CHAPTER III.

Imagine that the two farmers and their new servants have arrived at the farm-house--a large, roomy, old building, with deep bay windows of wavy green glass, in the very heart of the forest.

“Home at last,” said Plunket, who had pioneered the flouncing Nancy, as he thrust the key into the lock. As they all entered, Lady Henrietta could not help comparing the place to a prison. However, she did not make the odious comparison in a loud voice.

“There,” said Plunket, who was spokesman for the two, and addressing the girls, “there, that’s your room.”

“Oh--tha-a-a-ank you,” said the Lady Henrietta.

“_In_-deed,” said the sharp Nancy.

“Good night,” said her ladyship, and turned sleepily towards the door; for, truth to tell, her ladyship had never even dreamed of such journeying as she had performed that luckless day. “Good night,” and she had her hand upon the latch.

The stout Plunket stared. “Good night--why there’s work to do!”

“Wo-o-o-ork,” said Henrietta. And Nancy too, shrieked out the little word.

“Of course--take my hat,” said Plunket.

Nancy took the hat immediately, but she privately shot it into a corner. Lionel also held out his hat to Henrietta, but he seemed to do so rather because it brought him near her, than as the act of her legal master for twelve months, less one day. Henrietta took it, and knowing no more what to do with it than she had known what to do with the fast binding shilling, dropped it. But Lionel did not mark that fall--his eyes were on the new servant’s handsome face. Indeed, he was in love with her, I think.

“Work--work--work,” said Plunket.

“But I’m shivering with cold!”

“And so am I,” said Nancy.

“Brother,” said Lionel, “brother, she’s shivering with cold, you know.”

Then Nancy committed herself to this sharp remark,

“I’m sure this house is damp!”

If anybody had told the Lady Henrietta on the previous day that she could fall asleep before two strange men of the farmer kind, she would have been justified in denying the proposition, but ’tis a fact that now she sat down, laid her head upon her hands, and was off into a nap. Whereon, it need not be said, Nancy fell asleep too, for Nancy knew her duty. Indeed, it may be said that Nancy was very considerably enjoying this comedy--in her way. However, she did not enjoy the horrid shake with which rough farmer Plunket woke her. Plunket, somehow, did not use quite so much violence in waking up Henrietta. Perhaps this was because Lionel quietly touched him on the arm. And--and perhaps the Lady Henrietta was more handsome than ever, with her eyes closed.

“Hullo--what are your names?” said rough farmer Plunket.

“Name--name,” said Henrietta, as though puzzled at that plain question. “Name, sir. Oh, I’m--I’m MARTHA, so please you.” And she made a bob curtsey.

“And _I’m_ Betsy,” said Nancy, and she made a broken-backed curtsey.

“And not a bad name for a good girl is Betsy,” said farmer Plunket. “Betsy, put my cloak away.”

Which the indignant handmaiden did in the manner of the hat.

And then it was that Plunket proposed spinning. Why, neither of the girls knew a distaff from any other staff in the world. And then, surely, it would have been delightful to hear the great men direct the little women how to spin, still more delightful to see their great hands pressing the thin thread. But ah! nor one nor the other could have given the delight which the young farmer of the name of Lionel felt, when he found himself bending over the beautiful, delicate-handed servant, and actually touching those same delicate hands.

Br-r-r-r-r, br-r-r-r-r, br-r-r-r-r, went the wheels, the industrious wheels, and soon Martha was producing a highly creditable thread. Meanwhile, Nancy was making Plunket half wild, for her wheel kept flying first one way and then the other, and the flax got all manner of ways, the whole machinery looking as though in a fatal fit. Meanwhile, Martha was industriously spinning, and her young master as industriously praising her. At last Plunket got into a rage as Miss Betsy finally upset the wheel with a crash, and he was preparing to pounce upon her in the real old English middle age manner, when the spinster showed herself deft at running at least, and fled from the room, followed by Plunket, with threats of divers kinds.

As she was scudding round the door post, and looking over her shoulder, Martha looked up from her demure employment (neither she nor Lionel had heard the crash) and no longer seeing Nancy, or Betsy, behold the birr-birring of her wheel ceased, and she started up from the work-a-day, wooden seat.

“Nay, thou art not afraid.”

“Afraid--I? Of you--oh no.”

And she thought, for a farmer, he seemed very gentle; he also thought she was very superior, for a servant; and, as he was his own master, he had a right to think as he liked. Truth to tell, I think she was beginning to feel kindly towards the gentle farmer.

