Part 6

“There, missis, put away my gun; I’ll not want it no more; I be done wi’ it--I be done wi’ everythin’. I could wish that there stroke had a-carried I off. I bain’t no use i’ this world as I can see. It do seem a strange thing as the Lard ’ll leave ye to live on and on when folks be tired o’ ye, and be a-wishin’ of ye under the sod. I wish I were i’ my long home--aye, that I do.”

Mrs. Guppy was at first alarmed, then affected, and finally burst into tears.

“I’m sure I never did hear a man go on the same as you do, Jan; there, I be all of a tremble. What’s amiss? What’s come to ye? What’s it all about?”

“Gi’ I my pipe,” said John; “there’s things a woman can’t understand.”

Not another word could she extract from him till dinner-time, when she summoned him to table.

He gazed at the food sourly. “All charity!” he murmured. “Charity, woman. I be eatin’ what I haven’t earned. I may jist so well go to the Union.”

A few days later the Squire’s dogcart drew up at the little gate, and the Squire himself descended therefrom, carrying a couple of rabbits which he extracted from under the seat.

“Good-day, John; good-day, Mrs. Guppy. Well, John, how are you? Cheering up a bit, I hope.”

John shook his head slowly.

“I’ve brought you a couple of rabbits,” continued the Squire. “It never struck me till the other day how you must miss them. I’ll send you some every week. There are enough, Heaven knows.”

“I don’t want no rabbits,” growled Guppy; “I bain’t a-goin’ to eat of ’em.”

“John!” gasped his wife, hardly believing her ears.

“Put ’em back i’ the cart, woman,” he continued; “I bain’t a-goin’ to eat no rabbits what they chaps up yonder have a-ketched.”

“Why, John,” said the Squire, sitting down beside him, “can’t you get over it? I thought you would be all right by this time.”

“I bain’t all right, Squire, and I can’t get over it. Nay, look at it which way I will, I can’t. Here be I, John Guppy, a bit scram and a bit wambly; but so sound i’ the head as ever I was, whatever my legs mid be. Here be I, anxious for to do my dooty, and able for to do my dooty, and you won’t let I do it. You do give me money what I haven’t earned; you do want I to sit here idle when I’m as ready for a day’s work as any o’ they new-fangled chaps what you’ve a-set up yonder i’ my place.”

The Squire sighed and looked hopelessly at Mrs. Guppy, who stood with her hands folded limply at her waist, and a most dolorous expression on her countenance, shaking her head emphatically at every pause in her husband’s speech. After a few further attempts at consolation, the Squire rose and went to the door, followed by his hostess.

“What is to be done, Mrs. Guppy?” he inquired, when they were out of earshot. “I positively can’t have him back up there--he isn’t fit for it; and he has been setting all the other men by the ears.”

“He’s fair breakin’ ’is ’eart,” murmured Mrs. Guppy dolefully. “He thinks he bain’t o’ no use--and he bain’t--and it’s killin’ ’im. If he could even fancy he was doing summat and ockipy hisself in any way he’d be a different man. ’Tis the thought as nobody wants en what do cut en so.”

The Squire cogitated, and then a sudden light broke over his face.

“I have it,” he cried. “I have thought of a job for the old fellow! We’ll put him to rights yet, Mrs. Guppy--see if we don’t!”

He re-entered the cottage, and approached the inglenook where John still sat, leaning forward, and slowly rubbing the knees of his corduroys.

“John,” he said, “I was almost forgetting a most important thing I wanted to say to you. Sanders and Jim have got their hands pretty full up there, as you know.”

“I d’ ’low they have,” agreed Guppy; “they’re like to have ’em too full, seein’ as they don’t know how to set about their work nohow.”

“Yes, yes. Well, Sanders is very busy all day and Jim has a wide beat. Neither of them ever find time to go near the river. It’s my private belief, John, that that river is dreadfully poached. We’ve next to no wild duck, you know.”

“We never did have none, sir,” interrupted Guppy.

“Just what I say,” agreed his master; “we never had the chance. You had _your_ hands pretty full when you were head-keeper, hadn’t you?”

“I weren’t one what ’ud ever ha’ let ’em get empty,” growled Guppy.

“Well, I was thinking, now that you haven’t very much to do, you might undertake the control of those meadows down there by the river, if you feel up to it, and it’s not asking too much of you.”

“Oh! I could do it,” returned John, in a mollified tone; “I could do it right enough if I was let.”

“I should be very much obliged to you,” resumed the Squire, “very much obliged indeed. All that part of the property has got shamefully neglected. I imagine the people think they’ve got a right-of-way.”

