But I soon showed him I was not so mazed as he thought. He was tired of doing nothing. He wanted a change. Very well then; here was this little house right at the top of Edam Common, with the railway station opposite, and everybody's business taking him that way two or three times a day. What Edam wanted was a confectioner's shop. His wife was dying to have one. He would look a fine figure of a man in a white overall and cap! Hugh John had said it!
He whistled softly, and his little, deep-set eyes twinkled.
"I might ha' known," he said, "when I saw that long-legged brother of yours looking at me as if to calculate what I was good for. He's the fellow to make plans. Now the other——"
Here he laughed as he remembered Sir Toady Lion.
"More like me when I was his age!" he said. "But about the pastry-cook foolishness. What put that into his head?"
"It isn't foolishness," I answered, "and nobody that I know of ever puts anything into Hugh John's head!"
"He certainly is a wonder!" ("Corker" was what hesaid.)
Then I explained. One side of the villa was certainly expressly designed for a shop, the drawing-room and back drawing-room having side connections with the kitchen, only needed to be fitted with shelves and counters. The other side of the house and all above stairs might remain intact.
To my surprise Mr. Donnan never said a word concerning his position, his political aspirations, his illuminations, and disporting of the green harp of Ireland.
"But what are we to do with Cynthia's parlor furniture?" he asked instead. I could see a look of joy flash across his wife's face.
"Donnan," she said, "we will make the empty room above into a parlor. It's a perfect god-send. That boy should be paid by Government to make plans for people!"
Butcher Donnan bent his brows a moment on his wife. "Oh, you are in it, are you, Cynthia? Then I suppose I may as well go and order my white apron and cap?"
"Think how well they will become you!" said his wife, who also must have kissed the Blarney stone—the old one, not the new.
I agreed heartily. Butcher Donnan heaved a sigh. "And me, that never was seen but in decent blue," he said, "me to put on white like a mere bun-baker—and at my time of life!"
I said that it was certainly scandalous, but seeing that he would have nothing to do with the work except to sell, and arrange the windows for market-days, it would not matter so much.
"I shall need a small oven!" said his wife, "and a new set of French 'casserole molds' (which is to say patty-pans)andsome smaller brass pans, also——"
"Perhaps I was wrong," I interposed cunningly, "to lead Mr. Donnan into so much expense."
I knew that, if anything, this would fetch him, and it did.
"Expense, is it? Expense, Miss Sweetheart! Ha, Ha!" He slapped his pocket. "Ask your friend Mr. Anderson down at the Bank (not that he will tell you!) whether Butcher Donnan is a warm man or not?Hedid not retire on four bare walls and a pocket-handkerchief of front-garden like some I could tell you of. Cynthia, you shall have all the brass pans you want, and as for the front shop—well, there won't be the like of it, not as far as Dumfries! We shall have a van too, gold and blue!"
Butcher Donnan was all on fire now, and when Nipper came in he clapped him on the shoulder, crying that he had better look sharp. He, Butcher Donnan, was going to set up such a shop as never was seen in Edam, and people would never be wanting "fresh meat" any more, but live on pies and shortcake and sweets for ever and ever.
At this Nipper looked no little relieved, and even listened to the details with a secret satisfaction.
"Father," he said, "the shop down town can run itself the first day of the opening of yours. I'm coming up to see you face the public in your new nursing togs!"
"You're an impudent young jackanapes," said his father, clenching his fists, "and if it were not that you have to stick to business and pay me the money you owe me, I would thrash you on the spot, old as you are!"
"Oh, let Nipper alone," said I, as cheerfully as I could, "he has the sweet tooth. I know it well, and I will wager he will yet be one of your best customers!"
"He will bring his money along with him then every time," growled his father. "And now I am off to see Mr. Hetherington, the architect. We must get things ship-shape!"
"But," cried his wife, "you have never tasted your tea!"
"Oh, bother my tea!" said Butcher Donnan, flouncing out, having fallen a victim to Hugh John's dangerous imagination. But he looked in again, his topper hat of Do-Nothing Pride already exchanged for the cap of Edam Commerce.
"Tell that young gentleman of yours," he said, "that, if things turn out well, he is always welcome at our shop, eh, Cynthia? And nothing to pay! And you, Miss Sweetheart, I hope to live long enough to bake your bride's-cake!"
