Part 9

“The food be thrown down to us like dogs,” she said to herself, “an’ they be a-fightin’ over it like dogs!”

Presently the altercation attracted the attention of some one in authority, and the matter was inquired into, the fact being elicited that the new-comer had disdained her appointed portion.

“I haven’t never been used to take my meals wi’out no plate!” she protested with a burst of woe, for her outraged self-respect gave her courage. “There must be plates here—folks couldn’t eat their dinner wi’out no plates, and if ’tis along o’ the washin’ up, there be a-many women here as could do it; I’d do it myself!”

But she was told not to give herself such airs. When people came to the Union they mustn’t be so particular—she must be content to do as others did. Plates indeed! there were no plates there, not even coffin plates!

This joke was duly appreciated, but it fell on poor old Maria’s bewildered ears with an ominous sound, as it were a knell of final doom. “Not even coffin plates!” she murmured to herself; and her tears ceased falling, and she sat gazing vaguely at the wrinkled hands clasped in her lap. “Not even coffin plates!” Her actual misery had hitherto prevented her from dwelling on that last inevitable end, but now it seemed to stare her in the face. A pauper’s grave—that was what awaited her, as surely as death itself.

She passed the next few days in a sort of dream of anguish, hardly taking note of her surroundings; conforming, however, to the rules of the establishment, and eating, or trying to eat, the food allotted to her without further complaint or comment. One morning, however, on endeavouring to rise, she fell sideways against her bed and fainted away.

When she recovered consciousness she found herself in a different part of the house, in the infirmary, indeed, and a nurse was supporting her, and the doctor stood by her bed. As her dim eyes fixed themselves upon his face she recognised him: it was her own doctor; he had attended her—being a young man then—when James was born, and he had done his best for Stickly in his last illness.

“Why, Mrs. Stickly,” he said cheerily, “I didn’t expect to meet an old friend.”

“No, sir,” said Maria faintly, and the dim eyes grew still more dim.

“Well, well, they will take good care of you here—you will not want for anything.”

Maria’s lip trembled, but she said nothing; she followed the doctor appealingly with her eyes as he moved about the room.

“Poor old soul,” he said to the nurse, after meeting this piteous gaze, “she is eating out her heart here, but it won’t be for long—do all you can for her, nurse; she is breaking up fast.”

The old woman did not catch the words, but she saw the compassionate glance, and observed the infirmarian’s eyes directed towards her with a certain amount of interest—merely professional interest if she had but known it—and all at once a project took shape in her mind. If she asked for the rosy plate now, perhaps they would not refuse her.

When the nurse inquired later on if she wished for anything, she took courage to proffer her petition, very feebly and incoherently. There was a plate, a plate which belonged to her, the rosy plate as she called it; the lady kept it: the lady what lived in the room downstairs. Would the nurse ask if she might have it—this in a strained and tremulous whisper—she would keep it under her bed-clothes and no one should see, but if she might just have it.

The nurse demurred, but good-naturedly, patting her pillows the while. The matron, perhaps, would not be very well pleased if it were asked for; it was a little difficult to ask her to break the rules; and, after all, the plate couldn’t do Maria much good if it was to be kept under the bed-clothes.

“Oh, yes, it would,” pleaded Maria.

“Well, then, go to sleep, and we’ll see about it in the morning.”

But when the morning came the nurse was busy; and in the afternoon the matron was out. Thus, on one pretext or another, the realisation of the poor old woman’s desire was perpetually postponed; and meanwhile she herself grew hourly weaker. The feeble voice continued to falter her request whenever the nurse came near her bed, and when she moved away Maria’s pathetic gaze followed her, until the heavy lids dropped over the weary eyes, and she forgot for a little while her unfulfilled longing.

Once, on opening her eyes after one of these brief spells of slumber, she saw the doctor’s kind, familiar face looking down at her. His voice had penetrated faintly to her inner consciousness before she had felt equal to the task of raising her lids.

“Sinking fast!”—these were the words that had fallen upon her ears.

With the opening of Maria’s eyes there had leaped into them the appeal which during her waking moments was never absent from them. The doctor bent over her kindly.

“She wants something, poor old soul,” he said. “What is it, Mrs. Stickly? What can we do for you?”

Maria’s cold, feeble hands came suddenly out from under the bed-clothes, and closed round one of his: she rallied all her strength, and raised herself a little; a light flickered for a moment in her eyes.

“I want my plate,” she gasped: “they’ve took away—my rosy plate—and they won’t give it back to me!”

