and Mr. Brandon's lawyer have settled the matter between their two
selves, and don't intend to let me as much as know I'm to go out till
the time comes, for fear I should make a row over it. Nobody on earth
can stop it except Mr. Brandon," added Reed, with energy.
"Have you spoken to Mr. Brandon, Reed?"
"No, sir. I was going up to him; but the thought took me that I'd better
come off at once to Master Ludlow; his word might be of more avail than
mine. There's no time to be lost. If once the lawyers get Mr. Brandon's
consent, he may not be able to recall it."
"What does Parrifer want with the cottage?"
"I fancy he covets the bit of garden, sir; he sees the order I've
brought it into. If it's not that, I don't know what it can be. The
cottage can be no eyesore to him; he can't see it from his windows."
"Shall I go with you, Johnny?" said Tod, as Reed went home, after
drinking the ale old Thomas had given him. "We will circumvent that
Parrifer, if there's law or justice in the Brandon land."
We went off to Mr. Brandon's in the pony-carriage, Tod driving. He lived
near Alcester, and had the management of my property whilst I was a
minor. As we went along who should ride past, meeting us, but Major
Parrifer.
"Looking like the bull-dog that he is," cried Tod, who could not bear
the man. "Johnny, what will you lay that he has not been to Mr.
Brandon's? The negotiations are becoming serious."
Tod did not go in. On second thought, he said it might be better to
leave it to me. The Squire must try, if I failed. Mr. Brandon was at
home; and Tod drove on into Alcester by way of passing the time.
"But I don't think you can see him," said the housekeeper, when she came
to me in the drawing-room. "This is one of his bad days. A gentleman
called just now, and I went in to the master, but it was of no use."
"I know; it was Major Parrifer. We thought he might have been calling
here."
Mr. Brandon was thin and little, with a shrivelled face. He lived alone,
except for three or four servants, and always fancied himself ill with
one ailment or another. When I went in, for he said he'd see me, he was
sitting in an easy-chair, with a geranium-coloured Turkish cap on his
head, and two bottles of medicine at his elbow.
"Well, Johnny, an invalid as usual, you see. And what is it you so
particularly want?"
"I want to ask you a favour, Mr. Brandon, if you'll be good enough to
grant it me."
"What is it?"
"You know that cottage, sir, at the corner of Piefinch Lane. George
Reed's."
"Well?"
"I have come to ask you not to let it be sold."
"Who wants to sell it?" asked he, after a pause.
"Major Parrifer wants to buy it; and to turn Reed out. The lawyers are
going to arrange it."
Mr. Brandon pushed the cap up on his brow and gave the tassel over his
ear a twirl as he looked at me. People thought him incapable; but it was
only because he had no work to do that he seemed so. He would get a bit
irritable sometimes; very rarely though; and he had a squeaky voice: but
he was a good and just man.
"How did you hear this, Johnny?"
I told him all about it. What Reed had said, and of our having met the
Major on horseback as we drove along.
"He came here, but I did not feel well enough to see him," said Mr.
Brandon. "Johnny, you know that I stand in place of your father, as
regards your property; to do the best I can with it."
"Yes, sir. And I am sure you do it."
"If Major Parrifer--I don't like the man," broke off Mr. Brandon, "but
that's neither here nor there. At the last magistrates' meeting I
attended he was so overbearing as to shut us all up. My nerves were
unstrung for four-and-twenty hours afterwards."
"And Squire Todhetley came home swearing," I could not help putting in.
"Ah," said Mr. Brandon. "Yes; some people can throw bile off in that
way. I can't. But, Johnny, all that goes for nothing, in regard to the
matter in hand: and I was about to point out to you that if Major
Parrifer has set his mind upon buying Reed's cottage and the bit of land
attached to it, he is no doubt prepared to offer a good price; more,
probably, than it is worth. If so, I should not, in your interests, be
justified in refusing this."
I could feel my face flush with the sense of injustice, and the tears
come into my eyes. They called me a muff for many things.
"I would not touch the money myself, sir. And if you used it for me, I'm
sure it would never bring any good."
"What's that, Johnny?"
"Money got by oppression or injustice never does. There was a fellow at
school----"
"Never mind the fellow at school. Go on with your own argument."
"To turn Reed out of the place where he has always lived, out of the
garden he has done so well by, just because a rich man wants to get
possession of it, would be fearfully unjust, sir. It would be as bad as
the story of Naboth's vineyard, that we heard read in church last
Sunday, for the First Lesson. Tod said so as we came along."
