"Now do give me a rose, Mr Monnick; do, please."
"Give you a rose, my dear?" said John Monnick, pausing in his task of
thinning out the superabundant growth amongst the swelling grapes.
"Well, I don't like to refuse you anything, though it do seem a shame to
cut the poor things, when they look so much prettier on the trees."
"Oh, but I like to have one to wear, Mr Monnick, to pin in my breast."
"And then, as soon as it gets a bit faded, my dear, you chucks it away."
"O no; not if it's a nice one, Mr Monnick. I put it in water
afterwards, and let it recover."
"Putting things in water, 'specially masters, don't always make 'em
recover, my dear," said the old man, picking out and snapping off a few
more shoots. "Hah!" he cried, after a good sniff at the bunch of
succulent pieces, and then placing one acid tendrilled scrap in his
mouth, twisting it up, and munching it like some ruminating
animal--"smell that, my dear; there's a scent!" and he held out the
bunch to the pretty coquettish-looking maid.
"_De_-licious, Mr Monnick," said the girl, taking a long sniff at the
shoots. "And now you will give me a nice pretty rosebud, won't you?"
"I allus observe," said the old man thoughtfully, going on with his
work, "that if you want something, Fanny, you calls me Mister Monnick;
but if I ask you to do anything for me, or you have an order from Sir
James or my lady, it's nothing but plain John."
"Oh, I don't always think to call you Mr Monnick," said the girl
archly.--"But I must go now. Do give me a nice just opening bud."
"Well, if you'll be a good girl, and promise only to take one, I'll give
you leave to fetch your scissors and cut a Homer."
"What! one of those nasty common-looking little dirty pinky ones?" cried
the girl. "No, thank you; I want one of those." As she spoke, she
pointed to a trellis at the end of the greenhouse, over which was
trailed the abundant growth of a hook-thorned climbing rose.
"What, one o' my Ma'shal Niels?" cried the old gardener. "I should just
think not. Besides," he added with a grim smile, "yaller wouldn't suit
your complexion."
"Now, don't talk stuff," cried the girl. "Yellow does suit dark
people.--Do cut me one, there's a dear good man."
"Yes," said the old man; "and then, next time you get washing out your
bits o' lace and things, you'll go hanging 'em to dry on my trained
plants in the sun."
"No; I won't. There, I promise you I'll never do so any more."
"Till nex' time.--I say, Fanny, when's Mr Arthur going back to London?"
"I don't know," said the girl, rather sharply. "How can I tell?"
"Oh, I thought p'r'aps he might have been telling you last night."
"Telling me last night!" echoed the girl. "Where should he be telling
me?"
"Why, down the field-walk, to be sure, when he was a-talking to you."
"That I'm sure he wasn't," cried the girl, changing colour.
"Well, he was a-wagging his chin up and down and making sounds like
words; and so was you, Fanny, my dear."
"Oh, how can you say so!"
"This way," said the old man, facing her and speaking very deliberately.
"What was he saying to you?"
"I--I wasn't--"
"Stop a moment," said the old man. "Mr Arthur Prayle's such a
religious-spoken sort o' gent, that I dessay he was giving you all sorts
o' good advice, and I'm sure he wouldn't like you to tell a lie."
"I'm not telling a lie; I'm not.--Oh, you wicked, deceitful, spying old
thing!" she cried, bursting into tears. "How dare you come watching
me!"
"I didn't come watching you, my dear. I was down there with a pot,
picking up the big grey slugs that come out o' the field into the
garden; for they feeds the ducks, and saves my plants as well.--Now,
lookye here, my dear; you're a very pretty girl, and it's very nice to
be talked to by a young man, I dare say. I never cared for it myself;
but young women do."
"How dare you speak to me like that!" cried the girl, flaming up.
"'Cause I'm an old man, and knows the ways o' the world, my dear. Mr
Arthur comes down the garden to me and gives me bits o' religious
instruction and advice like; but if he wants to give any to you, I think
he ought to do it in the house, and give it to Martha Betts and cook at
the same time."
"It's all a wicked story," cried Fanny angrily; "and I won't stop here
to be insulted!"
"Don't, my dear. But I'm going to walk over to your brother William's
to-night, and have a bit o' chat with him 'bout things in general, and I
thought I'd give him my opinion on the pynte."
Fanny had reached the door of the vinery; but these words stopped her
short, and she came back with her face changing from red to white and
back again. "You are going to tell my brother William?"
"Yes, my dear, as is right and proper too. Sir James aren't fit to be
talked to; and it's a thing as I couldn't say to her ladyship. It
aren't in the doctor's way; and if I was to so much as hint at it to
Miss Raleigh, she'd snap my head off, and then send you home."
Fanny stood staring mutely with her lips apart at the old gardener, who
went on deliberately snapping out the shoots, and staring up at the roof
with his head amongst the vines. One moment her eyes flashed; the next
they softened and the tears brimmed in them. She made a movement
towards the old man where he sat perched upon his steps calmly
ruminating with his mouth full of acid shoots; then, in a fit of
indignation, she shrank back, but ended by going close up to him and
laying her hand upon his arm.
