IV

Esther's position in Woodview was now assured, and her fellow-servants

recognised the fact, though they liked her none the better for it. Mrs.

Latch still did what she could to prevent her from learning her trade, but

she no longer attempted to overburden her with work. Of Mr. Leopold she

saw almost as little as she did of the people upstairs. He passed along

the passages or remained shut up in his pantry. Ginger used to go there to

smoke; and when the door stood ajar Esther saw his narrow person seated on

the edge of the table, his leg swinging. Among the pantry people Mr.

Leopold's erudition was a constant subject of admiration. His

reminiscences of the races of thirty years ago were full of interest; he

had seen the great horses whose names live in the stud-book, the horses

the Gaffer had owned, had trained, had ridden, and he was full of anecdote

concerning them and the Gaffer. Praise of his father's horsemanship always

caused a cloud to gather on Ginger's face, and when he left the pantry

Swindles chuckled. "Whenever I wants to get a rise out of Ginger I says,

'Ah, we shall never see another gentleman jock who can use the whip at a

finish like the Governor in his best days.'"

Everyone delighted in the pantry, and to make Mr. Leopold comfortable Mr.

Swindles used to bring in the wolf-skin rug that went out with the

carriage, and wrap it round Mr. Leopold's wooden armchair, and the sallow

little man would curl himself up, and, smoking his long clay, discuss the

weights of the next big handicap. If Ginger contradicted him he would go

to the press and extract from its obscurity a package of _Bell's Life_ or

a file of the _Sportsman_.

Mr. Leopold's press! For forty years no one had looked into that press.

Mr. Leopold guarded it from every gaze, but it seemed to be a much-varied

repository from which, if he chose, he could produce almost any trifle

that might be required. It seemed to combine the usefulness of a hardware

shop and a drug store.

The pantry had its etiquette and its discipline. Jockey boys were rarely

admitted, unless with the intention of securing their services for the

cleaning of boots or knives. William was very proud of his right of entry.

For that half-hour in the pantry he would willingly surrender the pleasure

of walking in the drove-way with Sarah. But when Mrs. Latch learnt that he

was there her face darkened, and the noise she then made about the range

with her saucepans was alarming. Mrs. Barfield shared her cook's horror of

the pantry, and often spoke of Mr. Leopold as "that little man." Although

outwardly the family butler, he had never ceased to be the Gaffer's

private servant; he represented the old days of bachelorhood. Mrs.

Barfield and Mrs. Latch both disliked him. Had it not been for his

influence Mrs. Barfield felt sure her husband would never have returned to

his vice. Had it not been for Mr. Leopold Mrs. Latch felt that her husband

would never have taken to betting. Legends and mystery had formed around

Mr. Leopold and his pantry, and in Esther's unsophisticated mind this

little room, with its tobacco smoke and glasses on the table, became a

symbol of all that was wicked and dangerous; and when she passed the door

she closed her ears to the loud talk and instinctively lowered her eyes.

The simplest human sentiments were abiding principles in Esther--love of

God, and love of God in the home. But above this Protestantism was human

nature; and at this time Esther was, above all else, a young girl. Her

twentieth year thrilled within her; she was no longer weary with work, and

new, rich blood filled her veins. She sang at her work, gladdened by the

sights and sounds of the yard; the young rooks cawing lustily in the

evergreens, the gardener passing to and fro with plants in his hands, the

white cats licking themselves in the sun or running to meet the young

ladies who brought them plates of milk. Then the race-horses were always

going to or coming from the downs. Sometimes they came in so covered with

white mud that part of their toilette was accomplished in the yard; and

from her kitchen window she could see the beautiful creature haltered to

the hook fixed in the high wall, and the little boy in his shirtsleeves

and hitched-up trousers, not a bit afraid, but shouting and quieting him

into submission with the stick when he kicked and bit, tickled by the

washing brush passing under the belly. Then the wrestling, sparring,

ball-playing of the lads when their work was done, the pale, pathetic

figure of the Demon watching them. He was about to start for Portslade and

back, wrapped, as he would put it, in a red-hot scorcher of an overcoat.