"Who's Tod?"
"Joseph Todhetley. If you turned Reed out, sir, for the sake of
benefiting me, I should be ashamed to look people in the face when they
talked of it. If you please, sir, I do not think my father would allow
it if he were living. Reed says the place is like his homestead."
Mr. Brandon measured two tablespoonfuls of medicine into a glass, drank
it off, and ate a French plum afterwards. The plums were on a plate, and
he handed them to me. I took one, and tried to crack the stone.
"You have taken up a strong opinion on this matter, Master Johnny."
"Yes, sir. I like Reed. And if I did not, he has no more right to be
turned out of his home than Major Parrifer has out of his. How would
_he_ like it, if some rich and powerful man came down on his place and
turned him out?"
"Major Parrifer can't be turned out of his, Johnny. It is his own."
"And Reed's place is mine, sir--if you won't be angry with me for saying
it. Please don't let it be done, Mr. Brandon."
The pony-carriage came rattling up at this juncture, and we saw Tod look
at the windows impatiently. I got up, and Mr. Brandon shook hands with
me.
"What you have said is all very good, Johnny, right in principle;
but I cannot let it quite outweigh your interests. When this proposal
shall be put before me--as you say it will be--it must have my full
consideration."
I stopped when I got to the door and turned to look at him. If he would
only have given me an assurance! He read in my face what I wanted.
"No, Johnny, I can't do that. You may go home easy for the present,
however; for I will promise not to accept the offer to purchase without
first seeing you again and showing you my reasons."
"I may have gone back to school, sir."
"I tell you I will see you again if I decide to accept the offer," he
repeated emphatically. And I went out to the pony-chaise.
"Old Brandon means to sell," said Tod, when I told him. And he gave the
pony an angry cut, that made him fly off at a gallop.
Will anybody believe that I never heard another word upon the subject,
except what people said in the way of gossip? It was soon known that
Mr. Brandon had declined to sell the cottage; and when his lawyer
wrote him word that the sum, offered for it, was increased to quite an
unprecedented amount, considering the value of the cottage and garden
in question, Mr. Brandon only sent a peremptory note back again,
saying he was not in the habit of changing his decisions, and the
place _was not for sale_. Tod threw up his hat.
"Bravo, old Brandon! I thought he'd not go quite over to the enemy."
George Reed wanted to thank me for it. One evening, in passing his
cottage on my way home from the Court, I leaned over the gate to speak
to his little ones. He saw me and came running out. The rays of the
setting sun shone on the children's white corded bonnets.
"I have to thank you for this, sir. They are going to renew my lease."
"Are they? All right. But you need not thank me; I know nothing about
it."
George Reed gave a decisive nod. "If you hadn't got the ear of Mr.
Brandon, sir, I know what box I should have been in now. Look at them
girls!"
It was not a very complimentary mode of speech, as applied to the Misses
Parrifer. Three of them were passing, dressed outrageously in the
fashion as usual. I lifted my straw hat, and one of them nodded in
return, but the other two only looked out of the tail of their eyes.
"The Major has been trying it on with me now," remarked Reed, watching
them out of sight. "When he found he could not buy the place, he thought
he'd try and buy out me. He wanted the bit of land for a kitchen-garden,
he said; and would give me a five-pound bank-note to go out of it. Much
obliged, Major, I said; but I'd not go for fifty."
"As if he had not heaps of land himself to make kitchen-gardens of!"
"But don't you see, Master Johnny, to a man like Major Parrifer, who
thinks the world was made for him, there's nothing so mortifying as
being balked. He set his mind upon this place; he can't get it; and he
is just boiling over. He'd poison me if he could. Now then, what's
wanted?"
Cathy had come up, with her pretty dark eyes, whispering some question
to her father. I ran on; it was growing late, and the Manor ever-so-far
off.
* * * * *
From that time the feud grew between Major Parrifer and George Reed.
Not openly; not actively. It could not well be either when their
relative positions were so different. Major Parrifer was a wealthy
landed proprietor, a county magistrate (and an awfully overbearing
one); and George Reed was a poor cottager who worked for his bread as
a day-labourer. But that the Major grew to abhor and hate Reed; that
the man, inhabiting the place at his very gates in spite of him, and
looking at him independently, as if to say he knew it, every time he
passed, had become an eyesore to him; was easily seen.