“Well, to be sure, she’s at that old plate again,” said the nurse; and she began, half vexed and half laughing, to relate the story to the doctor.

Maria had fallen back on her pillows, but she still clung desperately to the doctor’s hand, and her gaze never left his face.

“I want my plate,” she repeated, when the nurse paused. “Do ’ee—ax ’em to give it to me.”

The doctor withdrew his hand, but very gently.

“In the name of heaven,” he cried, “give the poor old creature her plate! She hasn’t many hours to live.”

And so Maria’s last desperate appeal succeeded, and the doctor smiled as he saw how eagerly she hugged it to her withered bosom. He did not know that it represented for her Home, and all it had held of sweetness; that clasping it she possessed once more Youth, and Love, and Hope.

Once more he bent over her:

“All right now, Maria, eh?”

Maria smiled, and a new thought seemed to strike her. “Doctor,” she said feebly, but confidently too, “will ’ee ax ’em to put it in my coffin?”

As dawn drew nigh the night nurse paused near Maria’s bed, then, coming closer, bent over it, then, turning up the light, bent lower still. Straightening herself after a moment’s pause, she drew up the sheet softly over the old woman’s face.

But the thin arms beneath were folded close and the face wore a smile of bliss and peace, such as it might have worn more than half a century before, when, as a young mother, she had clasped her first-born to her breast.

* * * * *

“So she’s gone,” said the doctor. “Well, what did you do about the plate?”

The nurse laughed, and twisted her apron.

“It seems a silly thing,” she said, “but there! it was the last thing she asked me, and I someway felt I had to do it. I put it in her coffin.”

BECKY AND BITHEY.

NO pleasanter place than Mrs. Meatyard’s dairy was to be found at any hour of the summer’s day; but it was a busy place too. At early dawn the clatter of bright cans and the lowing of cows in the adjacent yard announced milking time, and men came staggering in with great foaming pails of milk and poured it, sweet and warm, into the shallow tins prepared for it. A little later mistress and maid alike were busy skimming the thick folds of last night’s cream. On churning days the regular _splash_, _splash_ in the outer milk-house was the forerunner of the pleasant labour of butter-making. On cheese days the huge vat had to be filled with gallons and gallons of milk, and then the rennet carefully measured out, and then Mrs. Meatyard and Rebecca took it in turns to “work” the curds; and what with this working, and putting the curds into presses, and running off the whey, and cleaning up afterwards, a body, as Rebecca frequently said, would be better off with four pair of hands nor with one.

Nevertheless there was something cheerful and delightful even to the workers about the bustle and stir—the sight of the rich milk, the faintly sour smell of the curds, the pure, sweet air that circled round hot faces through the wide open door, the little shifting lights and shades that played about shining tins and whitewashed walls as the branches of the trees that surrounded the house were set dancing in the wind. Yes, Thorncombe Dairy was a pleasant place, and never more so than on this particular June afternoon, when the roses outside the milk-house door were in full bloom, and the sweet odours of the old-fashioned flowers in the borders beneath the windows came floating in to mingle with the homelier scents within.

Mrs. Meatyard had duly “cleaned herself” and changed her dress, and now, with the cuffs of her stuff gown turned up, was delicately enswathing roll after roll of golden butter in small squares of gauze, and packing them, when thus protected, in baskets ready for to-morrow’s market. Old Rebecca was busy at the other end with scrubbing-brush and pail, “swilling down” the shelves. Her spare form was encased in a somewhat faded cotton garment, the sleeves of which were rolled up high; the sparse wisps of her grey hair were ruffled and untidy, but her ruddy, wrinkled old face was cheery and good-tempered, and she crooned a song to herself as she scrubbed the boards.

In the outer milk-house one of the labourers was also at work cleaning up, hissing as he used the broom as though he were rubbing down a horse, and every now and then making a great clatter with the piled-up cans.

Through the open door the imposing form of the “master” could be seen leaning over the gate which opened into the farmyard, contemplating the operations of two of the farm hands who were engaged in cleaning an outhouse. On the cobble-stones near his feet pigeons were strutting up and down, bowing and cooing; a little group of calves lay sunning themselves in a corner of the yard, flapping their ears and waving their tails as the flies teased them. Cocks and hens were crowing and clucking, pigs were grunting, sheep and lambs in the pasture behind the house were bleating, bees in the lime-blossom were humming, and throughout all the din of outdoor life Rebecca’s quavering, voice could be plainly heard:—

For Do’set dear Then gi’e woone cheer; D’ye hear? Woone cheer.