"There he goes!" murmured his wife, "in a week Donnan will think that he has made every single thing in the shop, from the brass weights on the counter to the specimen birthday-cake in the window!"
August eighth. Aged Fifteen.
It is only a month since the Donnans opened their new shop up on the open square facing the market hill, and not far from the railway station. It was one of a row of villas, mostly tenanted by men who had returned from the "pack"—that is, who had made a neat little fortune in the business which calls itself Credit Drapery, but which, perhaps undeservedly, is called much harder names by its clients, especially when its back is turned.
These, being the aristocracy of a Shilling-a-Week and Cent.-per-Cent., objected exceedingly to a mere confectioner's shop thrusting its nose into the midst of their blue-stone walls, picked out by window-sills and lintels of raw-beef Locharbriggs freestone. But they could not help it, and after the chief of them all, Oliphant McGill, had smelt the now floury fist of the Reformed Idler, and been informed what would happen if he "heard a wurrrd out of the heads av wan o' them"—there fell a great peace on Whinstone Villas.
Some even became customers, and the new business increased with wonderous rapidity. Butcher Donnan became Sweet-Cake Donnan, but that made no difference to his force of arm, or to the respect in which he was universally held.
As he had prophesied, it was not long till he had a pale-blue-and-gold covered van on the road, dandily hooded in case of rain, and with two spy-holes so that the driver could see for himself what was coming up behind him.
From the Cave of Mystery high up on Hugh John's hill we could see it crawling along the roads (really it was going quite fast), like a lumpy cerulean beetle, the like of which for brilliance is not to be found inCurtis.
And the driver was Butcher Donnan himself. He knew all the farmers, and as he had made one fortune already, as fortunes went in Edam, the people were the readier to deal with him. Sometimes even the poorest would save up a penny for one of Mrs. Donnan's sponge-cakes. It was soon called the "Watering Cart," because in hot weather you could tell when it had gone along the road by the drip from the ice underneath, by means of which the jellies and confections were kept cool, while in winter the blue-and-gold beetle steamed like a volcano with hot mince-pies. Oh, Butcher Donnan believed in delivering his goods to the customer in the finest possible condition!
But this same Butcher Donnan being now driver and salesman-out-of-doors, and Mrs. Donnan equally busy in the kitchen, it was obvious that some one must be found for the shop. HowIshould have loved the job! But a certain Eben Dickson, apprentice with Nipper at the down town business, was called in, and so thoroughly proved his liking for the place in the course of a single afternoon that a more permanent and less appreciative successor was sought for.
Eben was laid up for several days, owing to an accident which happened to him when Butcher Donnan returned from his journeyings afield. It is understood that Nipper also remonstrated with him, without, however, the use of many words.
The van had therefore to be put out of commission for several days till another arrangement was possible. And again it was Hugh John who, with his eyelids half closed and looking at the bright landscape through the long three-draw telescope, cut the knot with a carelessly breathed suggestion.
"Why not ask Elizabeth Fortinbras?"
"They would never dare!" said I. "Old Fortinbras thinks himself no end of a swell!"
"Yes," said Hugh John, with tranquil irony, "he has failed in at least four businesses—last of all in a stamp-shop at East Dene, while the Donnans have only succeeded in one—and are on the point of making another fortune in the second. But let them ask Elizabeth. She will not say 'no'!"
"What of her mother?" I said—"her father?"
"Her mother cannot support her—her father won't. In six months she will have to support them both!" said the philosophic Hugh John. "You ask Lizzie. Lizzie is a sensible girl."
I asked Hugh John how he knew.
"Oh, just—I know!" he answered shortly. And in another than Hugh John I should have suspected something. Because, you know, Elizabeth Fortinbras is a very pretty girl—not beautiful, but with a freshness and charm that does far better, a laugh that is hung on a hair-trigger; not much education, of course, because her stupid old frump of a mother—yes, I can say it, though Lizzie would not—has never permitted her to be long away from her, but must be served like a duchess in her room on pretext of headaches and megrims.
Being without a servant, she leaves Elizabeth to do all the housework, and all that she knows she has learned from the books I have lent her—and, as I now begin to suspect, Hugh John also.
"And whereisElizabeth?" I said, for I saw the three-draw glass hovering in the neighborhood of the Fortinbras Cottage.
