Mr. Pepys was a gentleman whose spirits were never dashed save when he
was testy for want of food or plunged into some periodical ague fit of
shivering religiosity. He was an excellent companion for the road, with
his vivacity and his bustling determination to get the best that life
could give. John Gore and the Secretary had agreed to take no servants
with them, for, as Mr. Pepys declared, “the rogues only drank their
masters’ purses dry, and ran away at the first click of a
pistol”—though it is highly probable that Mr. Samuel preferred to ride
alone upon his travels simply because he was minded to enjoy himself
without some prying rascal of a groom carrying home all manner of
scandalous lies as to what Mr. Samuel said and did and drank in his
hours of ease and absence.
They slept the first night at The Checkers Inn at Tunbridge, a fine
timber and plaster house whose great gables overhung the street. The
next day they rode on to The Wells, where many fashionable folk still
lingered, enjoying the autumn sunshine and the country air. Mr. Pepys
contrived to hire one of the little wooden cottages upon The Common for
the night, a step that saved them riding off to Speldhurst. The
Secretary appeared chiefly delighted with the fair held near The
Pantiles, where pretty country girls sold fruit and flowers and garden
stuff, and robbed their customers coquettishly, being not so simple as
they seemed. Mr. Pepys proved such a zealous marketeer that he came away
with a boy carrying a big basket, in which were three cabbages, a gallon
of apples, two pounds of butter, a chicken and a duck, some home-made
cakes, several bunches of ribbons, and a bottle of gooseberry wine.
“What the deuce to do with the stuff?” That was a problem that made him
laugh most heartily. And being an ingenious wag he went down in the
evening with the basket to a little pavilion where some of the quality
were playing cards by candle-light, and, soon finding friends there, he
sat down and played ombre till he had lost three guineas. Then came the
jest of protesting that he must pay his debts “in kind,” and the duck
and the cabbages and the butter were hauled forth out of the basket. The
bottle of gooseberry cordial was the only thing they took back with them
to the cottage on The Common, and they shared it between them, finding
it far stronger and more fiery than they had expected.
Mr. Pepys had a religious fit next morning when they rode on toward
Lamberhurst to condole with the ugly cousin over her losses. It proved
to be a smoky village in a valley, with a little stream running through
it and a good inn near the bridge. Mr. Pepys established himself at the
inn, swearing that he would cause Cousin Jane no extra expense; for her
cooking would have caused a second revolt in heaven—at least, so he
told John Gore. He appeared in need of a comfortable cup of mulled wine
when he returned from calling upon the relative, who lived in a dull
little house up the hill. Mr. Pepys confessed that she had talked five
gold pieces out of him, and he went to bed so surlily that the officious
insects, if there were any in the place, remained at a discreet and
respectful distance.
On the fourth day from crossing London Bridge they rode for the town of
Battle, leaving the Rye road at Flimwell, and entering upon a track that
made Mr. Pepys sore in spirit as well as in the saddle. The roughness
and the quagmires of the so-called highway reduced him to one of those
sad and pensive moods when a man beholds rottenness in every
institution, and despairs of an age that can suffer so much mud. When
Mr. Pepys felt gloomy he took to talking politics, and to inveighing
against the venality of the times, and the dangers that threatened every
man, however shrewd and honest he might be.
“Keep away from it, John,” he said, solemnly; “for I assure you there
will be heads falling before you and I are a year older. We are passing
through a pest of plots—ouch!—hold up, you beast, that is the fifth
time you have bumped me on the same place! I trust, John, that you have
not meddled with any of these intrigues.”
“I am just as wise as a child, Sam.”
“Be careful that you are not too simple. Now, in your ear, John, I have
many fears for that fine gentleman, your father. He is dabbling his
hands in dangerous dishes. God knows what will come of all this ferment.
The Protestant pot is on the bubble, John; it will boil over and scald a
good many people, or I know nothing.”
“How much of it is froth?”
