The Earl of Barfield stood at the lodge gate on a summer afternoon
attired in a wondrously old-fashioned suit of white kerseymere and a
peaked cap. He was a withered old gentleman, with red-rimmed eyes, broad
cheek-bones, and a projecting chin. He had a very sharp nose, and
his close-cropped hair was of a harsh, sandy tone and texture. He was
altogether a rather ferret-like old man, but he had, nevertheless, a
certain air of dignity and breeding which forbade the least observant to
take him for anything but a gentleman. His clothes, otherwise spotless,
were disfigured by a trail of snuff which ran lightly along all
projecting wrinkles from his right knee to his right shoulder. This
trail was accentuated in the region of his right-hand waistcoat pocket,
where his lordship kept his snuff loose for convenience' sake. He was
over eighty, and his head nodded and shook involuntarily with the palsy
of old age, but his figure was still fairly upright, and seemed to
promise an activity unusual for his years. He rested one hand on the
rung of a ladder which leaned against the wall beside him, and glanced
up and down the road with an air of impatience. On the ground at his
feet lay a billhook and a hand-saw, and once or twice he stirred these
with his foot, or made a movement with his disengaged right hand as if
he were using one of them.
When he had stood there some ten minutes in growing impatience, a young
gentleman came sauntering down the drive smoking a cigar. Times change,
and nowadays a young man attired after his fashion would be laughable,
but for his day he looked all over like a lady-killer, from his
tasselled French cap to his pointed patent leathers. Behind him walked
a valet, carrying a brass-bound mahogany box, a clumsy easel, and a
camp-stool.
“Going painting again, Ferdinand?” said his lordship, in a tone of some
little scorn and irritation.
“Yes,” said Ferdinand, rather idly, “I am going painting. Your man
hasn't arrived yet?” He cast a glance of lazy amusement at the ladder
and at the tools that lay at its feet.
“No,” returned his lordship, irritably. “Worthless scoundrel. Ah! here
he comes. Go away. Go away. Go and paint. Go and paint.”
The young gentleman lifted his cap and sauntered on, turning once or
twice to look at his lordship and a queer lop-sided figure shambling
rapidly towards him.
“Joseph Beaker,” said the Earl of Barfield, shaking his hand at the
lop-sided man, “you are late again. I have been waiting ten minutes.”
“What did I say yesterday?” asked Joseph Beaker. His face was lop-sided,
like his figure, and his speech came in a hollow mumble which was
difficult to follow. Joseph was content to pass as the harmless lunatic
of the parish, but there was a shrewdly humorous twinkle in his eye
which damaged his pretensions with the more discerning sort of people.
“I do not want to know what you said yesterday,” his lordship answered,
tartly. “Take up the billhook and the saw. Now bring the ladder.”
“What I said yesterday,” mumbled Joseph, shambling by the nobleman's
side, a little in the rear.
“Joseph Beaker,” said the earl, “hold your tongue.”
“Niver could do it,” replied Joseph; “it slips from betwixt the thumb
and finger like a eel. What I said yesterday was, 'Why doesn't thee set
thy watch by the parish church?' Thee'st got Barfield time, I reckon,
and Barfield's allays a wick and ten minutes afore other placen.”
The aged nobleman twinkled and took snuff.
“Joseph,” said his lordship, “I am going to make a new arrangement with
you.”
“Time you did,” returned Joseph, pausing, ostensibly to shift the ladder
from one shoulder to the other, but really to feign indifference.
“I find ninepence a day too much.”
“I've allays said so,” Joseph answered, shambling a little nearer. “A
sinful sight too much. And half on it wasted o' them white garmints.”
“I find myself a little in want of exercise,” said his lordship. “I
shall carry the ladder from the first tree to the second, and you will
carry it from the second to the third; then I shall carry it again, and
then _you_ will carry it again. We shall go on in that way the whole
afternoon, and shall continue in that way so long as I stay here.”
Joseph laughed. It was in his laugh that he chiefly betrayed the
shortcomings of character. His smile was dry and full of cunning, but
his laugh was fatuous.