But louder even than her ditty sounded all at once a shrill, tuneful whistle, and the head of a young man came presently in sight, moving rapidly along the irregular line of hedge that divided the farm premises from the lane; and presently the owner of the head rounded the corner and entered the yard.

“’Tis you, Charl’?” observed Farmer Meatyard, without removing his pipe from his mouth. “You be come in nice time to fetch cows up.”

“Jist what I was a-thinkin’,” said Charl’. “I was kept a bit longer in town nor I looked for, but I did hear sich a funny bit o’ noos.”

“Did ’ee now?” inquired his father, much interested.

“’Ees, I do ’low I did. That there new show as they be all a-talkin’ about—the Agricultural Show they calls it—ye wouldn’t never think what they be goin’ to give a prize for.”

“Why, I did hear, all sarts,” returned the father a trifle impatiently. “Harses and cattle and pigs, and cheese and butter—all they kind o’ things. There bain’t nothin’ so very wonderful i’ that. ’Tis much same as other shows—voolish work, I reckon it. Ye mid have the best harse, or the best milkin’ cow in the countryside, and yet they wouldn’t give en a prize. Nay, they’d sooner gi’e it to some strange beast from Bourne or Templecombe or some sich place.”

“Well, but ye haven’t heard my tale yet,” cried the son. “Jist you try to guess the last thing as I’ve heared they be a-goin’ to give a prize for. ’Tis somethin’ livin’—I’ll tell ’ee that much, and it isn’t neither a harse nor a cow, nor a pig, nor anything as ye’d think likely.”

“A bull?” suggested Farmer Meatyard, who was not an imaginative man.

“Nay now; when I said a cow I meant male or faymale. It bain’t nothin’ o’ that kind, nor yet cocks and hens. Ye’ll never guess—’tis the queerest thing! Call Mother, and let her see if she can have a shot at it.”

“Come here, Missus!” shouted the farmer excitedly. “Come here and give your opinion. Here’s Charl’ come back from town, and he do say they be a-goin’ to give a prize at this ’ere noo Show as is a-comin’ off next month for summat altogether out o’ the common. ’Tis alive, he says, but ’tis neither bird nor beast as I can hear of.”

“Wait a bit,” said Mrs. Meatyard, folding her hands at her waist, and looking out of the rose-framed milk-house door with placid interest. “Now—I have it! Bees!”

“No. Bless you, Mother, there bain’t nothin’ wonderful nor yet funny about bees.”

“Dear heart alive, what a tease the lad be! Is it a handsome thing, Charl’, or an oncommon thing?”

“’Tis neither one nor t’other,” replied Charl’, exploding with laughter. “There, I’d best tell you, for you’d never guess. ’Tis a wold ’ooman.”

“Ah, get away, do!” growled his father, much disgusted. “Don’t ’ee go for to tell I sich cock-and-bull stories. A wold ’ooman—who’d go for to give a prize for sich as that?”

“’Tis true, though,” retorted Charl’, “’twas in every one’s mouth. A prize, they do say, will be given for the woldest faymale farm servant.”

“Well, to be sure,” ejaculated his mother, “I’ve heard o’ prizes bein’ give for the finest baby, and somebody did tell I once about a prize bein’ give for the beautifullest young girl, but I never did hear o’ givin’ prizes for wold folks.”

“’Tisn’t raysonable, I don’t think,” commented her lord. “Nay, it do seem a foolish kind o’ notion. Why, if they do go encouragin’ o’ the wold hags that way, they’ll live for ever!”

“I shouldn’t wonder,” cried Mrs. Meatyard, disregarding him, “if our Rebecca didn’t have so good a chance as any one. She’s a good age, Rebecca is. Ah, I shouldn’t wonder a bit if Rebecca was to get it. I think she is the woldest woman in these parts, without it’s Mr. Sharp’s Bithey.”

“Becky!” screamed Charl’ ecstatically. “Becky! Come here a minute. I’ve brought some good news for ’ee.”

Becky came to the door, wiping her soapy arms with her coarse apron, and smiling pleasantly if toothlessly at the young man, who was a favourite with her.

“Becky,” cried he, “how would ’ee like for to win a prize at the new Show what’s to be given in the Royal George’s grounds next month? There, Mother thinks you have got so good a chance as any one.”

“I did hear as they was a-goin’ to give a prize for butter,” said Rebecca; “but all as comes out of this ’ere house be Missus’s makin’. I wasn’t never no great hand at it. Nay, I can milk and skim and churn right enough; but I haven’t Missus’s hand on butter.”