"Why, where should she be?" cried Hugh John. "At this hour of Monday morning she will certainly be hanging out the week's wash! There, put your eye down, don't stir the telescope, and you will see her. Also her sister Matilda sitting under a tree doing nothing but reading the latest story her mother has got out of the library!"
Hugh John's grasp of detail was something marvelous.
And, indeed, as I looked, through the tremble of the heat-mist the slender figure of Elizabeth Fortinbras jigged into view. She was standing on tiptoe, like the girl in the old illustrated nursery Caldecott, when
"By came a blackbird and snapped off her nose."
"By came a blackbird and snapped off her nose."
Which would certainly have been a pity in Elizabeth's case, for the nose was a very pretty saucy one, and worthy of a better fate. She had on a short skirt. Her feet were thrust into sandals, and her white working blouse, open at the neck, had red peas on it. Concerning all which points Hugh John had nothing to learn.
Now I had always liked Elizabeth. There was something wild-wood and gay as a bird about her. She wore the simplest dresses, made by herself, and when she played in our woods there was a good deal of tomboy about her. She was older than any of us, and had often been our leader in high-spy or at running through the wood.
I could run faster, but (as Hugh John said) I ran like a boy, with my hands clasped and my elbows in. As for the way that Elizabeth ran, that was quite different. She ran—just like Elizabeth.
But the way she tossed about the youngsters was a sight. She romped with them among the hay. She thought nothing of bringing back Maid Margaret on her back for miles and miles, with a hop and a skip at every second pace, as if only to show how lightly her burden sat astride her shoulders, and how entirely impossible it was for Elizabeth herself to walk along in a sedate and ladylike way. Like a questing collie, she constantly left the highway. You could see her mount a bank as if she had wings. She was wayward, uncertain as a bird, fitful as a butterfly, changing her purpose with the whim of the children. Indeed, there was no one, in the opinion of all of us when we were little, like Elizabeth Fortinbras.
It was like spying out some shy fleeing wood-nymph to see her, with a few long, easy movements, springing and bounding across the stepping-stones of the upper river—or, the petticoat held daintily high, all in a faint flurry of white spray and whiter feet, negotiating the shallow ford at the first Torres Vedras when we were paddling there in the hot days.
Yet, when once across, she never seemed to have "shipped a drop," as Sir Toady Lion asserted in his best naval manner.
Rather, be it said, she gave herself a shake like a scudding swallow that has dipped its wing a little too deep in the pond, and lo! our Elizabeth was dry again. She never had so much as to preen a feather.
They always tell me that I am a little in love with Elizabeth myself, and I am not ashamed of it. Once, from his hiding-place, Hugh John showed me a young dainty fawn come stepping lightly through the wood. I saw it skip airily across the Esk below the second Torres Vedras, ascend the bank in three bounds, walk demurely across the road like a maiden coming out of church, look about her as if gathering her skirts for something daring, and then, with one sidelong bound, swift and light, lo, she was over the high paling and lost in the wood!
Elizabeth Fortinbras would have done it just like that, as gracefully and as unconsciously. But to think of her taking a place in the Donnan's Confectionery shop—surely his good angel had for once forsaken Hugh John—plan-maker to the world in general, and private domestic Solomon!
"Go andaskElizabeth Fortinbras!" said Hugh John—and he said it as if he had good reason to know that Elizabeth would accept. Though that might only be his usual accent of quiet certainty. You see, Hugh John compels belief. Confidence accrues to his lightest guess, which is not accorded to Sir Toady on his oath. It is a shame that any one should be so favored by nature in the matter of his word. I, being a girl, am suspected of inaccuracy, Sir Toady of "monkeying," and Maid Margaret of knowing nothing about the matter.
But Hugh John may be inaccurate. He may be "monkeying" in secret, and he may know less than any one else about any matter. Nevertheless he is accredited like a plenipotentiary. He moves like Diogenes, his tub unseen about him. A calm certainty accompanies him. He inspires confidence, blind as that of a bank cashier in the multiplication table. All, too, without break, without insistence. To look at, he is just a tall lad, with singularly quiet manners, who looks at you fixedly out of gray eyes very wide apart. Only—you believe him.
But that is the reason why, in my secretest heart, as soon as Hugh John said, "Ask Elizabeth Fortinbras!" I knew that Elizabeth Fortinbras would accept.
