FALCON FARM
Beneath the Beacon, across the great slope that fell from its summit
to the river valley, a road ran into the woods that hid Buckland
village, and upon the right hand of this highway, perched among open
fields, that quilted the southern slope of the heights, there stood a
stone house. Here was Falcon Farm, and over it the hawks that had
given it name would often poise and soar and utter their complaining
cries. The cluster of buildings perched on the hillside consisted of
a slate-roofed dwelling house, with cartsheds, a cowhouse, and stable
and a fine barn assembled round the farm yard. About them stretched
square fields, off some of which a harvest of oats had just been
shorn; while others were grass green with the sprawling foliage of
turnip. Beneath, between the farmhouse and the wooded road, extended
meadows into which fern and heath were intruding ominously. A little
wedge of kitchen garden was scooped out of the hill beside the yard
and a dry-built wall fell from the shoulder of the Beacon above,
broke at Falcon Farm, and with diverging arms separated its field and
fallow from the surrounding wild.
The door of the dwelling faced west, and here stood a man talking to
a woman.
He was of sturdy build with a clean shaved, fresh-coloured face and
head growing bald. But he had plenty of grey hair still and his
countenance was plump and little wrinkled. His eyes were grey and,
having long learned the value of direct vision in affairs, he fixed
them upon people when he talked. Mr. Joseph Stockman declared
himself to be in sight of seventy; but he did not appear so much and
his neighbours believed this assertion of age no more than an excuse
for his manner of life.
Indeed, at this moment, his companion was uttering a pleasantry at
the farmer's expense. She had come on an errand from Buckland
village, a mile away, and loitered because she esteemed the humorous
qualities of Mr. Stockman and herself found laughter a source to
existence. She needed this addition. Her lot had not been one of
great emotions, or pleasures, for Melinda Honeysett was a widow after
three uneven years of marriage. They passed before she was five and
twenty, when a drunken husband, riding a horse that would not "carry
beer," was pitched off in the night on Dunstone Down and broke his
neck. She had no children and now lived with a bed-ridden father and
ministered to him in the village. This had been her life for nearly
twenty years. She was a connection of Joseph Stockman through her
marriage, for the Bamseys and the Stockmans and the Honeysetts were
related, though neither family exactly knew how.
"A day of great events," said the farmer. "My two new hands both
coming and, as my manner is, I hope the best, but fear the worst."
"A horseman and a cowman, so Susan said."
"Yes. But that means more than the words on a little place like
this, as I made clear. In fact, they've got to do pretty much
everything--with such help as I can give and Neddy Tutt."
"Hope they'll be all right. But they mustn't count on a poor, weak,
old man like you, of course."
Mr. Stockman looked into Melinda's face. She was a chubby,
red-haired woman built on massive lines with a bosom that threatened
to burst its lavender print, and a broad, beamy body beneath. She
had a pair of pale blue eyes and a finely modelled mouth, not devoid
of character. Her teeth were neglected. She wore a white sunbonnet,
which threw a cool shadow over her face, and carried a basket, now
full of small carrots and large lettuces.
"You poke your fun at me, forgetting I've done ten men's work in my
time and must slack off," he said. "Because, thanks to plain living
and moderation in all things, and the widowed state with all its
restfulness, I don't look my age, that's not to say I don't feel it,
I can assure you. There's certain rights I owe to myself--the only
person as ever I did owe anything to in my life--and even if I was
fool enough to want to make a martyr of myself, which I'm not--even
so Soosie-Toosie would never let me."
"I'm sure she wouldn't."
"My daughter knows where the shoe pinches; and that's in my breathing
parts. Often I'll stand to work like a young man, knowing all the
time I shall have to pay for it with a long rest after."
"Poor chap!"
He shook his head.
"You be among the unbelievers I see--that's your father's bad work.
But since he don't believe in nothing, I can't hope he'll ever
believe in me."
"But the new men. Tell me about them. What are they like?"
"Ah, you females! It's always the outside of a man as interests you.
For my part it was what their papers and characters were like that I
had to think about; and even so I've took one largely on trust."
"You're such a trustful creature, Joe."
"I like to trust. I like to do unto others as they should do unto
me. But it's a disappointing rule of life. To be above the staple
of your fellow creatures is to get a lot of shocks, Melinda; but you
can only set a good example; you can't make people follow it. One
man I have seen, t'other I have not. Thomas Palk, the horseman--so
to call him--is in sight of middle-age and a towser for work. He's
leaving Haccombe, down Newton Abbot way, because his master's son is
taking up his job. A very good man by all accounts, and he
understands the position and knows what lies before him. A
faithful-looking man and I hope he'll prove so. Plain as a bit of
moor-stone--in fact a mighty ugly man; but an honest face if I know
anything."
"Sounds all right."
"T'other I haven't seen. He comes from up country and answered my
advertisement. Can't give no character direct, because his master's
died sudden. But he's been along with him for nearly five years, and
it was a bigger place than this, and he writes a very good letter.
In fact an educated man seemingly, and nobody's the worse for that if
it don't come between them and work. Though I grant it be doing so."
"So father says."
"Lawrence Maynard he's called. I've engaged him and hope for the
best. Both free men--no encumbrances. I hope, with my gift of
making the darkness light where farming is concerned, they'll soon be
pulling their weight and getting things all ship-shape."
"Father says nobody knows better than you what work means; but
somebody else has always got to do it."
"A wonderful man your father; yet I'm very much afraid he'll go to
hell when the end comes, Melinda."
"He's not."
A ginger-coloured lurcher appeared. It was a gaunt and hideous dog
with a white muzzle. Behind it came a black spaniel and a white,
wire-haired fox-terrier.
