TRESPASSING
She looked up with a start--to find that a man was observing her who
seemed to be unusually tall. She lay in a hollow, he stood on the top
of the bank; so that perhaps their relative positions tended to
exaggerate his apparent inches. But that he was tall was beyond a
doubt. He was also broad. Her first feeling was, that she had never
seen a man who was at once so tall and so broad across the shoulders.
He was rather untidily dressed--in a grey tweed knickerbocker suit,
with a Norfolk jacket, and a huge cap which was crammed right down on
his head. He wore a flannel shirt, and a dark blue knitted tie, which
was tied in a scrambling sailor's knot. Both hands were in the pockets
of his jacket, which was wide open; and, altogether, the impression was
conveyed to her, as she lay so far beneath him, that he was of a
monstrous size.
It struck her that his being where he was was an impertinence, which
was rendered much greater by his venturing to address her; especially
with such an inquiry. Merely raising herself on her elbow, she favoured
him with a glance which was intended to crush him.
"There can be no doubt as to who is trespassing as you must be
perfectly well aware--you are."
"I quite agree with you in thinking that there can be no doubt as to
who is trespassing; but there, unfortunately, our agreement ends,
because, as it happens, you are."
"Do you suppose that I don't know which is my own property? I am Miss
Arnott, of Exham Park--this is part of my ground."
"I fancy, with all possible deference, that I know which is my property
better than you appear to know which is yours. I am Hugh Morice, of Oak
Dene, and, beyond the slightest shadow of a doubt, the ground on which
we both are is mine."
She rose to her feet a little hurriedly.
"What authority have you for what you say? Are you trying to amuse
yourself at my expense?"
"Allow me to explain. You see that fence, which is in rather a
doddering condition--it forms the boundary line between Exham Park and
Oak Dene, a fact which I have a particular reason to remember. Once,
before this was my ground, I was shooting in these woods. My bird--it
was only a pigeon--dropped on the other side of that fence. I was no
better acquainted with the landmarks then than you appear to be now.
Not aware that there was any difference between this side and that, I
was scrambling over the fence to retrieve my pigeon when I was pulled
up short by some very plain words, pronounced in a very plain tone of
voice. I won't tell you what the words were, because you might like
them even less than I did. I looked up; and there was an old gentleman,
who was flanked by two persons who were evidently keepers. He was one
of the most eloquent old gentlemen I had ever met. He commenced by
wanting to know what I meant by being about to defile his ground by the
intrusion of my person. I replied that I wasn't aware that it was his
ground, and that I wanted my pigeon. He asked me who I was. When I told
him he informed me that he was Septimus Arnott, and desired me to
inform all persons bearing my name what he thought of them. He thought
a good deal--in a sense. He wound up by remarking that he would
instruct his keepers, if ever they caught me on the wrong side of that
fence, to put a charge of lead into me at sight. Towards the end of the
interview I was as genially disposed as he was; so I retorted by
assuring him that if ever I caught anyone from Exham Park on this side,
I'd do the honours with a charge of lead. This is the exact spot on
which that interview took place--he was there and I here. But the
circumstances have changed--it is Exham Park who is now the trespasser.
Shall I put a charge of lead into you?"
"By all means--if you wish to."
"I am not quite sure that I do wish to."
"If you have the slightest inclination in that direction, pray don't
hesitate."
"You mightn't like it."
"Don't consider my feelings, I beg. In such a matter surely you
wouldn't allow my feelings to count."
"No? You think not? I don't know. Perhaps you're right; but, you see, I
haven't a gun. I can't put charges of lead into anything, or anyone,
without one.
"Pray don't let any trifling obstacle of that kind stand in your way.
Permit me to send for one."
"Would you? You're very good. Who would you send?"
"Of course I would myself fetch you the indispensable weapon."
"And how long would you be, do you imagine? Should I have time to smoke
a pipe while you were going there and back?"
Suddenly the lady drew herself up with a gesture which was possibly
meant to be expressive of a judicious mingling of scorn with hauteur.
"It is possible, if you prefer it. I will admit that it is probable
that my uncle was rude to you. Do you intend to continue the tradition,
and be rude to me?"
"I was simply telling you a little anecdote, Miss Arnott."
"I am obliged to you for taking so much trouble. Now, with your
permission, I will return to what you state to be my side of the
fence."
"I state? Don't you state that that side of the fence is yours?"
"My impression was that both sides were mine. I will have the matter
carefully inquired into. If your statement proves to be correct I will
see that a communication is sent to you, conveying my apologies for
having been an unwitting trespasser on your estate."
"Thank you. Can I lift you over?"
"Lift me over!"
