Part 2

But here was the wood at length, and the narrow little moss-grown path along which she had so often tripped as a child. Phoebe had been born and bred in that wood, as had her mother before her. The queer little thatched cottage in which the latter dwelt had been the old keeper’s house, and there Mrs Sweetapple had first seen the light. Her father had been keeper in those far-away days, and both her husbands had been keepers too. If she had been blest with a son he would doubtless have followed the family traditions; but Phoebe was her only child, and the grand new two-storied brick house which the Squire had built at a quarter of a mile’s distance from the old cottage was inhabited by a stranger.

The Squire had not had the heart to turn out old Lizzie Sweetapple, who was allowed to live on in her tumble-down abode, and to keep cocks and hens in the empty kennels, and even to fancy herself extremely useful by bringing up a certain number of pheasants. No hens were ever so conveniently broody as Lizzie’s, no pens so carefully sheltered, no young broods so well watched or tenderly nurtured.

Mrs Sweetapple—“Lwonesome Lizzie,” as her few acquaintances laughingly called her—was quite a celebrated personage in the neighbourhood, and though her apparently desolate plight won her much commiseration, she herself never complained of her solitude.

But Daughter Phoebe did not approve of the existing state of things, and frequently endeavoured to induce her mother to take up her residence with her. The little pension allowed her by the Squire would more than pay for her keep, and why not tend children, of whom Mrs Caines possessed “a plenty,” as well as cocks and pheasants? It was dangerous for her, living so entirely alone at her age, where nobody could look after her if she were taken ill; and if there were an accident, such as setting the house on fire or breaking her leg, nobody would be the wiser.

Though the old woman had hitherto stoutly refused to contemplate any such possibility as illness or mischance, and resolutely announced her intention of remaining where she was, Phoebe returned to the charge periodically, and the present expedition was undertaken with the view of shaking her mother’s determination.

Being a practical person, she wasted no time in looking about her now, but pressed on with as much speed as she could muster, occasionally repeating over to herself the arguments by means of which she hoped to convince the old woman.

Yet indeed the scene was lovely enough to have tempted a less business-like person to dally on her way. The young grass was springing up beneath the budding trees on one side, while on the other the ground was strewn with fir-needles and last year’s beech-leaves. Grass and moss were alike emerald green, withered leaves and needles copper and gold. These tints were repeated again on the trunks of Scotch firs, on the boughs of the heavily-clothed spruces; while the elders and a few stray thorns had borrowed the living green of the herbage below. The sycamores were brave with little crimson tufts, and the larches most glorious of all at this hour, raising as they did their delicate tracery of pendant twigs against the luminous sky, imprisoning the light, as it were, in a golden cage, the floating bars of which were studded here and there with jewels—emeralds that would soon become tassels, rubies that in course of time would turn into cones. The bank on the right was studded with wild violets, and here and there primroses grew in profusion, their tender young leaves flaming in the evening glow almost like the blossoms they protected.

At the turn of the path Mrs Caines caught sight of the lichen-grown roof of the cottage, and heaved a deep sigh of relief. Increasing her pace she hurried on, unceremoniously bursting into the kitchen, into which the door opened.

“’Tis you, Phoebe, love!” exclaimed old Lizzie, coming forward to meet her, dusting her hands on her apron as she advanced. “You’m welcome, I’m sure, my dear. I scarce looked for ’ee to come so late, though it be a goodish long while since I see’d ye.”

“The children have a-had the whooping-cough,” responded Mrs Caines, dropping into a chair. “Of all the tedious illnesses that be the worst—what wi’ coaxin’ of ’em to eat, an’ a-watchin’ of ’em so as they shouldn’t cough an’ a-make theirselves sick the minute they _have_ took their meals, it do fair wear a body out. Little Isaac, the way he do cough and the way he do choke, many a time I think he’ll bust hisself. He do turn the colour of a turkey-cock, he do!”

“That’s bad,” said the grandmother placidly. “You was never much trouble, Phoebe, I’ll say that for ’ee. Every sickness what come you did take so light as anything. An’ there’s some as ye did never have at all. ’Tis wi’ livin’ so much in the fresh air, I think. I’ll just mix this bit o’ meal an’ take it outside to the little chicken, an’ you mid pop on kettle, my dear, an’ rest yourself a bit. We’ll have tea so soon as I get back.”