“Very like they do,” agreed John, whose countenance was gradually clearing; “but I can soon show ’em whether they have or not.”

“Just so. Well, will you undertake to look after that part of the estate for me? It will be a great relief to my mind. Don’t overtire yourself, you know; but any day that you are feeling pretty fit you might stroll round, and just keep a sharp look-out.”

“’E-es, I could do that,” said John, after considering for a moment; “I could do it all right, Squire. I will look into the matter.”

“That’s right. Thank you very much, John. I shall feel quite satisfied about it now.”

He nodded, and went away, John looking after him with a satisfied expression.

“I never did mind obligin’ the Squire,” he remarked to his wife, “and I’m glad to do en a bit of a good turn i’ my ancient years. ’Tis true what he do say, that there bit down by the river have a-been fearful neglected. I myself could never make time to go down there, and ’t ain’t very likely as these here chaps ’ull go out of their way to look round. I’ll put it to rights, though.”

“I’m sure it’s very good o’ you, John,” said Mrs. Guppy, who had listened to the foregoing colloquy with a somewhat mystified air. “I shouldn’t ha’ thought that there was anything worth lookin’ arter down there. Why, the town boys do bathe there reg’lar i’ the summer.”

“They’ll not bathe there any more,” returned her lord resolutely. “I’ll teach Mr. Sanders a lesson--I’ll larn ’em how to see arter a place as it did ought to be looked arter! Reach me down that gun, woman!”

He sallied forth that very hour, drawing up his little, bent form to as close an approach to straightness as he could manage.

His first care on reaching his destination was to examine the gates that gave access to this stretch of meadow-land. He pursed his nether lip and shook his head disapprovingly at their shaky condition, making a mental resolution to repair them at the earliest opportunity, and moreover to see that they were provided with padlocks. After diligently hunting in the neighbouring wood, he discovered a half-defaced board, which had at one time borne the legend, “Trespassers will be prosecuted,” and, with a sigh of satisfaction, placed it in a more prominent position.

His joy was extreme when, late in the afternoon, he discovered an honest labouring man in the act of climbing a gate, which, owing to the rickety condition of its hinges, could not be opened without risk of falling flat upon the ground.

“Where be goin’ to?” inquired John, sternly.

“Why, jist home-along,” returned the other, with a good-humoured smile; “’tis a bit of a short cut this way.”

“There’s to be no more short cuts here,” cried John, with a certain almost malignant triumph. “These here meadows belongs to Squire. They’m his private property.”

The man’s jaw dropped. “That’ll be summat noo,” he said doubtfully, but still good-humouredly.

“’Tis noo times all round,” replied Guppy, with an odd contraction of the face, “but these ’ere reg’lations ’ull be carried out strict. You jist turn about, my bwoy.”

“I be three parts there now,” protested the other.

“Then you’ll have to step back three parts, that’s all,” responded Guppy unmoved.

The man scratched his head, stared, and finally recrossed the gate, and walked away, grumbling to himself, Guppy looking after him with a sense of well-nigh forgotten dignity. He had vindicated the majesty of the law.

All hitherto unconscious trespassers had thenceforth a bad time of it under the reign of the new river-keeper. Would-be bathers, small boys on bird’s-nesting intent, tired women with market-baskets, labourers on their way to and from their daily work, were ruthlessly turned back by old Guppy, whose magisterial air carried conviction with it. The other keepers, laughing perhaps in their sleeves, let him pursue his tactics unmolested, and the Squire was careful to congratulate him from time to time on the success of his labours. John Guppy’s greatest triumph was, perhaps, when he actually did discover a wild duck’s nest amid the sedges of the now tranquil river. How tenderly he watched over it; how proudly he noted the little brood of downy ducklings when they first paddled from one group of reeds to another in the wake of their mother; with what delight he imparted his discovery to the Squire, and with what supreme joy did he invite him to set about the destruction of these precious charges when they were sufficiently grown! Almost equal rapture was his when, having struggled along the avenue with a brace of ducks dangling from each hand, he encountered the head-keeper in the shrubbery.

“Those are fine ones,” remarked Sanders, good-naturedly; he was a good-hearted fellow in the main, and did not grudge the old man his small successes.

“I should think they was,” returned Guppy, swelling with pride. “They be uncommon fine uns, Maister Sanders; they be the only wild duck what was ever seen on this here property. I be glad to hear,” he added, condescendingly, “as you’ve done pretty well wi’ the pheasants, too. Squire was a-tellin’ me about the good season ye did have.”