I had to ask her myself. Or rather I took Mrs. Donnan with me, who did as she was told, smiling and stammering apologies in the proper places. As for me, I said what Hugh John had advised me to say, in our last long talk together up in the Cave.
Of course it was no use in the world consulting Elizabeth's parents. Her father was lost in dreams of making another fortune by a new and original butter-cooler which would put all others out of the market. Her mother, fretful and fine-ladyish, would declare that she could not do without her. But I knew that it would be an exceedingly good thing for her younger sister to get her nose taken out of thePenny Novelette. If Elizabeth went, she would have to do the housework, and so might yet save her soul—though as yet she had shown no signs of possessing any.
We talked to Elizabeth, however, or at least I did, without any mention of this. There were many knick-knacks about, on the mantelpiece, on the tables, on brackets set in corners—all the work of that ingenious, useless man, Mr. Robert Fortinbras. As we talked, Elizabeth moved gracefully about among these, her duster never hurried, never idle.
I never saw any one who could "play at work" as Elizabeth could. Any one else would have sat down and received her guests. Not so Elizabeth. If we chose to come at eleven o'clock in the morning—well, we must take her as we found her. In another quarter of an hour, if we stayed, we would be asked to come into her kitchen, and watch her peeling potatoes. And that would have seemed quite natural—not only to Elizabeth, but to us.
Elizabeth did not reply hastily. She heard me out without sign either of consent or of refusal. Mrs. Donnan, stout and motherly, purred acquiescence. Yes, they would give her the warmest welcome—if she cared to stay, the happiest home. But no doubt she would prefer to return to her own home at nights.
The next words which reached our ears were Elizabeth all over. "If I come, I shall stay," she said, "because if I went home, the work of the house would simply be left till I got back!"
The reason was clear, and almost the consent.
"Had you not better consult your father and mother?" I said, a little breathlessly, having been brought up in the faith of obedience to parents.
But in this matter Elizabeth, taught by long experience, had evolved other methods.
"I willtellthem," she said simply. "When do you want me to begin? Monday? Very well!"
And it was on Tuesday that Nipper Donnan began to neglect his business.
September 11 of the same year. Going Sixteen now.
Now I suppose you think this is going to be a love-story. But it isn't—at least not so far. And I am sure the hero won't be either of the twoyouthink—not, that is, Hugh John or Nipper Donnan.
But I am going to tell the story of the strangest, the delicatest friendship I have ever seen—that of Hugh John, my brother, and Elizabeth Fortinbras.
He is the youngest hero you can imagine, but somehow is much more like a young man who has shaved himself very close than the schoolboy he is.
Nothing puts Hugh John out. When he has some big festival to attend along with father, he sits quiet and self-possessed, doing his part without a quiver on his face. As far as looks go, he could easily be the chairman. The clean-cut outlines of his face do not denote hardness. Only he is of the Twentieth Century, and an adept at concealing his sensations—even from his parents, with whom he is great friends.
But, for all that modernity, there is something essentially knightly, and even knight-errant, about our Hugh John. An elder time has touched him. Ideas growing, alas! extinct—are natural to him. A chivalrous Cromwellian is perhaps the nearest I can come in the way of definition. For years he was the only one in the house (except Fuz, of course) who sustained Roundhead as against Cavalier. Yet all his outer man (surely a boy has an "outer man" when he is six feet high) is that of the Collegians who rallied about the King at Oxford, and swept away the train-bands with Rupert the Prince at Marston Moor. But Hugh John agrees with Mr. Prynne as to the Unloveliness of Love-Locks, and no Sergeant-Major could carry a closer cropped head of hair.
Also the mind within him is one that abhors restraint. That is, in thinking. In acting, he obeys as a principle all justly constituted authorities. Also, ifheis in authority, he will insist upon obedience even unto the shedding of blood.
Only the mind is free and untrammeled. Obedience includes only acts. Thought with him is free, liberal, critical, large.
But Hugh John is generally shy with the girls who come to our house. He retires to one of his fastnesses, a lonely David in some unknown Engedi. He blots himself out. Simply,he is not—so far, that is, as the rest of the house is concerned. But he has the most sharply defined and sudden affinities. He will see a girl for the first time—the most reserved, unlikely girl, shy as himself. He will go up to her, and lo! as like as not, five minutes afterwards they will pair off like two schoolboys arm in arm.