Esther often longed for a romp with these boys; she was now prime

favourite with them. Once they caught her in the hay yard, and fine sport

it was in the warm hay throwing each other over. Sometimes her wayward

temper would get the better of her, but her momentary rage vanished at the

sound of laughter. And after their tussling they would walk a little while

pensively, until perhaps one, with an adroit trip, would send the other

rolling over on the grass, and then, with wild cries, they would run down

the drove-way. Then there was the day when the Wool-gatherer told her he

was in love, and what fun they had had, and how well she had led him into

belief that she was jealous! She had taken a rope as if she were going to

hang herself, and having fastened it to a branch, she had knelt down as if

she were saying her prayers. The poor Wool-gatherer could stand it no

longer; he had rushed to her side, swearing that if she would promise not

to hang herself he would never look at another girl again. The other boys,

who had been crouching in the drove-way, rose up. How they did chaff the

Wool-gatherer! He had burst into tears and Esther had felt sorry for him,

and almost inclined to marry him out of pity for his forlorn condition.

Her life grew happier and happier. She forgot that Mrs. Latch would not

teach her how to make jellies, and had grown somewhat used to Sarah's

allusions to her ignorance. She was still very poor, had not sufficient

clothes, and her life was full of little troubles; but there were

compensations. It was to her that Mrs. Barfield always came when she

wanted anything in a hurry, and Miss Mary, too, seemed to prefer to apply

to Esther when she wanted milk for her cats or bran and oats for her

rabbits.

The Gaffer and his race-horses, the Saint and her greenhouse--so went the

stream of life at Woodview. What few visitors came were entertained by

Miss Mary in the drawing-room or on the tennis lawn. Mrs. Barfield saw no

one. She desired to remain in her old gown--an old thing that her daughter

had discarded long ago--pinned up around her, and on her head an old

bonnet with a faded poppy hanging from the crown. In such attire she

wished to be allowed to trot about to and fro from her greenhouse to her

potting-shed, watering, pruning, and syringing her plants. These plants

were dearer than all things to her except her children; she seemed,

indeed, to treat them as if they were children, and with the sun pouring

through the glass down on her back she would sit freeing them from

devouring insects all the day long. She would carry can after can of water

up the long path and never complain of fatigue. She broke into complaint

only when Miss Mary forgot to feed her pets, of which she had a great

number--rabbits, and cats, and rooks, and all the work devolved upon her.

She could not see these poor dumb creatures hungry, and would trudge to

the stables, coming back laden with trusses of hay. But it was sometimes

more than a pair of hands could do, and she would send Esther with scraps

of meat and bread and milk to the unfortunate rooks that Mary had so

unmercifully forgotten. "I'll have no more pets," she'd say, "Miss Mary

won't look after them, and all the trouble falls upon me. See these poor

cats, how they come mewing round my skirts." She loved to expatiate on her

inexhaustible affection for dumb animals, and she continued an anecdotal

discourse till, suddenly wearying of it, she would break off and speak to

Esther about Barnstaple and the Brethren.

The Saint loved to hear Esther tell of her father and the little shop in

Barnstaple, of the prayer-meetings and the simple earnestness and

narrowness of the faith of those good Brethren. Circumstances had effaced,

though they had not obliterated, the once sharply-marked confines of her

religious habits. Her religion was like a garden--a little less sedulously

tended than of yore, but no whit less fondly loved; and while listening to

Esther's story she dreamed her own early life over again, and paused,

laying down her watering-can, penetrated with the happiness of gentle

memories. So Esther's life grew and was fashioned; so amid the ceaseless

round of simple daily occupations mistress and maid learned to know and to

love one another, and became united and strengthful in the tender and

ineffable sympathies of race and religion.