“Naturally,” pursued the earl, “I shall not pay you full wages for
a half-day's work.” Joseph's face fell into a look of ludicrous
consternation. “I shall be generous, however--I shall be generous. I
shall give you sixpence. Sixpence a day, Joseph, and I shall do half the
work myself.”
“It ar'n't to be done, gaffer,” said Joseph, resolutely stopping short,
and setting up the ladder in the roadway.
The old nobleman turned to face him with pretended anger.
“You are impertinent, Joseph.”
“It caw't be done, my lord,” his assistant mumbled, thrusting his head
through a space in the ladder.
“Times are hard, Joseph,” returned his lordship.
There had been a discernible touch of banter in his voice and manner
when he had rebuked Joseph a second or two before, but he was very
serious now indeed.
“Times are hard; expenses must be cut down. I can't afford more.
Sixpence a day is three shillings a week, and three shillings a week is
one hundred and fifty-six shillings a year--seven pounds sixteen. That
is interest at three per cent, on a sum of two hundred and fifty-nine
pounds ten shillings. That is a great amount to lie waste. While I pay
you sixpence a day I am practically two hundred and fifty-nine pounds
ten shillings poorer than I should be if I kept the sixpence a day to
myself. I might just as well not have the money--it is of no use to me.”
“Gi'e it to me, then,” suggested Joseph, with a feeble gleam.
“Sixpence a day,” said his lordship, “is really a great waste of money.”
“It's cruel hard o' me,” returned Joseph, betraying a sudden inclination
to whimper. “If I was a lord I'd be a lord, I would.”
“Joseph! Joseph! Joseph!” cried his lordship, sharply.
“It's cruel hard,” said Joseph, whimpering outright. “I'd be a man _or_
a mouse, if I was thee.”
“I shall be generous,” said the aged nobleman, relenting. “I shall
give you a suit of clothes. I shall give you a pair of trousers and a
waistcoat--a laced waistcoat--and a coat.”
Joseph laughed again, but clouded a moment later.
“Theer's them as pets the back to humble the belly, and theer's them as
pets the belly to humble the back,” he said, rubbing his bristly chin on
a rung of the ladder as he spoke. “What soort o' comfort is theer in a
laced wescut, if a man's got nothing to stretch it out with?”
“Well, well, Joseph,” returned the earl, “sixpence a day is a great deal
of money. In these hard times I can't afford more.”
“What I look at,” said Joseph, “is, it robs me of my bit o' bacon. If
I was t'ask annybody in Heydon Hay, 'Is Lord Barfield the man to rob
a poor chap of his bit o' bacon?' they'd say, 'No.' That's what they'd
say. 'No,' they'd say; 'niver dream of a such-like thing as happening
Joseph.'”
His lordship fidgeted and took snuff.
“What his lordship 'ud be a deal likelier to do,” pursued Joseph,
declaiming, in imitation of his supposed interlocutor, with his head
through the ladder, and waving the billhook and the saw gently in either
hand, “'ud be to say as a poor chap as wanted it might goo up to the
Hall kitchen and have a bite--that's what annybody 'ud say in Hey don
Hay as happened to be inquired of.”
Joseph's glance dwelt lingeringly and wistfully on his lordship's face
as he watched for the effect of his speech. The old earl took snuff with
extreme deliberateness.
“Very well, Joseph,” he said, after a pause, “we will arrange it in that
way. Sixpence a day. And now and then--now and then, Joseph, you may go
and ask Dewson for a little cold meat. There is a great deal of waste in
the kitchen. It will make little difference--little difference.”
Things being thus happily arranged, his lordship drew a slip of paper
from his pocket and began to study it with much interest as he walked.
He began to chuckle, and the fire of strategic triumph lit his aged
eyes. The day's itinerary was planned upon that slip of paper, and Lord
Barfield had so arranged it that Joseph should carry the ladder all the
long distances, while he himself should carry it all the short ones.