The Major resented it on us all. He was rude to Mr. Brandon when they
met; he struck out his whip once when he was on horse-back, and I
passed him, as if he would like to strike me. I don't know whether he
was aware of my visit to Mr. Brandon; but the cottage was mine, I was
friendly with Reed, and that was enough. Months, however, went on, and
nothing came of it.
One Sunday morning in winter, when our church-bells were going for
service, Major Parrifer's carriage turned out with the ladies all in
full fig. The Major himself turned out after it, walking, one of his
daughters with him, a young man who was on a visit there, and a couple
of servants. As they passed George Reed's, the sound of work being done
in the garden at the back of the cottage caught the Major's quick ears.
He turned softly down Piefinch Lane, stole on tiptoe to the high hedge,
and stooped to peep through it.
Reed was doing something to his turnips; hoeing them, the Major said. He
called the gentleman to him and the two servants, and bade them look
through the hedge. Nothing more. Then the party came on to church.
On Tuesday, the Major rode out to take his place on the magisterial
bench at Alcester. It was bitterly cold January weather, and only one
magistrate besides himself was on it: _a clergyman_. Two or three petty
offenders were brought before them, who were severely sentenced--as
prisoners always were when Major Parrifer was presiding. Another
magistrate came in afterwards.
Singular to say, Tod and I had gone to the town that day about a new
saddle for his horse; singular on account of what happened. In saying
we were there I am telling the truth; it is not invented to give
colour to the tale. Upon turning out of the saddler's, which is near
the justice-room, old Jones the constable was coming along with a
prisoner handcuffed, a tail after him.
"Halloa!" cried Tod. "Here's fun!"
But I had seen what Tod did not, and rubbed my eyes, wondering if they
saw double.
"_Tod!_ It is George Reed!"
Reed's face was as white as a sheet, and he walked along, not
unwillingly, but as one in a state of sad shame, of awful rage. Tod
made only one bound to the prisoner; and old Jones knowing us, did not
push him back again.
"As I'm a living man, I do not know what this is for, or why I am
paraded through the town in disgrace," spoke Reed, in answer to Tod's
question. "If I'm charged with wrong-doing, I am willing to appear and
answer for it, without being turned into a felon in the face and eyes of
folks, beforehand."
"Why do you bring Reed up in this manner--handcuffed?" demanded Tod of
the constable.
"Because the Major telled me to, young Mr. Todhetley."
Be you very sure Tod pushed after them into the justice-room: the
police saw him, but he was a magistrate's son. The crowd would have
liked to push in also, but were sent to the right-about. I waited, and
was presently admitted surreptitiously. Reed was standing before Major
Parrifer and the other two, handcuffed still; and I gathered what the
charge was.
It was preferred by Major Parrifer, who had his servants there and a
gentleman as witnesses. George Reed had been working in his garden on
the previous Sunday morning--which was against the law. Old Jones had
gone to Mr. Sterling's and taken him on the Major's warrant, as he was
thrashing corn.
Reed's answer was to the following effect.
He was _not_ working. His wife was ill--her little boy being only four
days old--and Dr. Duffham ordered her some mutton broth. He went to the
garden to get the turnips to put into it. It was only on account of her
illness that he didn't go to church himself, he and Cathy. They might
ask Dr. Duffham.
"Do you dare to tell me you were not hoeing turnips?" cried Major
Parrifer.
"I dare to say I was not doing it as work," independently answered the
man. "If you looked at me, as you say, Major, through the hedge, you
must have seen the bunch of turnips I had got up, lying near. I took the
hoe in my hand, and I did use it for two or three minutes. Some dead
weeds had got thrown along the bed, by the children, perhaps, and I
pulled them away. I went indoors directly: before the clock struck
eleven the turnips were on, boiling with the scrag of mutton. I peeled
them and put them in myself."
"I see the bunch of turnips," cried one of the servants. "They was
lying----"
"Hold your tongue, sir," roared his master; "if your further evidence
is wanted, you'll be asked for it. As to this defence"--and the Major
turned to his brother-magistrates with a scornful smile--"it is quite
ingenious; one of the clever excuses we usually get here. But it will
not serve your turn, George Reed. When the sanctity of the Sabbath is
violated----"
"Reed is not a man to say he did not do a thing if he did," interrupted
Tod.
The Major glared at him for an instant, and then put out of hand a big
gold pencil he was waving majestically.
"Clear the room of spectators," said he to the policeman.