Grown-up People, after a certain while, forget how their own friendships were formed—how much was chance, how little intention, and they judgeusin the light of what they nowthinkthey were. They are "out" every time with Hugh John.
For instance, I know Somebody who was afraid he was going to fall in love with Elizabeth Fortinbras. No such good luck!Iknew. The first time I surprised them having a good talk together I saw that Elizabeth would take advice from that gray-eyed boy with a man's thoughts which she would scorn from any one else.
It was the day after we had been to see the Donnans. When I got home, Hugh John had merely said, "When does Elizabeth begin?"
"Monday," said I; "but how in the world did you know?"
"I did not knowthat!" he answered gravely, as usual.
You simply can't surprise Hugh John. A momentary glitter in a pair of rather close-lidded gray eyes—that is the most you can expect from him.
It was at the stile at the entrance into the High Wood that I found them. Elizabeth Fortinbras was seated on the top spar nursing her knees, and sucking the sorrel stems which Hugh John handed up one by one. They never looked at one another, but I saw in a moment (trust a girl!) that I would interrupt their talk. Just fancymeplaying gooseberry! No, thank you, kind sir, she said! Besides, I knew very well that Elizabeth did not consult her father—and her mother was not worth consulting. There remained only Hugh John. Of course she could have asked me, but what girl would have taken my advice when she could get Hugh John's?
I don't know what they said—of course not. I did not ask. But what Idoknow is that Elizabeth and Hugh John talked just as he and I would have done when taking counsel together up in the Cave or at the Feudal Tower.
Sir Toady was better advised than to attempt to make fun, and though the Grown-ups might lift their eyebrows, even they had confidence in Hugh John. Sometimes they asked his advice themselves—though I never heard of their going so far as to take it. Grown-ups, to my thinking, get narrow-minded. Perhaps Hugh John will too some day. But now at least he always just sees the one thing to do, and does it—the one thing another ought to do, and tells him of it.
Well, he never went to the new confectionery shop. He would pass it without lifting an eyelid—though I will wager that each time he did so Elizabeth Fortinbras saw him—and Hugh John knew that she did. And each was the happier for the knowledge.
To me Elizabeth's determination seemed to brighten all that part of Edam. It was quite near our house, only just outside the gates. Behind the counter Elizabeth made a slender figure in black and white. Black dress well fitting, a present from Mrs. Donnan, large turn-back cuffs, and a broad Eton collar. It was no wonder that the business throve—I mean the business which was under the charge of Elizabeth Fortinbras. The other "down town" suffered exceedingly.
You see, Nipper Donnan could not be in two places at the one time. And he found he had innumerable occasions to consult his father, or to have something mended by his mother. He could not possibly obtain the information or the reparations down town. Hence he spent much of his time hanging about the new confectionery shop opposite the Market hill. He became learned in the semophore signaling of the trains on the two little railways which diverged at Edam Junction. These he explained to Elizabeth.
His step-mother secretly encouraged him. Nothing would have pleased her better than for Nipper to "settle down" with such a daughter-in-law. But she knew, perhaps better than his own mother would have done, that this strong, incult, fighting Nipper had little chance with a girl like Elizabeth Fortinbras, whose chief friend and confidant was a certain gray-eyed lad with a perpendicular frown of thought between his brows.
But Nipper kept on. He thrashed one Hector McLean for blowing a kiss towards the shop-window from the far side of the Market dyke. All day long he thought what high and noble thing he could do for Elizabeth's sake—such as having marble slabs, and water running all the time between double plate-glass, or dressing all his assistants in blue, fresh and fresh every day! You see, Nipper's imagination was limited.
But once or twice his father came in and surprised him leaning over the counter. He regarded his son for a moment with dull, murky eyes; and then, quite abruptly, ordered him out. The third time this happened he followed Nipper outside and explained to him the consequences of this malingering—imprimis, he would get his head broken.Item, he would be "backward with his term installment"!Tertio, if he were, he need expect no mercy from his father; and in conclusion, he had better "get out of that, and stay out!" He, Butcher Donnan, was not a fool. He knew all about what he was after, if the womenfolk did not! And he was not going to have it! There! Nipper was warned!
His comings and goings did not, indeed, make much difference to Elizabeth. Often he was a nuisance, "lounging and suffering"—looking, as she said afterwards, "like a blue undertaker attached to a steel-yard." His expression spoiled sales. He looked acid drops. His jealousies poisoned the very strawberry shortcake on which Mrs. Donnan's heart prided itself.