“So thou art not afraid of me, Martha?”

“Oh no,” she said again; still, nevertheless wishing Nancy to return.

“I promise thee, Martha, I will be a kind master--a better master thou shalt not wish for.”

“And I promise thee, master, I shall be a bad servant--a worse servant thou wilt never wish to be rid of. The honest truth and the plain truth is, I’m only fit for laughing.”

“Well, if thou canst only laugh--i’faith, laugh. Thou doest that bravely. I’ll not part with thee, Martha. I’d rather die than part with thee, Martha!”

“Sir,” said the new servant, in faint surprise. ’Twas a love-at-first-sight declaration, she knew.

“And can you sing, Martha, as well as laugh? Sing now, sing about this rose,” here he took the little blossom from her bosom.

“Give me the rose.”

“Nay, thou wilt let me keep it.”

“Give me the rose, I say.”

“But--but.”

“Nay, master, if you _will_ keep it, keep it.”

And--she sang. The Lady Henrietta was beginning to enjoy the comedy. There was a deal of unlooked-for happiness about it, somehow.

It was at the end of this song, the honest chronicler states, that Lionel went down on his knees before the _new_ servant, and in plain straightforward terms told her he loved her. This may appear a highly rapid mode of courtship, but reference to middle age authorities--and the authorities of Elizabeth may surely be called middle aged--will thoroughly set at rest this question in the mind of any sceptical reader, if I have to deplore such a one. I do not know the authorities by name, but that has nothing whatever to do with it.

The lady smiling a little as the impromptu lover tore away all question of inferiority of rank on her part; this latter, as see the authorities again, was for suicide and sudden death, but the perky Nancy coming into the room, followed by Plunket, the young farmer Lionel only got up off his knees.

The new servant, Nancy, it seemed, had drawn a mug of beer, but forgotten to turn the tap off, hence flight on her part and pursuit on the part of farmer Plunket, who, chasing his prey up into a sharp corner, caught a crashing box on her saucy ears.

Then it was that the village clock struck such a late hour as farmers should never hear, except on the nights of fairs.

So the candles were lit, and the new servants respectfully lighted their young masters to the door.

Then left alone, the two girls looked at each other in the blankest manner possible. Beyond a doubt the whole castle was in an uproar; everybody hunting for her, (Nancy said, “hunting for us,”) and how should she explain her absence to the scandal-mongers?

“Well,” said Nancy, “they seem brave lads and honest.”

“And respectful.”

“Hum--good rough kind of souls, my lady.”

“Yes, I wish heartily we were at home.”

“We might as well wish for the queen’s diamonds.”

And here it was both the girls started, for a very distinct tapping came at the window. They were still trembling when the tapping was renewed, and a weak old voice cried, “Cousin--cousin.”

Perhaps Lady Henrietta never heard the old lord’s voice with less dislike than now. She opened the casement herself, and Tristam jumped in as lightly as possible.

Joy! their imprisonment was at an end. But--but the lady Henrietta seemed a little sorry to go. Indeed, when she had stepped lightly through the window-case, she half hesitated, as though she would turn back; but the impetuous Nancy in a measure drove her forward, and the next moment she was galloping away from the farm on her horse’s back, kindly brought by his lordship; but--but her thoughts were at the farm.

My Lord Tristam in making his hurried exit from the people’s place, overturned a table; and barely had he reached the ground through the window, when Lionel was up and preparing to enter the room where the spinning machines stood.

He tapped at her door--no answer. Again he tapped--no answer. Then he called Plunket, who came stormily into the room, but when he heard that the servants made no answer, he was alarmed, for he felt friendly towards the troublesome Betsy, and he flung the room door open. Empty! Then--the window was open! He went to it; listened! and sure enough in the distance he, and Lionel too, heard the sound of horses’ feet, and at one and the same moment each felt a blank at his heart. Lionel fell upon a chair overwhelmed, like a youth deeply in love as he was, but stout farmer Plunket, boiling with rage, called out in a voice of thunder to his farm servants; and when these people came hurrying in, he promised a golden guinea to the two men who should catch the runaways, and he then set to work, to earn his own guinea by a search after Nancy; but he and the men did not dream of that fugitive being within the walls of “the castle,” and they passed the mighty building, and went on hunting, long after Martha, Betsy, and John were safely housed.