Which was all Tod got for interfering. We had to go out: and in a minute
or two Reed came out also, handcuffed as before; not in charge of old
Jones, but of the county police. He had been sentenced to a month's
imprisonment. Major Parrifer had wanted to make it three months; he
said something about six; but the other two thought they saw some
slightly extenuating circumstances in the case. A solicitor who was
intimate with the Sterlings, and knew Reed very well, had been present
towards the end.
"Could you not have spoken in my defence, sir?" asked Reed, as he passed
this gentleman in coming out.
"I would had I been able. But you see, my man, when the law gets
broken----"
"The devil take the law," said Reed, savagely. "What I want is justice."
"And the administrators of it are determined to uphold it, what can
be said?" went on the solicitor equably, as if there had been no
interruption.
"You would make out that I broke the law, just doing what I did; and I
swear it was no more? That I can be legally punished for it?"
"Don't, Reed; it's of no use. The Major and his witnesses swore you were
at work. And it appears that you were."
"I asked them to take a fine--if I must be punished. I might have found
friends to advance it for me."
"Just so. And for that reason of course they did not take it," said the
candid lawyer.
"What is my wife to do while I am in prison? And the children? I may
come out to find them starved. A month's long enough to starve them in
such weather as this."
Reed was allowed time for no more. He would not have been allowed that,
but for having been jammed by the crowd at the doorway. He caught my eye
as they were getting clear.
"Master Johnny, will you go to the Court for me--your own place,
sir--and tell the master that I swear I am innocent? Perhaps he'll let
a few shillings go to the wife weekly; tell him with my duty that I'll
work it out as soon as I am released. All this is done out of revenge,
sir, because Major Parrifer couldn't get me from my cottage. May the
Lord repay him!"
It caused a commotion, I can tell you, this imprisonment of Reed's; the
place was ringing with it between the Court and Dyke Manor. Our two
houses seemed to have more to do with it than other people's; first,
because Reed worked at the Court; secondly, because I, who owned both
the Court and the cottage, lived at the Manor. People took it up pretty
warmly, and Mrs. Reed and the children were cared for. Mr. Sterling paid
her five shillings a week; and Mr. Brandon and the Squire helped her on
the quiet, and there were others also. In small country localities
gentlemen don't like to say openly that their neighbours are in the
wrong: at any rate, they rarely _do_ anything by way of remedy. Some
spoke of an appeal to the Home Secretary, but it came to nothing, and no
steps were taken to liberate Reed. Bill Whitney, who was staying a week
with us, wrote and told his mother about it; she sent back a sovereign
for Mrs. Reed; we three took it to her, and went about saying old
Parrifer ought to be kicked, which was a relief to our feelings.
But there's something to tell about Cathy. On the day that Reed was
taken up, it was not known at his home immediately. The neighbours,
aware that the wife was ill, said nothing to her--for old Duffham
thought she was going to have a fever, and ordered her to be kept quiet.
For one thing, they did not know what there was to tell; except that
Reed had been marched off from his work in handcuffs by Jones the
constable. In the evening, when news came of his committal, it was
agreed that an excuse should be made to Mrs. Reed that her husband had
gone out on a business job for his master; and that Cathy--who could not
fail to hear the truth from one or another--should be warned not to say
anything.
"Tell Cathy to come out here," said the woman, looking over the gate. It
was the little girl they spoke to; who could talk well: and she answered
that Cathy was not there. So Ann Perkins, Mrs. Reed's sister, was called
out.
"Where's Cathy?" cried they.
Ann Perkins answered in a passion--that she did not know where Cathy
was, but would uncommonly like to know, and she only wished she was
behind her--keeping her there with her sister when she ought to be at
her own home! Then the women told Ann Perkins what they had intended to
tell Cathy, and looked out for the latter.
She did not come back. The night passed, and the next day passed, and
Cathy was not seen or heard of. The only person who appeared to have
met her was Goody Picker. It was about two o'clock in the afternoon,
Tuesday, and Cathy had her best bonnet on. Mother Picker remarked upon
her looking so smart, and asked where she was going to. Cathy answered
that her uncle (who lived at Evesham) had sent to say she must go over
there at once. "But when she came to the two roads, she turned off
quite on the contrairy way to Evesham, and I thought the young woman
must be daft," concluded Mrs. Picker.
The month passed away, and Reed came out; but Cathy had not returned.