“Yes,” rejoined the keeper, with a twinkle in his eye; “they didn’t turn out so bad, you see, Mr. Guppy.”

“I be very glad on’t, I’m sure,” said John, still condescendingly; “of course it be easy to rear a good few pheasants if you do go in for buyin’ eggs; it bain’t so very easy to get wild duck to take to a place where they never did come afore.”

“No, to be sure,” agreed Sanders affably. “It was a wonderful piece of luck, that was.”

“It wasn’t luck, Maister Sanders,” said John impressively, “it was knowledge.”

And he walked on, with conscious pride in every line of face and figure, leaving his successor chuckling.

THE WORM THAT TURNED.

“Where be goin’, William?”

“Oh, I be jest steppin’ up to the Pure Drop.”

And William Faithfull brought back his abstracted gaze from the horizon, where it habitually rested when it was not required for practical purposes in the exercise of his profession, and fixed itself somewhat shamefacedly on his interlocutor.

He was a tall, loose-limbed man, of about forty, with an expression of countenance chronically dismal, except at such times when he was employed in some particularly genial task, such as making a coffin, or repairing the church trestles, when his neighbours averred that he became quite lively, and even whistled as he worked.

His crony now returned his glance with a jocular one, and slapped his thigh ecstatically.

“Well, I never seed such a chap! Faithfull by name and faithful by natur’--ah, sure you are. Why, ’tis nigh upon twelve year, bain’t it, since ye started coortin’ Martha Jesty?”

“Somewhere about that,” replied William; and his countenance, already ruddy in the sunset glow, assumed a still deeper tint.

“Well, I never!” returned the other with a shout of laughter. “She be gettin’ on pretty well, now--I d’ ’low she’ll be a staid woman by the time you wed her.”

William shifted uneasily from one foot to the other.

“Well,” he said, after a pause, “I d’ ’low she be worth waitin’ for. She be wonderful clever, Martha be--an’ that sprack! No, I don’t regret it--not at all I don’t.”

“Bain’t the wold man anyways comin’ round?” inquired his friend with his head on one side.

“No,” returned Faithfull gloomily. “Not at all. But he be so terr’ble punished, poor wold chap, one can’t expect rayson off he.”

“’Tis the rheumatics, bain’t it?” was the next query in a commiserating tone.

“’Tis the sky-attics,” replied the carpenter, not without a certain pride in his pseudo-father-in-law’s distinguished ailment. “There, he be so scraggled as anything--all doubled up by times. Martha do say he goes twisty-like same as a eel, when it do take en real bad.”

“Lard, now!” ejaculated the other.

“’E-es,” said William, shaking his head--“that’s how it do take en. So, as Martha do say, ye can’t expect the onpossible. ‘If my father,’ says she, ‘be so scram-like in his out’ard man, how can ye look for en to act straight-forrard? He’ve a-set his mind again’ the notion of us gettin’ wed, so we must just wait till he be underground. And then,’ says she, ‘I’ll not keep ’ee waitin’ a minute longer.’”

“Well, that’s handsome,” agreed the friend, “but I’m afeard, William, that there complaint bain’t like to carry en off very soon--no, not so very soon. Nay, I’ve a-knowed folks keep on a-livin’ in a way that ’ud surprise ye, as was fair bent in two wi’ pains in all their j’ints. I reckon you’ll very like go first yerself, William.”

After a pause of deep depression the carpenter’s face lighted up.

“The sky-attics, d’ye see, Tom,” he explained condescendingly--“the sky-attics is a new-fayshioned ailment, an’ a deal dangerouser nor the wold rheumatiz an’ newralgy and sich. Why, when I did mention to Parson t’other day about wold Jesty’s sky-attics he did laugh. ‘Sky-attics,’ says he. ‘Then he’ll be like to go up’ards afore very long,’ says he. Well, so long, Tom; I must be steppin’ up-along now.”

“Ye’ll find the wold fellow a bit tilty,” remarked Tom; “whether them there ’attics was troublin’ en or not I can’t say, but he was a-shoutin’ an’ a bally-raggin’ o’ that poor faymale while I was drinkin’ my drap o’ beer jist now, till I wonder she wasn’t dathered.”

William’s recent elation disappeared; he vouchsafed no comment on the unwelcome news, however, but with a sidelong nod at his crony, shambled away, swinging his long limbs as though every joint of them was loose.