On the other hand, he was useful when there were heavy weights to be lifted, boxes of materials for the little store-room at the back. Elizabeth could not move these, so she had either to unpack them on the street, or wait till Butcher Donnan drove his blue-and-gold wagon into the yard.
But Nipper delighted to show his strength, and would pick up a huge case, swing it on his shoulder, and deposit it wherever told. These were his moments of great joy, and almost repaid him for not being able to eat.
For Nipper's appetite had suffered. He indulged himself in startling neckties, and, as his girth shrank, the waistcoats which contained it became more and more gorgeous.
Poor Nipper! He could only gaze and wonder—that is, when there was no lifting to be done. His tongue forsook him when called upon to answer the simplest remark. When Elizabeth, taking pity upon him, asked about his week's receipts, he answered vaguely that he did not know.
Hearing this, she turned about, bearing a tray full of almond-cake fresh from Mrs. Donnan's hand, and said, "Nipper, do you mean to say you do not keep track of your sales? Why, you will get cheated right and left. Bring the books up to-night and I will go over them for you!"
To Nipper this seemed an opportunity too good to be lost. He imagined their two heads bent over the records of the down town shop, and perhaps also in time a corresponding approachment of ideas.
Beautiful dream! Foredoomed to failure, however. For Elizabeth, after a few questions, took up the books to her own room, and on the morrow furnished the disappointed Nipper with a few startling statistics as to receipts and expenditure.
"And what would you advise me to do?" said Nipper humbly.
"Oh, I don't know," said Elizabeth. "Ask Hugh John from the House in the Wood. He will tell you, if anybody can. He advised me to come to help your mother. If it had not been for him, I should not have been here now!"
The gleam of jealousy (which is yellow, and not green) in his eyes altered Nipper's countenance completely.
"Ah, Hugh John indeed!" he thought. That, then, was the explanation, was it? This coldness was owing to Hugh John—a boy, little more than a boy—while he, Nipper, was a man, a Councillor, with a shop and income of his own!
Yet he remembered, when he was already well-nigh Hugh John's present age, and the cock of all Edam, tying a pale-faced, determined little boy to a ring in a wall down in the dungeon of an ancient castle. He had determined then to make the cub give in, and there had been some sick work with string-twisting and wire-pincers. He did not care to think about that. But even then the cub had beaten them all. They had been good friends since—that is, in a way. But was it written in the Book of Fate (in which Nipper believed) that they should fight for the mastery on another and far more dangerous arena? It seemed preposterous, but still—well, he would see Hugh John and put the case to him, as Elizabeth had said.
Then, so Nipper told himself, he would know! Well—he might—supposing that Hugh John had been even as the young butcher, blushing half-a-mile away when a lissom, upright form and gait as of wind-blown corn told the world the important news (for Nipper Donnan) that Elizabeth Fortinbras was coming up the street in a hurry.
Hugh John listened quietly. Bygones were long bygones between him and Nipper. The "smoutchies" smoutched no more, but were (most of them) good servants of the King or honorable citizens of Edam. Already one wore the V. C., and for his sake and in the general interests of peace Hugh John tolerated those who remained. He even liked Nipper Donnan, and had no idea of the gusts of angry fury that were tearing his poor ignorant heart to pieces.
"Advise you—well, I don't know much about it," said Hugh John. "If it is a matter of your books, you had better show them to your father. No? You don't want to do that. Very well, then, tell me what Elizabeth Fortinbras said—exactly, I mean."
"Said I was to come to you—tell you about the week's deficit, and ask your advice."
"Then you must tell meallabout it!" said Hugh John, calmly impartial. Nipper gave some figures of entrances and exits, marts and sales, gross, retail, and monthly book-debts.
"Hum!" said Hugh John, after a minute's thought, "if I were you I should get rid of the whole indoor crowd, and work the business myself for a month or two, with a couple of 'prenticesandthe toe of my boot!"
Hugh John's eyes were distant, grave, thoughtful—Nipper's little, black, and virulent with suppressed anger. But the Thinker had grown man of action also, and Nipper felt no security that he could win a victory against Hugh John even with his fists. As to the mind, he felt instinctively the grip of his master.Thatwas not to be gainsaid.