V

The summer drowsed, baking the turf on the hills, and after every gallop

the Gaffer passed his fingers along the fine legs of the crack, in fear

and apprehension lest he should detect any swelling. William came every

day for news. He had five shillings on; he stood to win five pounds

ten--quite a little fortune--and he often stopped to ask Esther if there

was any news as he made his way to the pantry. She told him that so far as

she knew Silver Braid was all right, and continued shaking the rug.

"You'll never get the dust out of that rug," he said at last, "here, give

it to me." She hesitated, then gave it him, and he beat it against the

brick wall. "There," he said, handing it back to her, "that's how I beats

a mat; you won't find much dust in it now."

"Thank you.... Sarah went by an hour and a half ago."

"Ah, she must have gone to the Gardens. You have never been to those

gardens, have you? Dancing-hall, theatre, sorcerers--every blessed thing.

But you're that religious, I suppose you wouldn't come?"

"It is only the way you are brought up."

"Well, will you come?"

"I don't think I should like those Gardens.... But I daresay they are no

worse than any other place. I've heard so much since I was here, that

really----"

"That really what?"

"That sometimes it seems useless like to be particular."

"Of course--all rot. Well, will you come next Sunday?"

"Certainly not on Sunday."

The Gaffer had engaged him as footman: his livery would be ready by

Saturday, and he would enter service on Monday week. This reminded them

that henceforth they would see each other every day, and, speaking of the

pain it would give his mother when he came running downstairs to go out

with the carriage, he said--

"It was always her idea that I shouldn't be a servant, but I believe in

doing what you gets most coin for doing. I should like to have been a

jockey, and I could have ridden well enough--the Gaffer thought better at

one time of my riding than he did of Ginger's. But I never had any luck;

when I was about fifteen I began to grow.... If I could have remained like

the Demon----"

Esther looked at him, wondering if he were speaking seriously, and really

wished away his splendid height and shoulders.

A few days later he tried to persuade her to take a ticket in a shilling

sweepstakes which he was getting up among the out and the indoor servants.

She pleaded poverty--her wages would not be due till the end of August.

But William offered to lend her the money, and he pressed the hat

containing the bits of paper on which were written the horses' names so

insinuatingly upon her that a sudden impulse to oblige him came over her,

and before she had time to think she had put her hand in the hat and taken

a number.

"Come, none of your betting and gambling in my kitchen," said Mrs. Latch,

turning from her work. "Why can't you leave that innocent girl alone?"

"Don't be that disagreeable, mother; it ain't betting, it's a

sweepstakes."

"It is all the same," muttered Mrs. Latch; "it always begins that way, and

it goes on from bad to worse. I never saw any good come from it, and

Heaven knows I've seen enough misfortune."

Margaret and Sarah paused, looking at her open-mouthed, a little

perplexed, holding the numbers they had drawn in both hands. Esther had

not unfolded hers. She looked at Mrs. Latch and regretted having taken the

ticket in the lottery. She feared jeers from Sarah, or from Grover, who

had just come in, for her inability to read the name of the horse she had

drawn. Seeing her dilemma, William took her paper from her.

"Silver Braid.... by Jingo! She has got the right one."

At that moment the sound of hoofs was heard in the yard, and the servants

flew to the window.

"He'll win," cried William, leaning over the women's backs, waving his

bony hand to the Demon, who rode past on Silver Braid. "The Gaffer will

bring him to the post as fit as a fiddle."

"I think he will," said Mr. Leopold. "The rain has done us a lot of good;

he was beginning to go a bit short a week ago. We shall want some more

rain. I should like to see it come down for the next week or more."

