind, the straining fingers of the moonbeams through the chinks penciled

it strangely, and the shadows were huddled black behind it.

But now it hung revealed, with no more likeness to a human body than any average well-meaning

farm implement might be expected to have.

With a huge sigh of relief I turned away.

As I climbed the fence once more I gave a parting glance toward the yawning doorway

of the barn on the marsh.

There, as plain as before I had pierced the bubble, swung the body of my neighbour.

And all the way home, though I would not turn my head, I felt it at my heels.

End of the barn on the marsh.