Mrs Caines unpinned her shawl, threw back her bonnet-strings, and set the kettle on the fire. Then she heaved a sigh, partly of exasperation, partly of fatigue, and looked about her. The room seemed just the same as ever, the furniture a little older and a little shabbier than she remembered it of yore. The grandfather’s clock stood in one corner, with the hands pointing to a quarter to twelve, as they had done ever since she could remember; the warming-pan to the right of the fireplace was not quite as bright as usual, perhaps, and the china on the upper shelf of the dresser was distinctly dusty.

“Poor mother, she be gettin’ past her work, I d’ ’low,” said Phoebe to herself; and the reflection strengthened her resolution.

Continuing her survey, she presently gave a little start of surprise. The old oak settle which ever since her childhood had stood with its back against the wall, being but a clumsy piece of furniture and never used, was now pushed forward in comfortable proximity to the blaze. What fancy was this? Surely her mother could not choose to sit on that hard uncomfortable seat, instead of in the cosy elbow-chair in which Phoebe herself was now reposing. The fellow to it which had once been her father’s, now, to her astonishment, was relegated to the place usually occupied by the settle.

When Mrs Sweetapple returned, her daughter at once questioned her on the subject, openly expressing disapproval, for to people of her turn of mind any change in household arrangements, above all any change carried out unauthorised, must necessarily be condemned.

“What in the name o’ goodness ha’ ye gone shiftin’ thik wold settle for?” she exclaimed, in an aggrieved tone. “Sich a great ar’k’ard thing as it be, too heavy for your arms I d’ ’low—an’ there’s poor father’s chair set standin’ again’ the wall!”

Mrs Sweetapple blushed all over her wrinkled, kindly old face, and answered confusedly:—

“It be jist a fancy o’ mine—jist a notion! Some folks take some notions, an’ some takes others.”

“Well, but what be it _for_?” persisted Mrs Caines.

“Oh, ’tis jist a fancy I tell ’ee—a fancy o’ my own to make the time pass of an evenin’. There, I do make poor Bartlett an’ your own father take turn about to keep I company, an’ this be Bartlett’s week.”

“What in the world d’ye mean?” gasped Phoebe, staring harder than ever, and flushing in her turn.

“Well, there, I’ve a-lived here all my life in this same little place as ye know—all the time I were a maid, an’ when I wed poor Bartlett—scarce a year wi’ he, an’ nigh upon farty wi’ Sweetapple, your father. By daylight I’m bustlin’ about, ye know, workin’ at one thing an’ workin’ at another, an’ I don’t seem to have no time for thinkin’, but at night, when bolt’s drawed an’ window shut, and I do sit here by myself, I do seem to see their shapes an’ hear their voices. It did use to bother I, thinkin’ of ’em both, ye know, an’ sometimes one ’ud seem to be there, an’ sometimes the other. An’ at last I hit upon the notion o’ makin’ ’em take week about.”

She paused, drawing imaginary patterns with her forefinger on the polished seat of the old settle.

“Mother, you’re raving!” exclaimed Phoebe aghast.

“No, my dear, no; I be in my senses right enough, an’ ’tis wonderful how pleasant the time do pass when I’m fancyin’ I’m havin’ sich company. When I do get the settle out, d’ye see, I do call to mind the time when Bartlett used to come here a-coortin’. Father’d be out on his rounds most like, and mother’d be busy wi’ one thing an’ another, an’ him an’ me’d sit here side by side on thik wold settle—there, I can call to mind as if ’twere yesterday—the very things he used to say, an’ the way he’d put his arm round me.”

She broke off, smiling to herself, her toothless mouth unconsciously assuming something of the archness with which doubtless she had responded of yore to Bartlett’s amorous speeches, her dim eyes looking past Phoebe’s astonished face, and past the smoke-stained wall beyond, to that far, far away past, when she was a maid, and her young lover sate beside her.

“He did use to talk a deal o’ nonsense talk,” she went on. “It do all come back to me now. I do seem to hear what he did say, an’ what I did answer back, and sometimes I do find myself laughin’ out loud, an’ puss’ll get up from the hearth an’ walk over to I quite astonished.”

“Well, to be sure!” ejaculated Mrs Caines, then stopped short, astonishment depriving her for the moment of the power of speech.

“E-es,” continued Lizzie reflectively, “he wer terr’ble fond o’ me—Bartlett were. Even arter we was wed, he did use to say every evenin’ so soon as he comed in from his round: ‘Now then, little ’ooman,’ he’d say, ‘let’s have a bit o’ coortin’ same’s in wold times.’ An’ I’d hurry up wi’ my work an’ pop on a clean apron, an’ squat down aside of en on the wold settle—an’ then he do begin a-talkin’ nonsense talk jist so foolish as ever.”