Joseph on his side was equally satisfied with the arrangement, so far as
he knew it, and gave himself up to the sweet influences of fancy. He saw
a glorified edition of himself, attired in my lord's cast-off garments,
and engaged in the act of stretching out the laced waistcoat in the
kitchen at the Hall. The prospect grew so glorious that he could not
hold his own joy and gratulation. It welled over in a series of hollow
chuckles, and his lordship twinkled dryly as he walked in front, and
took snuff with a double gusto.
“We shall begin,” said his lordship, “at Mother Duke's. That laburnum
has been an eyesore this many a day. We must be resolute, Joseph. I
shall expect you to guard the ladder, and not to let it go, even if she
should venture to strike you.”
“Her took me very sharp over the knuckles with the rollin'-pin last
time, governor,” said Joseph. “But her'll be no more trouble to thee
now; her's gone away.”
“Gone away! Mother Duke gone away?”
“Yes,” mumbled Joseph, “her's gone away. There's a little old maid as
lives theer now--has been theer a wick to-day.”
“That's a pity--that's a pity,” said his lordship. “I should have liked
another skirmish with Mother Duke. At least, Joseph,” he added, with the
air of a man who finds consolation in disappointment, “we'll trim
the laburnum this time. At all events, we'll make a fight for it,
Joseph--we'll make a fight for it.” Here he took the billhook and the
saw from his assistant, and strode on, swinging one of the tools in each
hand.
“Theer'll be no need for a fight,” returned Joseph. “Her's no higher
than sixpenn'orth o' soap after a hard day's washing.”
“That's wrong reckoning, Joseph,” said the earl; “wrong reckoning. The
smaller they are the more terrible they may be.”
“I niver fled afore a little un,” said Joseph. “I could allays face a
little un.” He spoke with a retrospective tone. His lordship eyed him
askance with a twinkle of rich enjoyment, and took snuff with infinite
relish, as if he took Joseph's mental flavor with it and found it
delightful. “Mother Duke could strike a sort of a fear into a man,”
pursued Joseph.
“What did you say was the new tenant's name, Joseph?” his lordship
demanded, presently.
“Dunno,” said Joseph. “Her's a little un--very straight up. Goes about
on her heels like, to mek the most of herself.”
A minute's further walk brought them to a bend in the lane, and, passing
this, they paused before a cottage. The front of this cottage was
overgrown with climbing roses, just then in full bloom, and a disorderly
patch of overgrown blossom and shrub lay on each side the thread of
gravel-walk which led from the gate to the door. A little personage,
attired in a tight-fitting bodice and a girlish-looking skirt,
was busily reducing the redundant growth to order with a pair of
quick-snapping shears. It gave his lordship an odd kind of shock when
this little personage arose and turned. The face was old. There was
youth in the eyes and the delicate dark-brown arch of the eyebrows, but
the old-fashioned ringlet which hung at either cheek beneath the cottage
bonnet she wore was almost white. The cheeks were sunken from what had
once been a charming contour, the delicate aquiline nose was pinched
ever so little, the lips were dry, and there were fine wrinkles
everywhere. There was something almost eerie in the youthfulness of the
eyes, which shone in the midst of all her faded souvenirs of beauty.
Had the eyes been old the face would have been beautiful still, but the
contrast they presented to their setting was too striking for beauty.
They gave the old face a curiously exalted look, an expression hardly
indicative of complete sanity, though every feature was expressive in
itself of keen good-sense, quick apprehension, and strong self-reliance.
The figure in its tight-fitting bodice looked like that of a girl of
seventeen, but the stature was no more than that of a well-grown girl of
twelve. The movement with which she had arisen and the attitude she took
were full of life and vivacity. His lordship was so taken aback by
the extraordinary mixture of age and girlishness she presented that he
stared for a second or two unlike a man of the world, and only recovered
himself by an effort.