He got home on foot, in the afternoon, his hair cut close, and seemed
as quiet as a lamb. The man had been daunted. It was an awful insult
to put upon him; a slur on his good name for life; and some of them
said George Reed would never hold up his head again. Had he been cruel
or vindictive, he might have revenged himself on Major Parrifer,
personally, in a manner the Major would have found it difficult to
forget.
The wife was about again, but sickly: the little ones did not at first
know their father. One of the first people he asked after was Cathy.
The girl was not at hand to welcome him, and he took it in the light of
a reproach. When men come for the first time out of jail, they are
sensitive.
"Mr. Sterling called in yesterday, George, to say you were to go to your
work again as soon as ever you came home," said the wife, evading the
question about Cathy. "Everybody has been so kind; they know you didn't
deserve what you got."
"Ah," said Reed, carelessly. "Where's Cathy?"
Mrs. Reed felt obliged to tell him. No diplomatist, she brought out the
news abruptly: Cathy had not been seen or heard of since the afternoon
he was sent to prison. That aroused Reed: nothing else seemed to have
done it: and he got up from his chair.
"Why, where is she? What's become of her?"
The neighbours had been indulging in sundry speculations on the same
question, which they had obligingly favoured Mrs. Reed with; but she did
not think it necessary to impart them to her husband.
"Cathy was a good girl on the whole, George; putting aside that she'd do
no work, and spent her time reading good-for-nothing books. What I think
is this--that she heard of your misfortune after she left, and wouldn't
come home to face it. She is eighteen now, you know."
"Come home from where?"
Mrs. Reed had to tell the whole truth. That Cathy, dressed up in her
best things, had left home without saying a word to any one, stealing
out of the house unseen; she had been met in the road by Mrs. Picker,
and told her what has already been said. But the uncle at Evesham had
seen nothing of her.
Forgetting his cropped hair--as he would have to forget it until it
should grow again--George Reed went tramping off, there and then, the
nearly two miles of way to Mother Picker's. She could not tell him much
more than he already knew. "Cathy was all in her best, her curls 'iled,
and her pink ribbons as fresh as her cheeks, and said in answer to
questions that she had been sent for sudden to her uncle's at Evesham:
but she had turned off quite the contrairy road." From thence, Reed
walked on to his brother's at Evesham; and learnt that Cathy had not
been sent for, and had not come.
When Reed got home, he was dead-beat. How many miles the man had walked
that bleak February day, he did not stay to think--perhaps twenty. When
excitement buoys up the spirit, the body does not feel fatigue. Mrs.
Reed put supper before her husband, and he ate mechanically, lost in
thought.
"It fairly 'mazes me," he said, presently, in local phraseology. "But
for going out in her best, I should think some accident had come to her.
There's ponds about, and young girls might slip in unawares. But the
putting on her best things shows she was going somewhere."
"She put 'em on, and went off unseen," repeated Mrs. Reed, snuffing the
candle. "_I_ should have thought she'd maybe gone off to some wake--only
there wasn't one agate within range."
"Cathy had no bad acquaintance to lead her astray," he resumed. "The
girls about here are decent, and mind their work."
"Which Cathy didn't," thought Mrs. Reed. "Cathy held her head above
'em," she said, aloud. "It's my belief she used to fancy herself one
o' them fine ladies in her halfpenny books. She didn't seem to make
acquaintance with nobody but that young Parrifer. She'd talk to him by
the hour together, and I couldn't get her indoors."
Reed lifted his head. "Young Parrifer!--what--_his_ son?" turning his
thumb in the direction of Parrifer Hall. "Cathy talked to him?"
"By the hour together," reiterated Mrs. Reed. "He'd be on that side the
gate, a-talking, and laughing, and leaning on it; and Cathy, she'd be in
the path by the tall hollyhocks, talking back to him, and fondling the
children."
Reed rose up, a strange look on his face. "How long was that going on?"
"Ever so long; I can't just remember. But young Parrifer is only at the
Hall by fits and starts."
"And you never told me, woman!"
"I thought no harm of it. I don't think harm of it now," emphatically
added Mrs. Reed. "The worst of young Parrifer, that I've seen, is that
he's as soft as a tomtit."
Reed put on his hat without another word, and walked out. Late as it
was, he was going to the Hall. He rang a peal at it, more like a lord
than a labourer just let out of prison. There was some delay in opening
the door: the household had gone upstairs; but a man came at last.
"I want to see Major Parrifer."