“Perhaps on the top, sir; but there is a deuced lot of hot liquor
underneath. I know more of these things than most men, John; I am in and
out, here, there, and everywhere; I keep my ears open, my clacker quiet,
and my opinions to myself. There are some people who must be forever
meddling, and banking up secret bonfires under their own houses. The
papists are just such folk, John. There will be a flare soon, I tell
you, and a bigger flare, perhaps, than the Great Fire ever made. Keep
your fingers to yourself, John, and let fools play with hot coals.”
John Gore listened to Mr. Pepys’s prophecies, and watched the autumn
woods flow by, russet and green, and bronze and gold. They were riding
now over the Sussex hills, with a gorgeous landscape flowing toward the
sea. Blue distances, far, faint horizons, dim, winding valleys ablaze
with the splendor of decay. Leaves falling with a flicker of amber in
the autumn sunlight. Berries red upon the bryony and the brier. Bracken
bronzing the woodlands and the hill-sides, vague mists ready to rise so
soon as the sun had set.
It was late in the afternoon, and the west a sweep of cold clear gold,
when they came to the town of Battle, riding over the hill where the
windmills stood, the hill called Mountjoy in those parts, for there the
knights of William the Norman had tossed their spears in triumph as the
sun went down. Coming by Mill Street into King Street they saw the great
gray gate of the Abbey facing the town green where the fairs were held
and where they baited bulls. Looking about them for a good inn, they
chose “The Half Moon,” on the eastern side of the green. Over the way
stood the great beamed house where wayfarers had been lodged before the
days of the Abbey’s death.
The first piece of news Mr. Pepys had from the hostler as he dismounted
was that my Lord Montague was not at the Abbey, but was expected from
Cowdray some day that week. Mr. Pepys swore by way of protest, being
stiff and hungry, and inclined to be choleric and testy over trifles. He
was walking to and fro in the yard to stretch his legs, and throwing
caustic brevities toward John Gore, when a neat and comely woman of
forty came stepping over the stones, and desired to know how she could
make the gentlemen welcome.
Mr. Pepys looked at her bland, brown face, with plaits of dark hair
drawn over the forehead, and recovered some of his urbanity.
“Your best bedroom, ma’am, the best supper you can serve, and the best
bottle of wine you have. You may not know Mr. Pepys of the Admiralty in
these parts.”
The landlady spread her apron and curtesied very prettily, her brown
eyes and the red handkerchief over her bosom making Mr. Pepys approve of
her manners.
“The great Mr. Samuel Pepys, sir?”
“Some people would question the adjective, ma’am.”
“I have a boy in one of the King’s ships, sir, and Mr. Pepys, sir, is
mighty popular in the navy. I am proud to serve you, sir.” And she
dropped him another curtesy that made the great man think her a mighty
fine woman. “Tom, carry up the gentlemen’s valises to the big front
room. I can give you a little parlor to yourselves, sirs. And what may
it please you to take for supper?”
They became quite coy and coquettish over pasties and spitted woodcock,
duck and apple sauce, and Mr. Pepys’s favorite pudding. The Secretary
appeared to forget the stiffness in his legs. He walked in with the
genial air of a man who feels that his dignity is sure of its deserts,
whispering to John Gore, with a wink, that it is useful at times to be
somebody in this world, even for the sake of a clean bed.
The hostess of “The Half Moon” reconciled Mr. Pepys so thoroughly to his
quarters by the polish of her pewter, the warmth of the wood fire, and
by the supper she sent him by the hands of her daughter, that he lost
his spite against my Lord Montague for being on the other side of
Sussex. Lolling in a chair before the fire, his shoes off and his
stockinged feet enjoying the blaze, he made as comfortable a picture as
a philosopher could wish to praise.
“I could stomach a day or two here, John, with great contentment,” he
said; “for the thought of those Sussex roads at night make me bless God
for the burning logs, although it is October. My Lord Montague can come
to me while we enjoy ourselves. Let us consider what there is to be seen
in this part of Sussex. Ha, so—let us call up mine hostess’s daughter
and hear what she has to say.”