“Set up the ladder here, Joseph,” he said, pointing with the billhook
to indicate the place. Joseph set down the ladder on the pathway, and
leaning it across the close-clipped privet hedge where numberless small
staring eyes of white wood betrayed the recent presence of the shears,
he propped it against the stout limb of a well-pruned apple-tree. His
lordship, somewhat ostentatiously avoiding the eye of the inmate of the
cottage, tucked his saw and his billhook under his left arm and mounted
slowly, while Joseph made a great show of steadying the ladder. The
little old woman opened the garden gate with a click and slipped into
the roadway. His lordship hung his saw upon a rung of the ladder, and
leaning a little over took a grasp of the bough of a sweeping laburnum
which overhung the road.
“My lord,” said a quick, thin voice, which in its blending of the
characteristics of youth and age matched strangely with the speaker's
aspect, “this tenement and its surrounding grounds are my freehold. I
cannot permit your lordship to lay a mutilating hand upon them.”
“God bless my soul!” said his lordship. “That's Rachel Blythe! That must
be Rachel Blythe.”
“Rachel Blythe at your lordship's service,” said the little old lady.
She dropped a curt little courtesy, at once as young and as old as
everything about her, and stood looking up at him, with drooping hands
crossed upon the garden shears.
“God bless my soul! Dear me!” said his lordship. “Dear me! God bless my
soul!” He came slowly down the ladder and, surrendering his billhook
to Joseph, advanced and proffered a tremulous white hand. Miss Blythe
accepted it with a second curt little courtesy, shook it once up and
down and dropped it. “Welcome back to Heydon Hay, Miss Blythe,” said
the old nobleman, with something of an air of gallantry. “You have long
deprived us of your presence.”
Perhaps Miss Blythe discerned a touch of badinage in his tone, and
construed it as a mockery. She drew up her small figure in exaggerated
dignity, and made much such a motion with her head and neck as a hen
makes in walking.
“I have long been absent from Heydon Hay, my lord,” she answered.
“My good man,” turning upon Joseph, “you may remove that ladder. His
lordship can have no use for it here.”
“Oh, come, come, Miss Blythe,” said his lordship. “Manorial rights,
manorial rights. This laburnum overhangs the road and prevents people of
an average height from passing.”
“If your lordship is aggrieved I must ask your lordship to secure a
remedy in a legal manner.”
“But really now. Observe, Miss Blythe, I can't walk under these boughs
without knocking my hat off.” He illustrated this statement by walking
under the boughs. His cap fell on the dusty road, and Joseph, having
picked it up, returned it to him.
“Your lordship is above the average height,” said Miss Blythe--
“considerably.”
“No, no,” the earl protested. “Not at all, not at all.”
“I beg your lordship's pardon,” said the little old lady, with stately
politeness. “Nobody,” she added, “who was not profoundly disloyal would
venture to describe the Queen's Most Excellent Majesty as undersized. I
am but a barleycorn less in stature than her Most Excellent Majesty, and
your lordship is yards taller than myself.”
“My dear Miss Blythe--” his lordship began, with hands raised in protest
against this statement.
“Your lordship will pardon me,” Miss Blythe interposed, swiftly, “if
I say that at my age--forgive me if I say at your lordship's also--the
language of conventional gallantry is unbecoming.”
The little old lady said this with so starched and prim an air, and
through this there peeped so obvious a satisfaction in rebuking him upon
such a theme, that his lordship had to flourish his handkerchief from
his pocket to hide his laughter.
“I have passed the last quarter of a century of my life,” pursued Miss
Blythe, “in an intimate if humble capacity in the service of a family of
the loftiest nobility. I am not unacquainted with the airs and graces
of the higher powers, but between your lordship and myself, at our
respective ages, I cannot permit them to be introduced.”
His lordship had a fit of coughing which lasted him two or three
minutes, and brought the tears to his eyes. Most people might have
thought that the cough bore a suspicious resemblance to laughter, but no
such idea occurred to Miss Blythe.
“You are quite right, Miss Blythe,” said the old nobleman, when he could
trust himself to speak. He was twitching and twinkling with suppressed
mirth, but he contained himself heroically. “I beg your pardon, and I
promise that I will not again transgress in that manner. But really,
that--that--fit of coughing has quite exhausted me for the moment. May I
beg your permission to sit down?”