The Pure Drop was situated a stone’s throw from the village, and stood at the junction of four cross-roads; a most excellent position, which enabled it to waylay, as it were, not only the inhabitants of the hamlet as they set forth for or returned from their day’s vocations, but to capture most of the travellers who journeyed that way--cyclists galore, wagoners, dusty pedestrians. It must be owned that the aspect of the little place was inviting enough to tempt even a teetotaller; the low red-brick house overgrown with creepers, the mullioned windows winking brightly in the sun in summer, and in winter letting streams of ruddy firelight flow forth. It was so clean and airy, so cosy and trim, that those who went thither for the first time vowed they would return again, and old customers nodded knowingly, and declared that the place had not its like in the country. The liquor was good, while prudent folk who called for tea might have it, and a crusty home-baked loaf into the bargain, and a roll of fresh butter of Martha’s making.

Then Martha herself--though she was no longer in the first bloom of youth, she was a tidy, clean-skinned, pleasant-looking little body; and if her eye was sharp and her tongue ready, she was none the less popular on these accounts; every one got hauled over the coals from time to time, and when it was not your turn it was pleasant enough to see other folks made to look foolish.

Miss Jesty was standing in the open doorway when her lover came up, and immediately made a warning sign to him.

“Ye mustn’t come in to-night, William. Father--there! he’s something awful this evenin’, an’ he’ve a-been on the look-out for ye, so to speak, ever since dinner-time. Whenever the door do go, ‘There,’ he’ll cry, ‘is that that good-for-nothin’ William Faithfull?’ Or if there’s a knock, ‘’Tis that sammy o’ thine, for sure,’ he’ll say.”

“Oh, an’ does he?” returned poor William, with a deeper expression of melancholy.

Martha nodded portentously.

“Ye mustn’t come in to-day,” she said with decision; “no, not even for a minute. Father, he did say to I jist now, as whatever happened he wouldn’t have no cwortin’ here. ‘If ye can have the heart to think about cwortin’ when I’m so bad as I be,’ says he, ‘I’ll take an’ alter my will.’ So there’s nothin’ for it but for you to turn about an’ go home again.”

“I weren’t so much thinkin’ o’ cwortin’ this evenin’, Martha,” said the swain very meekly. “I wer’ lookin’ for a drap o’ beer--I be terr’ble dry.”

Martha hesitated for a moment, and in this interval a kind of bellow sounded from the interior of the house.

“That’s him,” she cried in terror. “No, William, ye can’t have no beer to-night. I dursen’t stay another minute. Go home-along, do, an’ if ye be so thirsty as that comes to, can’t ye get a bottle o’ ‘pop’ off Mrs. Andrews?”

William gazed at her blankly, but before he could protest his charmer had disappeared within the house, and he was forced very dolefully to retrace his steps. He did indeed purchase the bottle of “pop,” but found it by no means exhilarating; in fact, as he laid his head on the pillow that night he was tempted to think he might pay too high a price even for the hope of becoming one day Martha’s husband.

When on the following Sunday evening, however, he walked in the shady lane hand-in-hand with his sweetheart, he forgot how irksome was this time of trial, and listened with the melancholy satisfaction which was his nearest approach to cheerfulness (on ordinary occasions) to the glowing picture with which she depicted the reward earned by his constancy.

“I do r’alely think as poor father be a-breakin’ up,” she remarked consolingly. “When winter comes I reckon he’ll not be able to hold out. Well,” she added piously, “’tis what comes to us all, soon or late, an’ I’m sure he be well prepared, for I don’t think he’ve a-had a day’s health this twenty year. ’Twill be a mercy when he do go, poor wold man. An’ the winter ’ud be a very nice time for us to get married, William; ’twould suit us very well, wouldn’t it?”

“Ah, sure,” said William, with a slow smile.

“We shouldn’t be so busy then, d’ye see,” resumed Martha. “The harvestin’ ’ud be done an’ the potato-gettin’; an’ there wouldn’t be so many by-cyclists--there’s not so much goin’ backwards an’ forrards in winter-time. We shouldn’t be at much loss if we was to take a holiday.”

“Ah,” said William, with mournful rapture, “you was thinkin’ of us takin’ a holiday, was ye, Martha?”

“I thought we mid go to London,” cried Miss Jesty triumphantly. “I have always longed to go to London an’ see the sights there, an’ go to the theayters. There! Susan Inkpen as wed Miller Dewey did go up to London for her honeymoon.”

“For her what?” interrupted Faithfull.

“For her honeymoon--her weddin’ journey--the jaunt what folks do take when they gets wed.”