Mr. Leopold's desires looked as if they were going to be fulfilled. The

heavens seemed to have taken the fortunes of the stable in hand. Rain fell

generally in the afternoon and night, leaving the mornings fine, and

Silver Braid went the mile gaily, becoming harder and stronger. And in the

intermittent swish of showers blown up from the sea Woodview grew joyous,

and a conviction of ultimate triumph gathered and settled on every face

except Mrs. Barfield's and Mrs. Latch's. And askance they looked at the

triumphant little butler. He became more and more the topic of

conversation. He seemed to hold the thread of their destiny in his press.

Peggy was especially afraid of him.

And, continuing her confidences to the under-housemaid, the young lady

said, "I like to know things for the pleasure of talking about them, but

he for the pleasure of holding his tongue." Peggy was Miss Margaret

Barfield, a cousin, the daughter of a rich brewer. "If he brings in your

letters in the morning he hands them to you just as if he knew whom they

are from. Ugly little beast; it irritates me when he comes into the room."

"He hates women, Miss; he never lets us near his pantry, and he keeps

William there talking racing."

"Ah, William is very different. He ought never to have been a servant. His

family was once quite as good as the Barfields."

"So I have heard, Miss. But the world is that full of ups and downs you

never can tell who is who. But we all likes William and 'ates that little

man and his pantry. Mrs. Latch calls him the 'evil genius.'"

A furtive and clandestine little man, ashamed of his women-folk and

keeping them out of sight as much as possible. His wife a pale, dim woman,

tall as he was short, preserving still some of the graces of the

lady's-maid, shy either by nature or by the severe rule of her lord,

always anxious to obliterate herself against the hedges when you met her

in the lane or against the pantry door when any of the family knocked to

ask for hot water, or came with a letter for the post. By nature a

bachelor, he was instinctively ashamed of his family, and when the

weary-looking wife, the thin, shy girl, or the corpulent, stupid-faced son

were with him and he heard steps outside, he would come out like a little

wasp, and, unmistakably resenting the intrusion, would ask what was

wanted.

If it were Ginger, Mr. Leopold would say, "Can I do anything for you, Mr.

Arthur?"

"Oh, nothing, thank you; I only thought that----" and Ginger would invent

some paltry excuse and slink away to smoke elsewhere.

Every day, a little before twelve, Mr. Leopold went out for his morning

walk; every day if it were fine you would meet him at that hour in the

lane either coming from or going to Shoreham. For thirty years he had done

his little constitutional, always taking the same road, always starting

within a few minutes of twelve, always returning in time to lay the cloth

for lunch at half-past one. The hour between twelve and one he spent in

the little cottage which he rented from the squire for his wife and

children, or in the "Red Lion," where he had a glass of beer and talked

with Watkins, the bookmaker.

"There he goes, off to the 'Red Lion,'" said Mrs. Latch. "They try to get

some information out of him, but he's too sharp for them, and he knows it;

that's what he goes there for--just for the pleasure of seeing them

swallow the lies he tells them.... He has been telling them lies about the

horses for the last twenty years, and still he get them to believe what he

says. It is a cruel shame! It was the lies he told poor Jackson about Blue

Beard that made the poor man back the horse for all he was worth."

"And the horse didn't win?"

"Win! The master didn't even intend to run him, and Jackson lost all he

had, and more. He went down to the river and drowned himself. John Randal

has that man's death on his conscience. But his conscience don't trouble

him much; if it did he'd be in his grave long ago. Lies, lies, nothing but

lies! But I daresay I'm too 'ard on him; isn't lies our natural lot? What

is servants for but to lie when it is in their master's interest, and to

be a confidential servant is to be the Prince of liars!"

"Perhaps he didn't know the 'orse was scratched."

"I see you are falling in nicely with the lingo of the trade."

"Oh," replied Esther, laughing; "one never hears anything else; one picks

it up without knowing. Mr. Leopold is very rich, so they say. The boys

tell me that he won a pile over the City and Suburban, and has thousands

in the bank."

"So some says; but who knows what he has? One hears of the winnings, but

they say very little about the losings."