There was no bell in the parlor, but Mr. Pepys improvised a gong with
the bottom of a big brass candlestick and the poker. But since this most
martial clashing did not bring the damsel, he went to the stairs-head
and called over the balusters:
“Betty—Betty, my dear.”
Petticoats bustled up the stairs, and the daughter of the house appeared
with a tray held like a buckler across her bosom. Mr. Pepys made her a
polite little bow.
“We shall be beholden to you, my dear, if you will tell us how we may be
amused to-morrow. Are there any gentlemen’s houses worth a ride in the
neighborhood?”
Mr. Pepys retreated backward into the room as though desirous of drawing
the girl after him.
“There is the Abbey, sir.”
“The Abbey!” And Mr. Pepys tossed the suggestion aside as superfluous.
“I shall see enough of it, Betty, when my Lord Montague reaches us. Are
there any houses hereabouts where murder has been committed, or a plot
hatched, or a king been entertained. We like to see the shows.”
The girl leaned against the door-post with the tray lodged jauntily upon
one hip, and her green stays with their red laces showing off a very
embraceable figure.
“There is Bodjam Castle, sir.”
“Bodjam—Bodjam. What a name, my dear, for a cobbler! It likes me
little.” And he admired the red petticoat and the green stays.
“Hastings Town—and Castle, sir.”
“Fish and old stones! No, John, eh; no Betty. Try me again.”
“Perhaps Rye Town would please you, sir.”
“A wry road, no doubt, which is more than your figure is, my dear; not
wry, I mean, but trim as—well—just what you please.”
The girl laughed, perked up her chin, and glanced at John Gore as though
he looked a sturdy fellow, and as though she expected him to wink.
“There is Pevensey, sir, where the King landed, and Thorn House, and
Hurstmonceux.”
“Ah, Hurstmonceux, and Thorn, did you say? Thorn belongs to the
Purcells, John, surely?”
“Yes, Mr. Pepys—”
“Pat off the tongue—Patrick Pepys shall be patted!”
“No one ever goes to Thorn, sir; there is nothing to see but ravens.”
“Hurstmonceux is a pretty word, my dear. Say it again; I like to see
your lips pout out. What! giggling? Now, dear soul, what is there to
laugh at? I am an old bachelor, as this gentleman will tell you. And,
Betty, don’t forget the warming-pan, will you, my dear?”
John Gore and Mr. Pepys shared the same room that night, and the
Secretary’s bed-going was as lengthy as his tongue. He had a habit of
undressing by degrees, and of sitting down and roasting his toes at the
fire between each act. He would even draw off his small-clothes from one
leg and sit with the other still breeched, while he chatted and fondled
his chin. Even when he had undressed, the toilet for the night was
nearly as thorough as the toilet for the day. Mr. Pepys aired the
contents of his travelling valise before the fire, and donned in
succession a pair of lamb’s-wool bed-boots, a thick undervest, a blue
cloth sleeping-coat, and a great nightcap, which he drew down over his
ears. Then he shut the lattice tight, pushed a table against the door,
put his money under his pillow, warmed his feet for the last time at the
fire, and then clambered into bed.
“Lord Montague can stay at Jericho,” he said, as he wallowed down into a
feathered mattress. “The weather should be steady, Jack—my corns are
quiet. What do you say to Hurstmonceux for to-morrow. I wager that we
can get inside.”
“The girl spoke of Thorn.”
“That was an allegory, John; ask her if her name is Rose. Now I dare you
to keep me awake with your talking, sir; I know you sailors, all yarn to
the rope’s-end. Good wench, she has warmed the bed well just where my
feet go, God bless her! Did you applaud the color of those stays, John?
Red and green are rare colors on a dark woman. Ah—ho!—if I tie not my
clacker up, you will never let me sleep till midnight.”
John Gore still remembered Mr. Pepys’s snoring when they ordered their
horses out next morning for a jaunt over the Sussex hills. Mistress
Green Stays brought Mr. Pepys a mug of sack into the court-yard as he
sat in the saddle, for which favor he thanked her gallantly, and told
her she had pretty dimples at the elbow. They took a track that ran out
of the western end of the town past the old Watch Oak, and soon toward
Ashburnham and Penhurst.