"Us must get to work," said Mr. Stockman. "Soosie-Toosie wants a
brace of rabbits for supper to-night and I'd best to fight for 'em
afore the rain comes. It have been offering since morning and will
be on us afore nightfall."
The dogs, apparently understanding, sat round with their eye on
Joseph.
"If your godless parent was to see these poor creatures to work, I
can tell you what he'd say, Melinda. He'd say thicky spaniel was
like me--knows her job very well indeed and prefers to see the
younger dogs doing it. And why not?"
"No use growing old if you don't grow artful," admitted Melinda.
"Of course it ban't--here's the girl. What's the matter now, Soosie?
The rabbits? I be just going after 'em."
But Miss Stockman, Joseph's only child, had not come about the
rabbits. She was a woman resembling her father in no respect. Her
hair was black, lustreless and rough, her brown face disfigured by a
"port wine" stain that descended from her forehead to her cheek. Her
expression was anxious and careworn, and though large-boned and
powerfully made, she was thin. She had brown, dog-like eyes, a mouth
with sad lips and a pleading voice, which seemed to have the same
querulous note as the hawks that so often hung in air above her home.
"Mr. Maynard's box have come, father," she said. "Be he to live in
the house, or to go in the tallet over the stables? Both rooms are
sweet and ready for 'em."
"Trust you for that, Soosie," declared Melinda.
"The horseman goes over the stables, as being the right and proper
place for him," said Mr. Stockman. "And if there was a dwelling room
over the cows, the cowman would go there. But there is not, so he'll
come in the house."
"Right then," answered his daughter. "Mr. Maynard comes in the
house; Mr. Palk goes over the hosses."
Susan disappeared and Mrs. Honeysett prepared to depart.
"And you tell your father that so soon as the woodcock be back--not
long now--he'll have the first. I don't bear no malice."
"We all know that. And when you shoot it, you come in and have a
tell with father. You do him good."
"And you too I hope?"
"Of course you do--such a long-sighted man as you."
She descended down the farm road to the highway beneath, and Joseph,
getting his gun, went upwards with his rejoicing dogs into the fern
brakes on the side of the Beacon.
Here, in the pursuit of the only exercise he really loved, Joe
Stockman forgot his alleged years. He was a wonderfully steady shot,
though it suited him to pretend that failing sight interfered very
seriously with his sport; but he excelled still in the difficult
business of snapping rabbits in fern. Thus engaged, with his dogs to
help him, he became oblivious of weather and it was not until the
sight of an approaching stranger arrested him that he grew conscious
of the rain. Then he turned up his collar over his blue woollen
shirt and swore.
The man who had recently surveyed Dart Vale from the summit of the
rocks above, was now descending, and seeing the farmer, turned his
steps towards him. He was a slight-built but well-knit youth of
seven or eight and twenty. He stood an inch under six feet and was
somewhat refined in appearance. His face was resolute and cleanly
turned, his skin clear and of a natural olive, that his open-air life
had tanned. He wore a small, black moustache over a stern mouth, and
his eyes were very dark brown and of a restless and inquiring
expression. He wore rough, old tweeds, a little darned at the seat,
and on his left arm over the elbow was a mourning band. His legs
were cased in tawny gaiters; he had a grey cap on his black hair and
in his hands he carried an ash sapling with which, unconsciously from
habit, he smote his leg as he walked.
"Sorry to spoil sport," he said, in a quick, clear voice somewhat low
pitched, "but I'm a stranger in these parts and want Falcon Farm. Be
I right for it?"
"Very right indeed," answered Mr. Stockman. "In fact, so right that
it's under your nose. There's Falcon Farm, and I'm the farmer, and I
guess you're Lawrence Maynard, due to-day."
The other smiled and his habitual solemnity lifted off his face.
"That's right. I walked from Bovey, because I wanted to have a look
at the country."
"And what d'you think of it?"
"Fine. After flat Somerset it makes your legs wake up."
"I dare say it would. There's nothing like a hilly country for
tightening the muscles. The Shire hosses find that out when they
come here. Yes, that's Falcon Farm. And there's the cows--all red
Devons."
The newcomer looked down upon a little cluster of kine grazing in a
meadow.
"A beautiful spot sure enough. And snug by the look of it."
"Nothing to grumble at for high land. But it calls for work. I've
been here five and twenty year and made it what it is; but I'm old
for my age, along of hard labour in all weathers, and can't do all I
would no more. However, we'll tell about it later when my other new
man, Thomas Palk, arrives. Horseman, he is; but, as I explained, you
and him are going to be my right and left hand now, and I can see
you're the quick sort that will justify yourself from the first."
"I hope so."
"Heave up them rabbits then, and we'll go down along. I can stop a
bird or beast still, though getting cruel dim in the eye."
Maynard picked up three heavy rabbits and they went down the hill
together.
"We're a small party," explained Joe, "but very friendly, easy
people--too busy to waste time on differences. And you and Palk will
find yourselves very comfortable I hope. There's only me and my
daughter, Miss Stockman, who rules us men, and a young boy, Neddy
Tutt, whose making up into a useful hand. At hay harvest and corn
harvest I hire. We've just got home our oats. For the roots, we can
pull them ourselves. Of the men who have left me, one went for
faults, and we can let the past bury the past; t'other found the
winter a thought too hard up here and have gone down to the
in-country. He's wrong, but that's his business."
The newcomer felt favourably impressed, for Mr. Stockman had great
art to win strangers. He promised to be a kindly and easy man, as he
declared himself to be.
Lawrence patted the dogs, who sniffed round him with offers of
friendship, and presently all returned together.