She drew her withered hand pensively along the back of the settle as she spoke, and presently continued in an altered tone:—

“Thik wold settle. ’Twas here they did lay en when they carried en in arter that there accident wi’ his gun what killed en. An’ I knelt down as it mid be here” (pointing with her hand), “an’ he couldn’t speak nor yet move, but he jist looked at I, an’ I looked back, an’ I took his poor hand an’ kissed it, an’ then when I looked again he wer’ gone.”

“I’m sure ye didn’t ought to be thinkin’ o’ sich things,” burst out Phoebe, with an irritation that was part real, part feigned, to conceal her alarm. “What call have ’ee now to be fetchin’ ’em up arter all they years—fifty year an’ more, I’m sure, what have gone by since. If ye must think o’ anybody why don’t ye think o’ poor father? The best husband as a woman need wish to be tied-to, I’m sure; him as was allus so kind an’ worked for ye so faithful—why, you was his wife for farty year very near.”

“Farty year and ten month,” said Mrs Sweet-apple. “I do think of en, my dear, frequent,” she continued mildly. “There, as I do tell ’ee, him an’ Bartlett takes it week about. I do push back settle to the carner, d’ye see, where it did bide all the years him an’ me lived together. I could never seem to have the heart to leave it in its wold place here arter Bartlett died. So I do push it back to the carner, an’ I do pull out Sweetapple’s chair, an’ I do set it where he did use to like it anigh the fire, an’ I do sit in my own where you be a-sittin’ now, an’ I do fetch out a wold sock an’ make a purtence o’ darnin’ it. An’ I do look up now an’ again, an’ fancy to myself I do see en a-sittin’ there in his shirt sleeves same as he did use to do, an’ a-smokin’ of his pipe. An’ I do say to en by times: ‘Well, Sweetapple, an’ how be the young birds a-lookin’?’

“Wonderful well,’ he d’ say, an’ then us’ll say nothin’ for a bit till by an’ by I’ll maybe tell en about a hen what I think ’ull soon go broody, or a clutch o’ young pheasants what I do think ’ull turn out very well. Why, there’s times when I do actually take en out o’ door to look at the pens. I do light lantern an’ carry it, an’ I do fancy I hear his steps aside o’ mine so plain—”

“Mother,” exclaimed Phoebe, “do you truly mean you do go out at nights wi’ the lantern an’ all? Why, ye’ll be gettin’ lost in the woods so sure as anything, or maybe settin’ the whole place afire.”

Mrs Sweetapple gazed at her, smiling again and rubbing her hands.

“’Tis only a bit o’ nonsense, bain’t it?” queried her daughter anxiously, struck by a sudden thought. “You do jist fancy you do go out-o’-door same as you do fancy you be talkin’ wi’ my father—you don’t truly do sich a thing, do ye?”

Mrs Sweetapple appeared to reflect:—

“Well, I don’t rightly know, my dear,” she replied after a pause. “There’s times when I mid fancy it, and there’s other times when I do truly think I do go out to show father the pens. Last week ’twas—’twas father’s week ye know—I did get my shoes quite wet, an’ I did have a bit of a cold for a day or two. I think it must have come along o’ takin’ father out to see the pens.”

Mrs Caines gazed resolutely at her mother, the colour once more overspreading her already sufficiently rosy face.

“It’s time there was an end o’ this,” she announced firmly. “You’ll be tumblin’ down the well some night, or else maybe go wanderin’ off the Lard knows where. No, Mother, there’s no use talkin’, the time’s come for ’ee to shift. Lady Day’s very near, an’ ’twill be so good a time as any other. I’ll speak to Squire about it. He’ll send a waggon to move as many o’ your things as be worth takin’, an’ you can come an’ bide along o’ us. The children ’ull be better company for ’ee nor they crazy notions o’ yours, an’ if ye do want to do a bit o’ mendin’ of a evenin’ ye can darn Caines’ socks.”

“Nay, now, nay Phoebe, nay indeed,” cried the old woman in a shaking voice, her eyes becoming round with alarm, and her lips quivering. “I couldn’t shift, my dear, I couldn’t bide nowhere but in the wold place where I was barn, an’ where I do look to die. The only shiftin’ I’ll do ’ull be then. I’ll shift to the New House, Phoebe, my dear, whenever it be the Lard’s will to take I, but not before.”

“I’ll speak to Squire about it,” persisted Phoebe. “Summat awful ’ull be happenin’ if you do go on this way. ’Tis time that he should see to it.

