ROWDON SMITHY.
Though the four youngsters fancied that they had been wandering for
hours in the cold and darkness, the time of their relief was early in
the evening. Work was not yet over for somebody at the smithy. The
forge was set up in a large building, which looked a sort of superior
shed, open on the side next to the road, and with a paved court, worn
by the tread of many horses, in front of it. Gazing across the unwalled
court to the open shed, Frances saw in the brilliant light of the
smithy fire a young man busily engaged with hammer and anvil; his tall,
slight figure, in rough working dress, bent and raised with almost
mechanical precision as his supple right arm swung its ponderous tool.
When the lumbering waggon halted before the court, the worker paused in
his labour, throwing back his head and screening his eyes with his free
left hand, to gain a better view of the arrival. The waggoner called
out a hasty summons, and the young smith left his forge and quickly
crossed the yard.
“Anything wrong, Job?”
The lad’s voice was clear and soft, and his speech, though rustic in
expression, conveyed no trace of dialect; while his face, now plainly
visible in the lantern’s glow, appeared a singularly pleasant one. Its
attraction increased when Max’s lively countenance was thrust forward
by its owner, and when Max shouted a gay greeting.
“Hallo, Jim!--Jim East! Look out for a sensation! Here’s a snowed-up
party of four humans and one animal come to beg help and shelter!”
Max had jumped down and was pouring out explanations in a moment. The
young smith listened and looked, and shyly doffed his cap, standing
bare-headed in the driving snow while his eyes rested in astonishment
on the figures of the two girls.
“The little ladies!” murmured Jim; “they’ve never been with you, Master
Brenton?”
“Haven’t they, though! They’ve found out what a snowstorm on Rowdon
Common means, I can tell you. But I’m afraid they are very cold and
tired,” added Max seriously. “I was beginning to think it was all up
with us when I first caught sight of Job. Well, Jim, will you help us?”
“Surely!” exclaimed the lad.
Though evidently bashful, Jim East had nothing clownish about him.
His manner showed a simple courtesy which pleased and reassured the
girl-travellers, as he stepped close to the waggon and held up his
strong, lithe arms.
“Come, Missies, let me lift you down, and show you the way to
grandfather’s cottage. ’Tis but a step; and our old Elizabeth, if she’s
there, shall wait on you. You’ll be sorely stiff with the terrible
cold.”
The girls willingly accepted the young smith’s offered aid, and were
placed with gentle care at Max’s side.
“Young master too?” suggested Jim, seeing Austin still above him.
“Oh, I can get down all right,” said Austin, not too civilly. Austin
did not appear to advantage when brought by circumstances into contact
with the class he chose to term “cads”. “Here, you chap, just catch
this baggage, will you? We’ve no end of traps. I’ll throw them down.”
Frances blushed with sisterly mortification--why would Austin be so
rude and snobbish to this worthy young artisan? Surely Jim East was
a type of those whose humble toil was the crown of honest manhood.
Certainly Austin was not a model member of the Woodend Society of
Altruists. But glancing apprehensively at young East, lest her
brother’s imperious commands should make him surly and indignant,
Frances saw that the lad’s countenance revealed nothing but frank
good-nature. He gave Austin a smiling reply, and would have obeyed him
without question, had not Max laid a hand on his arm.
“Not a bit, Jim! I’ll see to the baggage. Do you get the girls under
cover as quickly as you can, there’s a good fellow.”
Jim turned to Frances and Florry.
“You’ll come with me, then, Missies? Master Brenton knows the way.”
A few paces along the road a low hedge began. This bordered a long,
narrow, old-fashioned garden, cut vertically in precise halves by a
flagged pathway reached through a small green gate. Jim opened the
gate for the girls, and led them towards a cottage lying back from the
road at the end of the garden.
Frances, with Florry immediately behind her, stepped gladly into the
light and shelter of a long passage with a door at either end. Another
door, in the wall on their right, was pushed open by the young smith,
whose dark eyes glowed with pleasure as he spoke softly to someone
within:
“Grandfather, here’s little ladies for you--two little ladies! They’ve
been like to have lost themselves in the storm, so Master Brenton’s
been telling me. They’ll be best to come in here--eh, grandfather? And
maybe they’ll warm themselves with you, till I fetch Elizabeth to wait
on them.”