The air of red-hot indignation with which his proposition was declined
ought to have scorched him. It seemed, however, to have no effect on
him of any sort. He continued to regard her from the top of the bank,
with an air of indolent nonchalance, which was rapidly driving her to
the conclusion that he was the most insolent person she had ever
encountered. With a view, possibly, of showing the full absurdity of
his offer of assistance, she placed both hands on the top of the fence,
with the intention of vaulting over it. The intention was only
partially fulfilled. During her wanderings with her father among their
Cumberland hills she had become skilled in all manner of athletic
exercises. Ordinarily she would have thought nothing of vaulting--or,
for the matter of that, jumping--an insignificant fence. Perhaps her
nervous system was more disorganised than she imagined. She caught her
knee against the bar, and, instead of alighting gracefully on her feet,
she rolled ignominiously over. She was up almost as soon as she was
down, but not before he had cleared the fence at a bound, and was
standing at her side. She exhibited no sign of gratitude for the
rapidity with which he had come to her assistance. She merely put to
him an icy question,--
"Was it necessary that you should trespass also?"
"Are you sure that you are not hurt? ankle not twisted, or anything of
that kind?"
"Quite sure. Be so good as to return to your own side."
As he seemed to hesitate, a voice exclaimed, in husky tones,--
"By----, I've a mind to shoot you now."
He turned to see a man, between forty and fifty years of age, in the
unmistakable habiliments of a gamekeeper, standing some twenty feet
off, holding a gun in a fashion which suggested that it would need very
little to induce him to put it to his shoulder and pull the trigger.
Hugh Morice greeted him as if he were an old acquaintance.
"Hullo, Jim Baker! So you're still in the land of the living?"
Mr Baker displayed something more than surliness in his reply.
"So are you, worse luck! What are you doing here? Didn't Mr Arnott tell
me if I saw you on our land to let fly, and pepper you?"
"I was just telling Miss Arnott the story. Odd that you should come
upon the scene as corroborating evidence."
"For two pins I'd let fly!"
"Now, Baker, don't be an idiot. Take care how you handle that gun, or
there'll be trouble; your hands don't seem too steady. You don't want
me to give you another thrashing, do you? Have you forgotten the last
one I gave you?"
"Have I forgotten?" The man cursed his questioner with a vigour which
was startling. "I'll never forget--trust me. I'll be even with you yet,
trust me. By ---- if you say another word about it I'll let fly at you
now!"
Up went the stock of the gun to the speaker's shoulder, the muzzle
pointing direct at Mr Morice. That gentleman neither moved nor spoke;
Miss Arnott did both.
"Baker, are you mad? Put down that gun. How dare you so misbehave
yourself?"
The gun was lowered with evident reluctance.
"Mr Arnott, he told me to shoot him if ever I see him this side the
fence."
"I am mistress here now. You may think yourself fortunate if you're not
presently introduced to a policeman."
"I was only obeying orders, that's all I was doing."
"Orders! How long ago is it since the orders to which you refer were
given you?"
Mr Morice interposed an answer,--
"It's more than four years since I was near the place."
The keeper turned towards him with a vindictive snarl.
"Four years! what's four years? An order's an order if it's four years
or forty. How was I to know that things are different, and that now
you're to come poaching and trespassing whenever you please?"
Miss Arnott was very stern.
"Baker, take yourself away from here at once. You will hear of this
again. Do you hear me? Go! without a word!"
Mr Baker went, but as he went he delivered himself of several words.
They were uttered to himself rather than to the general public, but
they were pretty audible all the same. When he was out of sight and
sound, the lady put a question to the gentleman,--
"Do you think it possible that he could have been in earnest, and that
he would have shot you?"
"I daresay. I suspect that few things would have pleased him better.
Why not? He would only have been carrying out instructions received."
"But--Mr Morice, I wish you would not jest on such a subject! Has he a
personal grudge against you?"
"It depends upon what you call a grudge; you heard what he said. He
used to live in that cottage near the gravel pits; and may do so still
for all I know. Once, when I was passing, I heard a terrible
hullabaloo. I invited myself inside to find that Mr Baker was
correcting Mrs Baker with what seemed to me such unnecessary vigour
that--I corrected him. The incident seems to linger in his memory, in
spite of the passage of the years; and I shouldn't be at all surprised
if, in his turn, he is still quite willing to correct me, with the aid
of a few pellets of lead."
"But he must be a dangerous character."
"He's a character, at anyrate. I've always felt he was a little mad;
when he's drunk he's stark mad. He's perhaps been having half a gallon
now. Let me hasten to assure you that, I fancy, Baker's qualities were
regarded by Mr Septimus Arnott, in the main, as virtues. Mr Arnott was
himself a character; if I may be excused for saying so."
"I never saw my uncle in his life, and knew absolutely nothing about
him, except what my father used to tell me of the days when they were
boys together."