“No, don’t ’ee go for to speak to Squire,” pleaded Lizzie. “What be the good o’ carryin’ tales to Squire? I be so happy as anything here. I don’t want for nothin’, an’ I do never feel lwonesome. If you do go puttin’ notions in Squire’s head—but you wouldn’t be so unkind, would ye, my dear?”

Phoebe made no answer; the kettle boiled at this juncture, and gave an excuse for rising and rescuing it from the fire. She insisted on making tea for her mother, and, instead of reverting to the vexed topic, chatted throughout the meal so incessantly, and on such a variety of topics, that Lizzie became a trifle bewildered; and, imagining from her daughter’s altered demeanour that the latter had come round to her views, smiled pleasantly, and put in a word now and then whenever she could catch the drift of the conversation. For, if truth be told, her wits had become duller than of yore, and remarks and smiles alike were a trifle vague.

Mrs Caines rose at last to take her departure, straightened her bonnet, donned her shawl, and kissed her mother affectionately.

Lizzie had already washed up and put away the tea-things, and after returning her daughter’s embrace, pulled down her cuffs and shook out her apron with a pre-occupied air. Almost before Phoebe had left the room she had installed herself on the settle, and was gazing expectantly at the door.

“Now don’t go out to-night, whatever happens,” urged Phoebe. “There’s a good soul! I can see ye’ve got a bit of a cold hangin’ about ye still.”

“Nay, my dear,” responded Lizzie, with a small secret smile. “’Tis Bartlett’s night, ye know. I do never ha’ time to think o’ chicken an’ sich when Bartlett be here.”

Phoebe stared; then, taking her umbrella, left the house. She heard Lizzie bolt the door behind her, and walked away, shaking her head and pursing up her lips. After proceeding fifty yards or so she paused, and presently turning retraced her steps as noiselessly as possible. The kitchen window was already shuttered, but Phoebe knew there was a wide chink beneath the hinge, and making her way towards it, peered into the fire-lit room.

Old Lizzie was still seated on the settle, in the far corner, so as to leave plenty of room for the other imaginary occupant. She was smiling, and glancing now up, now down, with that revived coyness of her youth.

Now she stretched out her trembling old hand with a curious little gesture, as though stroking something—the crisp brown locks perhaps which had been so long hidden away in the grave; now she was laughing.

“I never did hear any chap carry on like that,” she said. “Why we be old married folks now—six month wed come Tuesday.”

Phoebe turned away from the window and stepped forth briskly through the twilight. Her mind was irrevocably made up.

A wilful woman must have her way, we are told, and Mrs Caines’ way appeared so very reasonable that even the Squire fell in with it, though reluctantly. That he himself should take active measures to turn old Lizzie out of her cherished little house was certainly a most disagreeable necessity; nevertheless he appeared to have no choice. The old woman’s actual plight was undeniably dangerous, and she would no doubt be more cheerful as well as better looked after amid her daughter’s family.

Somehow or other, Lizzie never quite realised how, it was made clear to her that the Squire wanted her cottage for some important purpose, and moreover wanted possession of it so soon that she must turn out at once. Event succeeded event with such rapidity that she found herself uprooted almost before she had time to grasp the full extent of her misfortune, and was installed by Mrs Caines’ hearth and surrounded by Mrs Caines’ noisy little flock while still pleading and protesting.

“Now here you be, mother,” announced Phoebe, whisking off her parent’s bonnet and shawl, and firmly tying on her black net cap, “here you be so right as anything. Here be your own chair, d’ye see, for ye to sit in, and yonder’s the dresser—how well it do look in the carner, don’t it? Us’ll unpack the china by and by, and wash it and set it out—that’s summat to do, bain’t it? An’ there’s father’s chair opposite yours, same as usual.”

“Ah,” murmured Lizzie vaguely, “this be Sweet-apple’s week. ’Ees, sure—’ees, there be his chair. Where be—”

Her eyes wandered round the unfamiliar room. “Where be,” she was beginning again, when Phoebe adroitly interrupted her.

“This be father’s chair, as you do say, mother, an’ this be his week to be sure. There you can talk to en so comfortable as can be.”

Lizzie glanced round again with a deep sigh.

John Caines, Phoebe’s husband, worked in the Branston brewery, and they lived in consequence in the town. Theirs was a six-roomed semi-detached house with a dusty little yard in the rear, and a tiny grass-plot in front, on which Phoebe sometimes spread out linen to dry. It was situated near the station, and many vehicles passed that way, creating much dust, and making a considerable amount of noise.

