But he was so high above them, they had no chance.He seized the coal-scoop and whanged Mr.Poodle across the skull.The Bishop came dangerously near reaching him, but Gissing released a jet of scalding steam from an exhaust-cock, which gave the impetuous prelate much cause for grief.A lump of coal, accurately thrown, discouraged Mr.Airedale.Mr.Towser, attacking on the other side of the engine, managed to scramble up so high that he carried away the embroidered stole, but otherwise the fugitive had all the best of it.Mr.Dobermann-Pinscher burned his feet trying to climb up the side of the boiler.From the summit of his uncouth vehicle Gissing looked down undismayed.
"Miserable freethinker!" said Borzoi."You shall be tried by the assembly of bishops.""In a mere lay reader," quoted Gissing, "a slight laxity is allowable.You had better go back and calm down the congregation, or they'll tear the chapel to bits.This kind of thing will have a very bad influence on church discipline."They shouted additional menace, but Gissing had already started his deafening machinery and could not hear what was said.He left them bickering by the roadside.
For fear of further pursuit, he turned off the highway a little beyond, and rumbled noisily down a rustic lane between high banks and hedges where sumac was turning red.Strangely enough, there was something very comforting about his enormous crawling contraption.It was docile and reliable, like an elephant.The crashing clangour of its movement was soon forgotten-- became, in fact, an actual stimulus to thought.For the mere pleasure of novelty, he steered through a copse, and took joy in seeing the monster thrash its way through thickets and brambles, and then across a field of crackling stubble.Steering toward the lonelier regions of that farming country, presently he halted in a dingle of birches beside a small pond.He spent some time very happily, carefully studying the machinery.He found some waste and an oilcan in the tool-chest, and polished untilthe metal shone.The water looked rather low in the gauge, and he replenished it from the pool.
It was while grooming the roller that it struck him his own appearance was unusual for a highway mechanic.He was still wearing the famous floorwalker suit, which he had punctiliously donned every Sunday for chapel.But he had had to flee without a hat--even without his luggage, which was neatly packed in a bag in the vestry.That, he felt sure, Mr.Poodle had already burst open for evidences of heresy and schism.The pearly trousers were stained with oil and coal-dust; the neat cutaway coat bore smears of engine-grease.As long as he stuck to the roller and the telltale garments, pursuit and identification would of course be easy enough.But he had taken a fancy to the machine: he decided not to abandon it yet.
Obviously it was better to keep to the roads, where the engine would at any rate be less surprisingly conspicuous, and where it would leave no trail.So he made a long circuit across meadows and pastures, carrying a devilish clamour into the quiet Sunday afternoon.Regaining a macadam surface, he set oil at random, causing considerable annoyance to the motoring public.Finding that his cutaway coat caused jeers and merriment, he removed it; and when any one showed a disposition to inquire, he explained that he was doing penance for an ill-judged wager.His oscillating perch above the boiler was extraordinarily warm, and he bought a gallon jug of cider from a farmer by the way.Cheering himself with this, and reviewing in his mind the queer experiences of the past months, he went thundering mildly on.
At first he had feared a furious pursuit on the part of the Bishop, or even a whole college of bishops, quickly mobilized for the event.He had imagined them speeding after him in a huge motor-bus, and himself keeping them at bay with lumps of coal.But gradually he realized that the Bishop would not further jeopardize his dignity, or run the risk of making himself ridiculous.Mr.Poodle would undoubtedly set the township road commissioner on his trail, and he would be liable to seizure for the theft of a steam roller.But that could hardly happen so quickly.In the meantime, a plan had been forming in his mind, but it would require darkness for itsexecution.Darkness did not delay in coming.As he jolted cheerfully from road to road, holding up long strings of motors at every corner while he jovially held out his arm as a sign that he was going to turn, dark purple clouds were massing and piling up.Foreseeing a storm, he bought some provisions at a roadhouse, and turned into a field, where he camped in the lee of a forest of birches.He cooked himself an excellent supper, toasting bread and frankfurters in the firebox of the roller.With boiling water from a steam-cock he brewed a panikin of tea; and sat placidly admiring the fawn-pink light on wide pampas of bronze grasses, tawny as a panther's hide.A strong wind began to draw from the southeast.He lit the lantern at the rear of the machine and by the time the rain came hissing upon the hot boiler, he was ready.Luckily he had saved the tarpaulin.He spread this on the ground underneath the roller, and curled up in it.The glow from the firebox kept him warm and dry.
"Summer is over," he said to himself, as he heard the clash and spouting of rain all about him.He lay for some time, not sleepy, thinking theology, and enjoying the close tumult of wind and weather.
People who have had an arm or a leg amputated, he reflected, say they can still feel pains in the absent member.Well, there's an analogy in that.Modern skepticism has amputated God from the heart; but there is still a twinge where the arteries were sewn up.
He slept peacefully until about two in the morning, except when a red- hot coal, slipping through the grate-bars, burned a lamentable hole in his trousers.When he woke, the night still dripped, but was clear aloft.He started the engine and drove cautiously, along black slippery roads, to Mr.Poodle's house.In spite of the unavoidable racket, no one stirred: he surmised that the curate slept soundly after the crises of the day.He left the engine by the doorstep, pinning a note to the steering-wheel.It said:
TO REV.J.ROVER POODLE this useful steam-roller as a symbol of the theological mindMR.GISSING