“Oh, to be sure,” said the carpenter. “An’ you an’ me be to go to London for our honeymoon, be we?”

“’E-es,” cried Martha with a chuckle. “We’ll have a rale week’s pleasurin’, you an’ me. If ’tis winter-time--as most like ’twill be, on account o’ poor father’s sky-attics, you know--the pantomines ’ull be goin’ on. Susan Dewey did go, an’ she said they was the wonderfullest things, wi’ fairies an’ mermaids, an’ sich-like, an’ Clown an’ Pantaloon a-knockin’ of each other about. There, she an’ her husband did fair split their sides wi’ laughin’.”

William appeared to survey this prospect stolidly, and made no comment, and Miss Jesty continued eagerly:--

“Then there’d be the Waxworks, an’ the Zoo, where all the wild beasts is kept; an’ we’d go an’ see the Tower o’ London, where all the king’s jools an’ suits of armour is set out, an’ we’d go to Westminster Abbey----”

“What’s that?” inquired Mr. Faithfull dubiously.

Martha was taken aback for a moment.

“Susan went to see it,” said she hesitatingly, “so I s’pose ’tis worth lookin’ at. ’Tis a wold ancient church.”

“A wold church?” repeated William, shaking his head. “I d’ ’low I shouldn’t care so much to see that. I’d sooner wait till ’twas done-up fresh-like. I never cared at all for goin’ into our church till the Rector had it cleaned and painted-up so good as new. I think ’t ’ud be a foolish kind o’ thing to go trapesin’ off to yon--what-d’-ye-call-it--Abbey till they get it repaired.”

“Maybe not,” agreed Martha cheerfully; “there’s plenty more to be seen wi’out that. Well, I hope the Lord ’ull spare father so long as it be good for en, poor dear man, but if he was to be took, I hope as it may be in the winter, William.”

William, who had been trailing beside her arm-in-crook, suddenly stopped short and faced her with a determined air.

“Whether he do go in winter or whether he do go in summer, Martha,” said he, “you an’ me must be called home so soon as he be laid underground, mind that.”

And having come to the turn in the lane where they usually parted, William went his way, leaving Martha somewhat in doubt whether to be pleased at this proof of ardour or indignant at the sudden display of spirit.

A wilful woman is proverbially supposed to have her way, yet it sometimes happens that, even when she proposes, Heaven disposes events otherwise than she would have had them. Thus, though Martha Jesty had made arrangements for her father to depart this life in the winter--a time when business should be conveniently slack--that worthy old gentleman was removed from this earthly sphere in the very height of summer, when the harvest was in full swing, and more than an ordinary number of tourists halted daily for refreshment at the Pure Drop.

Tidings of this melancholy event were imparted to William by a group who entered his yard on the morning of the occurrence, each eager to be the first to tell the news. That old Mr. Jesty was gone was an incontrovertible fact, but none of the newsmongers could agree as to the precise ailment which had carried him off. He had had a bit of a cold for a day or two, but while some said it had turned to “browntitus,” others were sure it was “poomonia,” and one shrill-voiced old lady delivered it as her opinion that nothing short of an “apple-complex” could have carried him off that sudden.

Beyond sundry “ohs” and “ahs” and grunts indicative of surprise and sympathy, William made no remark, though when one facetious bystander observed that it would be his turn next--a somewhat obscure phrase, which might be interpreted in a variety of ways--he grinned appreciatively.

No sooner had the gossips departed, however, than he went indoors and assumed his coat, and immediately betook himself, not to the Pure Drop, but to the Rectory.

“The Reverend,” as his parishioners frequently called him, was sitting in his study, tranquilly reading his _Times_, when William Faithfull was ushered in.

“You’ll have heard the noos, sir,” he began abruptly; “old Abel Jesty up to the Pure Drop, he’s gone at last.”

“Oh!” said the Rector, looking rather startled; “that’s sudden, isn’t it?”

“’E-es,” said William, with a wooden face; “sudden but not unpre-pared. Martha has been a-lookin’ for en to go this ten year.”

“Oh!” said the Rector again, this time a little uncertainly.

“’E-es,” resumed William; “I thought I’d call an’ tell ye, so as ye need lose no time in settling things.”

“About the funeral, I suppose you mean?” put in the clergyman as he paused.

“No,” said William, who was gazing not only over the Rector’s head, but apparently through the wall at some distant sky-line; “about the weddin’--mine an’ Martha’s. Ye mid call us over on Sunday.”

“Really, William, I think that is too sudden,” said the Rector; “why, the poor old man won’t have been dead a week!”