Phoebe presently commented on this fact to her bewildered mother.

“’Tis nice an’ cheerful to be so near the road, bain’t it?” she remarked pleasantly, tilting up as she spoke a corner of the muslin blind. “Ye can look out, look-see. That’s the ’bus from the Crown, an’ there’s Sibley’s cart, and look, look—there’s a motor.”

The children all rushed to the window to investigate this wonder, Isaac pausing midway to whoop violently. Lizzie bent a vacant gaze upon the window, and then drew back into her corner.

“’Tis awful lwonesome here,” she said, “terr’ble lwonesome—there, that noise an’ the dust an’ all; it do fair make my head go round.”

Phoebe burst out laughing:—

“Dear, to be sure, that’s a queer notion! How can ye be lwonesome wi’ so many folks about?”

Lizzie rocked herself backwards and forwards in her chair, half moaning to herself.

“I can’t find nothin’ what I’m used to. I can’t seem to hear nothin’—wi’ so much talkin’ an’ that there terr’ble noise outside, an’ I can’t find—”

She broke off suddenly, sitting bolt upright.

“Where be the settle?” she cried, in a loud, anxious tone. “Where be the wold settle? Ye’ve never been an’ left that behind?”

Phoebe was taken aback for a moment: as a matter of fact, she had purposely left it behind, not only because it seemed to her worthless in itself, but because she thought the sight of it would conjure up those crazy notions which she was so anxious to dispel. It was all very well that her mother should dwell on the memory of Phoebe’s own departed father; she might look at his chair as much as she liked, and accomplish a bit of darning for the family, under the impression it was for him; but it was quite a different matter to go on in such a foolish way about a man who had been in his grave for more than fifty years, and to whom she had been wed but for a few months. The neighbours would think Mrs Sweetapple daft indeed if she were to regale them with such tales as she had recently related to her daughter.

“Where be the settle?” repeated Lizzie, with a shrill cry.

“There, don’t ye take on,” said Phoebe soothingly; “there wasn’t room for’t in the cart, d’ye see, an’ us’ll have to send to fetch it. ’Tis so heavy—the poor harse couldn’t ha’ dragged it so far wi’ so many other things.”

“It must be here by end of the week,” said Mrs Sweetapple. “It must be here by Sunday. It’ll be Bartlett’s week, come Sunday.”

“We’ll send for it—we’ll send for it,” exclaimed Mrs Caines. “There now, mother,” returning to an argument which she had before found efficacious, “don’t ye go for to forget as this be father’s turn. Poor father—ye didn’t ought for to forget he.”

“I don’t forget en, my dear, I don’t forget en,” said Lizzie, dropping her head upon her breast. “I do feel a bit confused—I bain’t used to childern, ye see, and—I do feel terr’ble lwonesome; I did ought to be feedin’ chicken now,” she added, half rising, and then dropping back again. “What’s become o’ the chicken, Phoebe?”

“Why, don’t ye know?” responded Phoebe, cheerfully. “Mr Foster—Keeper Foster, ye know, he did take ’em all off your hands. He’ll see to the little pheasants right enough, and he did pay money down for the chicken. I’ve got it safe for ’ee. I did tell ’ee all about that.”

“So ye did, so ye did,” murmured Lizzie. “I was forgettin’—it do seem strange to ha’ no chicken to see to. I d’ ’low father ’ull miss ’em so well as me.”

“Eh?” said Mrs Caines, staring.

“I d’ ’low father’ll miss ’em,” repeated Lizzie. “He’ll be lookin’ to go out wi’ me last thing to see how they be a-comin’ on.”

“My dear ’ooman,” exclaimed Phoebe, “you can’t go walkin’ out in the street o’ nights here, fancy or no fancy. Ye mid be runned over an’ killed straight-off.”

“Runned over!” exclaimed Lizzie. She looked about her vaguely, and then sank into silence.

Mrs Caines drew her John into the privacy of the back kitchen as soon as he appeared, and, with many shakes of the head, explained to him the state of affairs.

“Poor mother be queerer nor ever to-night. Us mustn’t lose sight of her for a minute; there’s no knowin’ what she mid do. There, she’ve been carryin’ on about takin’ father out to see the pens and about bein’ so lwonesome—lwonesome here in the town, ye know. She says the noise an’ the voices an’ all do make her feel lwonesome.”

John Caines removed his pipe in order to grin at ease, and then put it back again; he was a man of few words.