Jim stood on one side, his happy excitement controlled by an
instinctive wish to be quiet and unobtrusive in the company of young
gentlefolk. The two girls, with ready thanks on their lips, passed
by their conductor into a fair-sized room furnished with much homely
comfort, and saw in an arm-chair by the fire an old man, whose fine
head, with its massive forehead, keen eyes, and firm mouth, denoted
strength of will and individual character. William East’s silvery locks
were quick to command the respect of the two girls, who stepped slowly
towards their aged host.
“Elizabeth has gone home, grandson,” said East, speaking in a quavering
voice which still retained a note of decision and authority, as
towards one who had been taught prompt obedience. “So you will wait on
the little ladies yourself. Chairs to the fire for them, Jim,--and
off with their boots. Then you’ll make some hot, strong coffee, and
see you’re quick with it. These are not the kind as needs to lose
themselves in snowstorms.” East turned his face to the girls, and
it softened wonderfully, while he addressed them in very different
tones: “Come near to the fire, Missies, and tell me all about it. Why,
you both look fairly spent. There, there, dearies--the recklessness
one sees in young folk! But sit you down, and be sure you’re kindly
welcome.”
“You’re very good,” said Frances gratefully. “I don’t know why you
should be troubled with all of us boys and girls. There are four of us,
Mr. East,--and a pony. We’ve left the carriage somewhere in the snow.
I’m afraid we’re a great bother, but you must please try not to let us
worry you;--Max Brenton has been telling us that you aren’t very well
just now, and I’m so sorry.”
Frances’s sympathy was sure of appreciation--it was so earnest and
sincere, and expressed with the simplest good-will. Old East greeted it
with many nods and smiles, and beckoned Frances to the chair nearest to
himself. Indeed, he was amazingly pleased to see this bright young lady
by his side.
Jim waited deftly on both the girls, taking off their wet boots and
coats, and trying to rub some feeling back into their half-frozen feet.
Next he went away with the boots into the kitchen, and set about making
coffee in his best style.
Meanwhile Frances and Florry made great friends with the ailing
grandsire.
“I must tell you our names,” said Frances presently, when the boys
had joined the group in the cottage parlour. “Of course you know the
Doctor’s son--everybody knows Doctor Max.”
“Ay, he’s his father’s son truly--I can’t say better for him than that.”
“And the boy beside him is my brother Austin. Then this is Miss Florry
Fane, the best of girls; and I am Frances Morland.”
The old man leaned forward suddenly, and seemed to scan the speaker’s
face with a curious intentness.
“Morland, did you say, my dear? Ah! once I knew someone with that name.
Does your father live here-abouts?”
“My father is dead. Austin and I live with our mother in Woodend; but
we have not been here long--only since the spring.”
Frances talked on easily and quietly, fearing to disturb East, who,
with his face turned from her, gazed into the fire. One hand he
held across his eyes; the other, which rested on his knee, trembled
a little. For a time he sat thus, hardly speaking, yet evidently
listening with interest and pleasure to all the young girl cared to
tell him. When she did hear his voice, it addressed her in quavering
gentleness:
“And you’ve come to see me, Missy,--you, so blithe and bonnie! The
Lord Himself sent you this night to gladden my old eyes. Ah! but I’m
thankful--I’m thankful! Will you remember, little Missy, when I’m gone
hence, as your coming brought a blessing with it to Rowdon Cottage?”
[Illustration:
M432
“THE OLD MAN LEANED FORWARD SUDDENLY TO SCAN THE SPEAKER’S FACE.”]
Frances, moved by this appeal, and somewhat shy--for the aged face
near her was quivering, and the aged voice faltered and broke--put her
small hand trustfully on East’s wasted fingers.
“I am glad we came; and you are very kind. Mayn’t I come and see you
sometimes, with Max?”
“Rarely welcome would you be, little Missy,” said the old man,
brightening. “And there’s something I’d say. If ever my Jim needs
kindness, as like enough he may, will you try to be good to him?”
“Oh yes, I will,” said Frances soberly, knowing that East’s thoughts
were anticipating his nearing end and his grandson’s consequent
loneliness.
“Jim’s one to think much of kindness from little ladies,” continued the
grandfather wistfully. “I fancy, maybe, as I’ve not done well by him.