"Leave that now," she said.
"Nay, nay, my lass; I've no time to spare. Here's all these shoots
running away with the jushe and strength as ought to go into the grapes;
and the master never touches them now. It all falls upon my shoulders
since he's ill."
"Yes, yes; you work very hard; but I want to talk to you a minute."
"Well; there then," he said. "Now, what is it?" and he left off his
task to select a nice fresh tendril to munch.
"You--you won't tell Brother William."
"Ay, but I shall, lass. Why, what do it matter to you, if it was all a
lie and you warn't there?"
"But William will think it was me, Mr Monnick; and he is _so_
particular; and--There, I'll confess it, was me."
"Thankye," said the old man, with a grim smile; "but my eyes are not had
enough to make a mistake."
"But you won't tell William?"
"It aren't pleasant for you, my dear; but you'll thank me for it some
day."
"But it would make such trouble. William would come over and see Mr
Prayle; and you know how violent my brother can be. There's plenty of
trouble in the house without that."
"I don't know as William Cressy would be violent, my dear. He's a very
fine young fellow, and as good a judge o' gardening as he be of his
farm. He be very proud of his sister: and he said to me one day--"
"William said--to you?"
"Yes, my dear, to me, over a quiet pipe, as he had along o' me one
evening in my tool-house. `John Monnick,' he says, `our Fanny's as
pretty a little lass as ever stepped, and some day she'll be having a
chap.'"
"Having a chip!" said Fanny, with her lip curling in disgust.
"`And that's all right and proper, if he's a good sort; but I'm not
going to have her take up with anybody, and I'm not going to have her
fooled.'"
"I wish William would mind his own business," cried Fanny, stamping her
foot. "He's got a deal to talk about; coming and staring at a stupid
housemaid."
"Martha Betts aren't stupid, my dear, and a housemaid's is a very
honourable situation. The first woman as ever lived in a house must
have been a housemaid, just the same as the first man was a gardener.
Don't you sneer at lowly occupations. Everything as is honest is good."
"Oh, yes, of course. But you won't tell William?"
"I feel, my dear, as if I must," said the old man, taking the girl's
hand, and patting it softly. "You're a very pretty little lass, and
it's quite right that you should have a sweetheart."
"Sweetheart, indeed!" cried Fanny in disgust,
"But that there Mr Arthur aren't the right sort."
"How do you know?" cried the girl defiantly.
"'Cause I'm an old man as has seen a deal of the world, my dear, and
I've got a granddaughter just like you. I shouldn't have thought it of
Mr Arthur, and I don't know as I shan't speak to him about it myself."
"Oh no, no!" cried the girl excitedly. "Pray, don't do that."
The old man loosed her hand to sit gazing thoughtfully before him, while
the girl once more grasped his arm.
"There's on'y one thing as would make me say I wouldn't speak to William
Cressy and Mr Arthur."
"And what's that?" cried the girl.
"You a-giving of me your solemn promise as you won't let Mr Arthur talk
to you again."
"I'll promise," cried the girl. "Yes," said the old man; "it's easy
enough to promise; but will you keep it?"
"Yes, yes, that I will."
"You see he's a gentleman, and you're only a farmer's daughter, my dear;
and he wouldn't think no more of you, after once he'd gone away from
here; and then you'd be frettin' your pretty little heart out."
"Then you won't tell Brother William?"
"Well, I won't."
"Nor yet speak to Mr Arthur?"
"Not this time, my dear; but if I see any more of it, I shall go
straight over to William Cressy, and then he'll do what seems best in
his own eyes."
"I think it would be far more creditable of you, gardener, if you were
attending to your vines, instead of wasting your time gossiping with the
maids," said a stern sharp voice. "And as for you, Fanny, I think you
have enough to do indoors."
"If you please, ma'am, you are not my mistress," said the girl pertly.
"No, Fanny, and never shall be; but your mistress is too much taken up
with her cares to note your negligence, therefore I speak. Now go!"
A sharp answer was upon Fanny's lips; but she checked it, and flounced
out of the vinery, leaving Aunt Sophia with the gardener.
"I am surprised at you, John Monnick," continued the old lady. "Your
master is helpless now, and you take advantage of it."
"No, ma'am, no," said the old fellow, who would not bring the question
of Fanny's delinquency into his defence. "I'm working as steadily as I
can."
"Humph!" ejaculated Aunt Sophia. "I never saw these vines so wild
before."
"Well, they are behind, ma'am; but you see this is all extry. Sir James
always done the vines himself, besides nearly all the other glass-work;
and the things do run away from me a bit."
"Yes, if you encourage the maid-servants to come and talk."
"Yes, ma'am; shan't occur again," said the old fellow grimly; and he
went on busily snapping out the shoots, while Aunt Sophia stalked out
into the garden to meet Arthur Prayle, who was walking thoughtfully up
and down one of the green walks, with his hands behind him, one holding
a memorandum book, the other a pencil, with which he made a note from
time to time.
Volume 2, Chapter IX.