“Certainly, my lord,” replied the little old lady, and in a bird-like
fashion fluttered to the gate. It was not until she had reached the
porch of the cottage that she became aware of the fact that the earl was
following her. “Your lordship's pardon,” she said then; “I will bring
your lordship a chair into the garden. I am alone,” she added, more prim
and starched than ever, “and I have my reputation to consider.”
Miss Blythe entered the cottage and returned with a chair, which she
planted on the gravelled pathway. The old nobleman sat down and took
snuff, twitching and twinkling in humorous enjoyment.
“How long is it since you left us?” he asked. “It looks as if it were
only yesterday.”
“I have been absent from Heydon Hay for more than a quarter of a
century,” the little old lady answered.
“Ah!” said he, and for a full minute sat staring before him rather
forlornly. He recovered himself with a slight shake and resumed the
talk. “You maintain your reputation for cruelty, Miss Blythe?”
“For cruelty, my lord?” returned Miss Blythe, with a transparent
pretence of not understanding him.
“Breaking hearts,” said his lordship, “eh? I was elderly before you went
away, you know, but I remember a disturbance--a disturbance.” He rapped
with the knuckles of his left hand on his white kerseymere waistcoat.
Miss Blythe tightened her lips and regarded him with an uncompromising
air.
“Differences of sex, alone, my lord,” she said, with decision, “should
preclude a continuance of this conversation.”
“Should they?” asked the old nobleman. “Do you really think so? I
forget. I am a monument of old age, and I forget, but I fancy I used to
think otherwise. You were the beauty of the place, you know. Is that a
forbidden topic also?”
Miss Blythe blushed ever so little, but her curiously youthful eyes
smiled, and it was plain she was not greatly displeased. The Earl of
Barfield went quiet again, and again stared straight before him with
a somewhat forlorn expression. The little old lady reminded him of her
mother, and the remembrance of her mother reminded him of his own youth.
He woke up suddenly. “So you've come back?” he said, abruptly. “You've
bought the cottage?”
“The freehold of the cottage was purchased for me by my dear mistress,”
said the little old lady. “I desired to end my days where I began them.”
“H'm!” said my lord. “We're going to be neighbors? We _are_ neighbors.
We must dwell together in unity. Miss Blythe--we must dwell together in
unity. I have my hands pretty full this afternoon, and I must go. I'll
just trim these laburnums, and alter--”
“I beg your lordship's pardon,” said Miss Blythe, with decision, “your
lordship will do nothing of the sort.”
“Eh? Oh, nonsense, nonsense! Must clear the footway. Must have the
footway clear--really must. Besides, it improves the aspect of the
garden. Always does. Decidedly improves it. Joseph Beaker, hold the
ladder.”
Talking thus, the old gentleman had arisen from his chair and had
re-entered the roadway, but the little old lady skimmed past him and
faced him at the foot of the ladder.
“If your lordship wants to cut trees,” she said, “your lordship may cut
your lordship's own.”
“Up thee goest, gaffer,” said Joseph, handing over the little old lady's
head the billhook and the saw.
Miss Blythe turned upon him with terrible majesty.
“Joseph Beaker?” she said, regarding him inquiringly. “Ah! The passage
of six-and-twenty years has not improved your intellectual condition.
Take up that ladder, Joseph Beaker. If you should ever dare again to
place it against a tree upon my freehold property I shall call the
policeman. I will set man-traps,” pursued the little old lady, shaking
her curls vigorously at Joseph. “I will have spring-guns placed in the
trees.”
“Her's wuss than t'other un,” mumbled the routed Joseph, as he shambled
in his lop-sided fashion down the road. “I should ha' thought you could
ha' done what you liked wi' a little un like that. I niver counted on
being forced to flee afore a little un.”
The earl said nothing, and Miss Blythe, satisfied that the retreat was
real, had already gone back to her gardening.