’Twas my wish to bring him up strong and sturdy and independent; for,
as a wean even, the boy was gentle and soft, and fond of daintiness.
That’s why I made him a smith by trade. Thought I, ‘He’ll learn
hardness as he stands by the forge and bends the iron to his will’. But
no, Jim’s craft will never make a man of him.”
“That’s a pity,” said the consoling voice of Max, who had drawn near.
“A fellow ought to match his trade. My trade’s doctoring,--at least
it’s going to be; so I don’t miss a chance of practice. It’s not often
I get a really good thing, though. Still, all my chums have promised
that if they break an arm they’ll let me set it.”
Max, with his cheery laugh, could dispel most shadows, but East’s
thoughtful gravity did not disappear. Frances was drawn across the room
by the fragments she caught of a conversation between her brother and
the young blacksmith, and East’s eyes followed her and watched all her
movements.
Jim was begging Austin to come to the kitchen and be swathed in
blankets while his clothes were drying. Not that the working lad would
have thought much of being in a yet damper condition than was his
boy-guest, but he had heard Frances confide to his grandfather her
fears for her brother.
“Do now, young master, do!”
“Catch me!” retorted Austin, more bored than angry; “I’m not such a
soft. Clear off, I say, Jim East. I tell you, I won’t be coddled.”
“Better take a bit of care than lie abed,” argued Jim sensibly. “And
Missy’s feared for you, sir.”
“Girls always fuss,” muttered the boy, growing cross. He pushed aside,
with unmannerly roughness, young East’s detaining hand, and was making
for the fireside when Frances intercepted him.
“Oh, Austin, how can you be so rude?” whispered the girl reproachfully.
“Do go with this good-natured lad,” she pleaded. “You know how dreadful
it is when you get a bad throat.”
“As though I’d loaf about his dirty old kitchen and be rolled up in
smithy blankets!” said Austin, in extreme disgust.
He spoke low, but Frances knew that Jim must hear, and she coloured
deeply in her distress. Her brother’s over-fastidiousness on some
points always made her impatient, but now she felt that he was both
foolish and ungrateful in repelling kindly advances. She allowed Austin
to pass, and throw himself on the rug before the fire at Florry’s feet;
then she turned to Jim, again apprehensive that his feelings might
have been hurt by his guest’s unmannerly words and ungracious bearing.
Jim’s eyes were on Austin; Jim’s lips smiled as, without a touch of
jealousy, he recognized in the handsome, attractive boy the evidence of
the better training and opportunities denied to himself.
“Boys are always so tiresome, aren’t they?” said Frances, seeing with
relief that Jim’s face betrayed no sense of injury. “My brother won’t
be taken care of, you see; though I’m sure if he does have a sore
throat, he won’t like it.”
“Oh, I hope he won’t be ill, Missy,” said Jim. “He looks so--so game,
and happy-like. I’d think it wasn’t easy to coddle him.”
“It isn’t,” said Frances soberly; “and I don’t want him to be a
molly--only I wouldn’t like him to be ill again. I’m ever so much
obliged to you for offering to help him.”
“You’ve no call to thank me, Missy. It wouldn’t have been much to do.
The pony’s safe in the shed,” added the young smith shyly; “I’ll give
him a rub down and a feed by and by.”
“You are good,” said Frances. “Oh, do you think there’s any chance of
getting home to-night? All our friends will be so anxious if we don’t
return till morning, though it’s very kind of your grandfather to say
we may camp here.”
“Indeed and you mustn’t worry, Missy,” said Jim. “Sometimes there’s
folks passes here much later than this; and if you’d not mind mounting
into a waggon again--”
“We wouldn’t mind a bit. I can’t think what Mamma will do if she hears
nothing about us till morning.”
Jim’s young face looked very serious, but he offered no further
comfort; and Frances, feeling that her low spirits might become
infectious, tried to divert her mind by asking leave to look at a
book-case against the wall near at hand. While she looked, and wondered
a little at the class of books she found on the shelves, Jim fetched
her a cup of hot coffee and placed it on a small table by her side.
Frances was used to the companionship and natural attentions of
well-bred lads, but it struck her that none of her boy-friends could
have shown her more courteous respect than she was now receiving from
this pleasant young rustic.