"If, in those days, he was anything like what he was afterwards, he
must have been a curiosity. To make the whole position clear to you I
should mention that my uncle was also a character. I am not sure that,
taking him altogether, he was not the more remarkable character of the
two. The Morices, of course, have been here since the flood. But when
your uncle came my uncle detected in him a kindred spirit. They became
intimates; inseparable chums, and a pair of curios I promise you they
were, until they quarrelled--over a game of chess."
"Of chess?"
"Of chess. They used to play together three or four times a
week--tremendous games. Until one evening my uncle insisted that your
uncle had taken his hand off a piece, and wouldn't allow him to withdraw
his move. Then the fur flew. Each called the other everything he could
think of, and both had an extensive repertoire. The war which followed
raged unceasingly; it's a mystery to me how they both managed to die in
their beds."
"And all because of a dispute over a game of chess?"
"My uncle could quarrel about a less serious matter than a game of
chess; he was a master of the art. He quarrelled with me--but that's
another story; since when I've been in the out-of-the-way-corners of
the world. I was in Northern Rhodesia when I heard that he was dead,
and had left me Oak Dene. I don't know why--except that there has
always been a Morice at Oak Dene, and that I am the only remaining
specimen of the breed."
"How strange. It is only recently that I learned--to my complete
surprise--that Exham Park was mine."
"It seems that we are both of us indebted to our uncles, dead; though
apparently we neither of us owed much to them while they still were
living. Well, are the orders to be perpetuated that I'm to be shot when
seen on this side of the fence?"
"I do not myself practise such methods."
"They are drastic; though there are occasions on which drastic methods
are the kindest. Since I only arrived yesterday I take it that I am the
latest comer. It is your duty, therefore, to call on me. Do you propose
to do your duty?"
"I certainly do not propose to call on you, if that's what you mean."
"Good. Then I'll call on you. I shall have the pleasure, Miss Arnott,
of waiting on you, on this side of the fence, at a very early date. Do
you keep a shot gun in the hall?"
"Do you consider it good taste to persist in harping on a subject which
you must perceive is distasteful?"
"My taste was always bad."
"That I can easily imagine."
"There is something which I also can easily imagine."
"Indeed?"
"I can imagine that your uncle left you something besides Exham Park."
"What is that?"
"A little of his temper."
"Mr Morice! I have no wish to exchange retorts with you, but, from what
you say, it is quite obvious that your uncle left you all his manners."
"Thank you. Anything else?"
"Yes, Mr Morice, there is something else. It is not my fault that we
are neighbours."
"Don't say that it's my misfortune."
"And since you must have left many inconsolable friends behind you in
Rhodesia there is no reason why we should continue to be neighbours."
"Quite so."
"Of course, whether you return to Rhodesia or remain here is a matter
of complete indifference to me."
"Precisely."
"But, should you elect to stay, you will be so good as to understand
that, if you do call at Exham Park, you will be told that I am not at
home. Good afternoon, Mr Morice, and good-bye."
"Good-bye, Miss Arnott. I had a sort of premonition that those orders
would be re-issued, and that I should be shot if I was seen this side."
She had already gone some distance; but, on hearing this, stopping, she
turned towards him again.
"Possibly if we raise the fence to a sufficient height, that will keep
you out."
"Oh, I can scale any fence. No fence was ever constructed that I
couldn't negotiate. You'll have to shoot."
"Shall we? We shall see."
"We shall--Miss Arnott?"
She stopped again.
"What is it you wish to say to me?"
"Merely that I have in my mind some half-formed intention to call on
you to-morrow."
"You dare!"
"You have no notion what I do dare."
This time she was not tempted to a further rejoinder. He watched her
as, straight as a dart, her head in the air, striding along the winding
path, she vanished among the trees. He ruminated after she had gone,--
"She's splendid! she magnificent! How she holds herself, and how she
looks at you, and what eyes they are with which to look. I never saw
anything like her, and I hope, for her own sake, she never saw anything
like me. What a brute she must think me, and what a brute I am. I don't
care; there's something about her which sets all my blood on fire,
which rouses in me the instinct of the hunter. I wish old Baker would
come along just now; gun or no gun, we'd have a pretty little argument.
It might do me good. There's no doubt that what I said was true--the
girl has her uncle's temper, if I've my uncle's manners; as I'm a
sinful man I've as good as half a mind to marry her."
The lady was unconscious of the compliments which, mentally, the
gentleman was paying her. When, returning home, she entered the
apartment where Mrs Plummer, apparently just roused from a peaceful
doze, was waiting for her tea, she was in a flame of passion.
"I have just left the most unendurable person I ever yet encountered,
the most ill-mannered, the most clumsy, the most cowardly, the most
stupid, the most absurd, the most unspeakable!"
"My dear! who is this very superlative individual? what is his
delightful name?"
"His name!" For some occult reason Mrs Plummer's, under the
circumstances, mild request, seemed to cause her passion to flame up
higher. "What do I care what his name is? So far as I am concerned such
a creature has no name!"