Now, to put the matter frankly, these two gentlemen got wickedly lost
that day, largely through a fit of friskiness on Mr. Pepys’s part in
chasing a stray donkey down a side road. He had been lusting for a
gallop, so he said, and the moke gave it him, to land him quizzically in
a stout thorn-hedge. John Gore extricated the Secretary, condoled with
him over the scratches, and prevailed upon him to return toward the
road. But Mr. Pepys boasted a great belief in his own bump of locality,
and, taking to a bridle-path, lost himself with complete success. And
then he swore roundly at the Sussex roads, as though it was their duty
to fly up in his face and not go crawling and sneaking like a lot of
thieves behind a wood.
John Gore laughed, for it was Mr. Pepys’s outing and not his, and he
suffered his friend to follow his own nose, being amused to know what
would be the end of it. They were following a grass track that curled
hither and thither through thickets and over scrubby meadows, not a
house to be seen anywhere, with the sun at noon, and no dinner
threatening.
The track proved kind to them, however, for the woods gave back
suddenly, and they saw a red farm-house shelving its thatch under the
shelter of a few beech-trees against the clear blue of an October sky.
The beeches themselves were a-glitter with ruddy gold. And from the low
brick chimney blew a wisp of smoke, as though flying a signal to Mr.
Pepys’s inner man.
The Secretary bumped his heels into his horse and went forward at a
canter. John Gore saw him rein in clumsily as he skirted a hedge that
closed the orchard and yard, rolling forward in the saddle as though he
was in danger of going over his horse’s head. He waved an arm over the
hedge toward a great pond that lay on the farther side thereof, between
the farm-yard and the orchard.
It seemed that the farmer’s child of seven had something of the Columbus
in him, for while the men were in the fields and his mother in the
kitchen he had rolled a big tub down from the yard, floated the craft,
and embarked boldly, with a couple of thatching-pegs for oars. Whether
the child paddled his way too daringly or no, the tub overturned in the
middle of the pond, and, righting itself, lay there water-logged, while
a flaxen head and a pair of frightened hands went bobbing and clawing
and gulping amid ripples of scared water. And on the far bank, with the
drake at their head, a company of white ducks were quacking in chorus,
shaking their tails, and making a mighty pother.
John Gore saw that the boy was likely to drown, and, vaulting out of the
saddle, he broke through the hedge and reached the pond. The pool looked
too dark and deep for wading, and probably had two feet of mud at the
bottom; so, pulling off his horseman’s coat and his heavy riding-boots,
he went in, made a breast plunge for it, and struck out for the child.
The white head was going under again when John Gore snatched at the
curls. He held the boy at arm’s-length, and, swimming till his feet
touched mud, stood up and lifted the youngster in his arms.
Mr. Pepys, who had run into the farm-house, appeared at the hedge with a
round of rope and a big, raw-boned woman in a blue petticoat and a kind
of linen smock. She pushed through, not sparing her brown forearms or
her face, and would have taken the child out of John Gore’s arms.
But he put her aside kindly, and, laying the boy on the grass under the
hedge, unfastened his little doublet, and then held him up by the legs
to empty the windpipe and lungs of water.
“Have you a good fire burning?”
“Lord bless you, sir, yes.”
“Go and get your blankets ready. We shall soon have him alive and
roaring.”
John Gore carried the child into the farm kitchen, and, laying him in a
blanket almost upon the hearth-stone, rubbed and kneaded him till the
skin began to redden. A loud sneeze was the first greeting that he gave
them. His mother went down on her knees instantly and huddled him to her
bosom, the blanket trailing across the brick floor.
“You be for terrifying me, you God-forsaken little rascal! Playing these
tricks on us, with the good gentleman here wet to the skin and his
stockings all mud! Won’t I smack ye when ye can bear a hand on a spot
where a hand can’t do much harm!”