“Jim,” said the voice of the old grandfather, “fetch your fiddle, lad.
Maybe the young folks might like to hear a tune.”
Austin grimaced expressively behind his hands, but only Max saw, and
Max joined the girls in polite invitations to blushing Jim. The fiddle
was brought from another room, and its owner, seating himself modestly
in a dark corner, begged to know what tune the little ladies would like
best. Florry, guessing that the performer’s repertory might be limited,
suggested “Home, Sweet Home”.
Then Jim surprised his audience, for though his rendering was entirely
simple, it showed an ear for rhythm, a taste for expression, and an
unerring correctness of pitch.
“He does play in tune,” murmured Austin the critic, while the other
children thanked the fiddler heartily.
Jim coloured with gratification to find himself approved, and willingly
obliged his guests with all their favourite popular airs. By the time
he had satisfied everybody the evening had worn far on; and Jim,
yielding his fiddle into the hands of Austin, who longed to finger
the instrument of his fellow-musician, went to hold a low-voiced
consultation with his grandfather.
The result of this talk was the summoning of Frances to consider a plan
of action, as proposed by the Easts.
“My grandson fears there’s no chance now of a way home for you
to-night, Missy. The snow is too deep for any wise man to take a
beast into without necessity. I’m thinking ’twere best if you settled
yourselves down quiet-like, took a bit of supper, and made the best of
what I can give you. There’ll be a tidy room upstairs for the missies,
and the young masters will sleep soundly on yonder big couch. ’Tis all
I can do.”
“Indeed, you are very kind,” said Frances. “Of course we shall do
splendidly. It’s only because of our friends that we mind. My mother is
all alone--except for servants,--and she will be so frightened. Then
there are Florry’s parents, and the Doctor.”
“You’re right to think of them, Missy,” said the old man, whose eyes
seemed to shine with a sort of solemn joy when they rested on Frances.
“And ’twould never do to let them go in fear all night. They’d be out
scouring the country, like as not. There’s Jim will set out for Woodend
just as soon as he can get ready; and he’ll let your friends know
you’re safe and well, and waiting here till sent for.”
“Jim cross the Common to-night!” cried Max, coming forward as
spokesman for the visitors. “Oh, I say, Mr. East! How could he?”
“We mustn’t let him,” said Frances. “I’m sure we oughtn’t to.”
“I could go myself rather,” went on Max seriously. “It isn’t fair that
Jim should suffer for my foolery. I ought to have backed up Frances
when she wanted to hire a trap in Exham.”
“That’s over and done with, master,” said East, “and it’s no use to
spend your time blaming yourself for what was just a bit of a frolic.
Jim will go, he’s tall and strong and hardy.”
Frances looked at the grandson’s slight figure and sensitive face. Jim
was healthily spare and wiry, but hardly robust. And he must be all
in all to his grandfather--the prop of the little home. Her sense of
justice made her beg hard that the venturesome journey to Woodend might
not be made; but both the Easts, though they tried to reassure their
anxious young guests, had evidently made up their minds.
“Elizabeth--our old housekeeper--lives quite close at hand,” said Jim
to the girls. “I shall pass her cottage, and I’ll bid her come to you,
Missies, and see to your comfort as well as she can.”
The girls insisted that they needed no waiting-woman, but Jim smiled in
respectful disagreement while he wished them good-night. The room door
closed softly behind him, and the grandfather, pitying the disturbed
young faces, told their owners not to fret, for Jim would surely come
safely back from Woodend, though not till long after they were a-bed
and asleep.
The snowstorm which had brought with it to our youngsters so great an
adventure was the talk of the countryside for many a week. The roads
about Exham were impassable for some days, except to sturdy rustics or
stout farm-horses. Dr. Brenton came to the smithy next day in a great
waggon (just like Job Benson’s rescuing ark), which he had borrowed
from a Woodend farmer; and with hearty thanks to the Easts, and warm
acknowledgments of Jim’s pluck and consideration, carried off the
wanderers to their homes.
“We should like to come again, if we may,” said Frances, lingering by
the old grandfather for a second farewell.
“Ay,” he returned, pressing the girl’s kind little hand. “I’m glad I’ve
seen you, Missy. Come again.”
“Please!” added Jim from the background. “We’ll be proud to have you,
Missy. Come again.”