“It bain’t the butter prize as I mean,” cried Charl’. “They be a-goin’ to give a prize for the woldest ’ooman-servant. I heared it wi’ my own ears, and the prize is to be a butter-dish, and you’ve just so good a right to it, Becky, as any other. Better! For I don’t believe there’s sich another old witch in the country.”

“Ye’re an impident chap, Charl’,” cried Rebecca, somewhat offended. “I don’t want to listen to sich a pack of rubbish! There, I’ve a-got summat else to do. Ye mid keep a civil tongue in yer head, I think. Witch, says he! Tell him to go and drive cows up, Master, else we shan’t get through with our work this day.”

“I’ll go and drive cows up right enough,” said the youth; “but ye needn’t be so highty-tighty, Beck! ’Tis truth as I be a-tellin’ ’ee. Every one be a-talkin’ of it in town.”

“Dear, to be sure!” ejaculated Rebecca, partially convinced, but looking to her mistress for confirmation of the strange statement.

“It do seem queer,” returned Mrs. Meatyard; “but it’s true, Becky; and as I was a-sayin’, I think you ought to try for it. You be turned seventy, bain’t you?”

“I reckon I must be,” said the old woman, ruminating. “My hair have been white this twenty year and more, d’ye see; and I haven’t a tooth in my head. I must be a tremenjious age, sure!”

“’Tis a bit hard to tell wi’ such as you, Beck,” remarked Farmer Meatyard, contemplating her thoughtfully. “You do seem to be sich a dried-up wold stick—ah, and have been so ever since I knowed ye. Ye’ve never looked a bit different since ye come to this ’ere village. How long ago was that, can you mind?”

“Well, now, ’tis a bit hard to reckon, Master—one year do seem so like another, and the days do follow each other so fast. I lived down at Childe-Okeford till I were thirty year of age, and then when mother died I went to service, and I were ten year or thereabouts at a farm Shillingstone way, and eight year at a public, and fifteen year at another farm a mile out of Sturminster—I think ’twas fifteen year, but it mid ha’ been eighteen—and then I’ve been here the rest of the time.”

“An’ that must be twelve year or more,” put in her mistress, “for I can call to mind as Charl’ there was only just breeched when you did come.”

“Why, woman, you must be comin’ on for eighty,” cried the farmer, half-admiringly, half-disapprovingly. “Bless me, ye haven’t no business to be alive at all!”

“He, he,” chuckled Becky. “Here I be, ye see, sir; and if there’s to be a prize for wold folks, I shouldn’t wonder if I did get it.”

“I can’t call to mind anybody else in these parts as can beat ye if your tale be true,” returned he, “unless it’s Mr. Sharp’s Bithey. She be a wonderful age, now—I shouldn’t wonder if she’s turned her four score.”

“Lard, no, sir!” cried Rebecca, with a sudden cessation of her laughter, while a flush began to mount in her shrivelled cheeks. “Bithey! Why, she’s no age at all to speak on. She’ve ha’ got very near all her teeth, and her hair—what there is of it, they do say is as black as can be under that wold woolly net as she do wear. She don’t come up to my age, Master!”

“She runs you very near though, Beck,” cried mischievous Charl’, beginning to caper with glee. “She’s oncommon hard o’ hearin’, and she do get the rheumatiz so bad in her j’ints. Ther’ be times, Mr. Sharp do say, as she can scarce walk.”

“Pooh,” cried Rebecca, with fine scorn, “what signifies that? A child mid get rheumatiz, and I’ve ha’ knowed folks so young as Missus be hard o’ hearin’. That don’t prove nothin’. There, I must give over talkin’ here, and get back to my work.”

She retired, muttering to herself and shaking her head, while Charl’, still chuckling, went off to fetch the cows.

He came back in a state of explosive excitement, and immediately called his parents out of hearing of Rebecca, who had stalked loftily past him, armed with stool and pail.

“You’ll never guess what I’ve been doin’,” he began. “Jist as I was crossin’ the lane down yonder, who should I see but wold Bithey toddlin’ along in front of me; so I hollers after her, and tells her all about the prize, and did advise her to go in for it, and the wold body is that set up about it ’tis as good as a play. She makes sure she is goin’ to win it, and thinks nothin’ at all o’ poor Beck’s chance. Lard, ’twill be rare sport to set the two wold folks one again t’other.”

The father laughed jovially, but the mother inquired in an aggrieved tone why he had interfered and lessened poor Rebecca’s chance.

“There, she’ve a-been that excited all the evenin’ thinkin’ about it—she’ll be awful disappointed if she don’t get the prize. Besides, I can’t but think ’twould ha’ been a kind o’ honour for we if she was to win it.”

“Maybe she will, all the same,” said Charl’. “I don’t believe Bithey’s half so old myself.”

And he went away to do his share of the milking.

The news soon spread all over the village that both Rebecca and Bithey intended to compete for the strange new-fangled prize that was to be given at the forthcoming show. Opinions were pretty evenly divided as to the respective merits of the two aspirants, but much amusement was caused by the seriousness and pertinacity with which each old lady advanced her claims.

On the Sunday following Charl’ mischievously brought the rivals into contact by calling back Rebecca just as she had haughtily walked past Bithey on leaving church.

“Come here, Beck, for one minute. Here’s Bithey won’t believe you are any older nor her.”

Rebecca turned, eyeing Tabitha up and down somewhat disdainfully.

“Ye may believe it or not, as ye please,” she said, “but you was a little maid goin’ to school when I was out in service.”

“What does she say?” inquired Tabitha, turning to one of the bystanders—for quite a little crowd had gathered around the two.

“She says you are no age at all worth countin’,” bawled Charl’. “She ’lows you be quite a little maid still.”

“Little maid, indeed!” retorted Bithey. “I know I must be seventy if I’m a day, and I’m a’most sure I’m a good bit more nor that. Why, I be getting that weak in the limbs I can scarce get about.”

“Anybody mid get weak in the limbs!” cried Rebecca wrathfully. “’Tisn’t no sign of age, that isn’t. When I did come to live at Thorncombe Farm, twelve or fifteen years ago, I was a staid body, as anybody mid see; but you—you was quite fresh and well-lookin’. I can mind it well. You did come up to our place for a bit o’ lard soon arter I did get there, and you was as straight and as active and as smooth and chuffy in the face—”

“Dear, dear! however can ye go for to tell sich tales, Rebecca?” groaned Bithey, much scandalised. “I can mind that day so well as you, and I can mind as you did offer to carry the lard for me as far as the gate, for, says you, ‘You do look mortal tired for sure,’ says you; ‘and ’tis a long way to carry it and you not bein’ so young as you was’.”

“Oh, faith, Becky, the case is goin’ again’ you!” shouted Charl’. “If ye said that, it shows plain as you was treatin’ Bithey respectful like, you bein’ the youngest.”

“God forgive you, Bithey!” ejaculated the dairywoman. “Have you no conscience at all? _I_ say sich a thing! I offer to carry lard for you! ’Twas never my way to go in for payin’ compliments to folks, and I’d always plenty to do wi’out makin’ out more work for myself.”

“Come, come,” cried a fat, good-natured man who had drawn near, “don’t be fallin’ out on a Sunday! There must be some way of knowin’ your ages. Let’s see how far back you can remember, and maybe that’ll tell us summat. Can ye mind when Rectory chimbley was blowed down? I were a little chap myself then, but I can remember it.”

“Nay, that was afore my day,” said Becky, much crestfallen. “I’ve only been here a matter of twelve or fifteen year.”

“I can mind it,” cried Bithey eagerly. “I can mind it so well as if it were yesterday. I had my sampler in my hand, and when my mother did call out I run the needle very nigh an inch into my finger.”

“Then you was a little gurl, for sure!” exclaimed Rebecca triumphantly. “Ye must ha’ been quite a young maid, else ye wouldn’t ha’ been workin’ on a sampler. What year was that, Mr. Joyce?”

“Let’s see,” said Mr. Joyce meditatively. “’Twas in the year ’48, I think—’ees, I’m very near sure ’twas ’48.”

“An’ say you was ten year old then, Bithey,” went on the other claimant, with increasing animation, “say you was ten or twelve—you couldn’t ha’ been much more, else you’d ha’ had more sense nor to be working samplers—well, ’tis but a little over fifty year ago—that ’ud leave ye not much more nor sixty. Ye haven’t wore so very well, I d’ ’low; but there, ’tis plain sixty’s your age.”

“I feel sure I’m a deal more nor sixty,” protested Bithey, almost in tears. “Now I think on’t, ’twasn’t when Rectory chimbley was blowed down as I did run needle into my finger; ’twas when Mr. Sharp’s roof took fire. Can you mind when Mr. Sharp’s thatch took fire, Mr. Joyce?”

“Nay, nay, ’twas long afore my time.”

“An’ _you_ must be comin’ on about sixty, Mr. Joyce?”