"Yes," he said, jerking out his words like leaden pellets on a table, "I suppose thatisthe plan. I will fire the whole lot this very night!" Hugh John nodded quietly.
"It will be best!" he said, and the advice once given, his mind would have passed to another question had not Nipper recalled him suspiciously.
"Has my father not been speaking to you?" he growled ungraciously.
"Your father? No, not that I remember!" said Hugh John, staring in wonder.
"Nor my—Mrs. Donnan, I mean?"
"Never spoke to her in my life, I believe—Sis has, though!"
"Nor Elizabeth?"
Nipper's eyes were like gimlets now, but the calm serenity in those of Hugh John baffled them.
"Elizabeth Fortinbras? Oh, yes," said Hugh John tranquilly, "when she wants to ask me about anything—as you are doing now—then she speaks to me."
"Is that all?" Nipper's face worked. His lips were bitten so close that the words had almost to force themselves between the clenched teeth. Hugh John regarded him a moment gravely, as he did all things, with gaze unhurried, undismayed. Then he put his hands in his pockets and turned his back on Nipper with only the words, "Enough for you to know, anyway!"
And if ever Nipper came near striking any one a dastardly blow from behind, it was Hugh John who was in danger and at that moment.
September 23. And my Age still going Sixteen.
It was the week before Hugh John went to college that what I am going to tell took place. September is almost always nice about Edam—with the corn standing white in stooks all down the valley, waving blonde half-way up the sides of the wide glen, and looking over into it from the heights of Kingside still as green as grass. Yes, in our part September is wonderfully quiet and windless—generally, that is. Yet withal, there is the stir of harvest about the farm-town, the merry whirr of the "reaper" over the hedge, and always the clatter of voices as the workers go homeward in the twilight. The big scythe is now only used about our house for "opening up" a field. After that the horses pull the red-and-blue "McCormick" round as neatly as a toy. The squares get less and the yellow stooks rise, as it were, out of the very ground.
This year it was a specially gay time for us all. Mr. Ex-Butcher Donnan had more customers. His wife had taken a laboratory assistant in the shape of an apple-cheeked lass, Meg Linwood, the daughter of the station-master at Bridge of Edam—honest as the day, but at first incapable in the kitchen as a crossing-sweeper of goldsmith work.
Mrs. Donnan told me of Meg's iniquities in her frank impulsive Irish way.
"There's not a thing breakable the craitur has not broke, or at least tried her best to break. And what she can't knock to flinders with one skelp, she will fall over like an applelaunche (avalanche?) and rowl out flat like so much sheet lead. I dare not show the master the tenth of her breakages, or there would be bloodshed and wounds. And yet she is the honest, well-meaning craitur too, and would not hurt a fly. Only it is the heaven's pity she has no power of her feet! Hear to that now!"
Poor Mrs. Donnan ought, of course, to have remained unmoved where she was and entertained me with a stomach-aching smile so long as I chose to stay. But, being an Irishwoman and natural, she sprang up and ran forthwith into the kitchen.
She came out with tears in her eyes.
"It's the épergne," she said, "I might have known it. The green figs is just come in, and as they are a new thing in Edam I thought to make a kind of trophy out of them. And now——!"
Mrs. Donnan's motherly eyes overflowed, good, kindly soul, without very much anger at the breaker, but with real grief for the loss of the "trophy" she had counted upon to display in her plate-glass shop window.
I patted her on one plump shoulder, and she murmured my undeserved praises—undeserved, I mean, at that moment. But I had remembered that there was in our china-closet at home a huge épergne of many storys, which Somebody had taken a prejudice against, because when loaded it shut off the entire view of the people at table, and they played at "Bo-peep" all the time around it and about—all right for us little ones who, unseen, could convey extra fruits and comfits to our plates, but abhorred by Somebody who was thus prevented from keeping a kindly, governing eye upon us. So the tall épergne was banished—a life sentence firmly expressed.
I went quickly home and excavated it from a general ruck of odd plates and cupless saucers. In triumph I carried it to the good mistress of New Erin Villa.
"Oh, Miss Sweetheart," she said, "I cannot—I cannot indeed——"
"Suppose that your—that 'Somebody' were to come along and see that épergne in my window—sure they might have in the police!"
Finally I satisfied Mrs. Donnan that though I had not asked special permission, it was only because there was no need, and that Somebody, if duly approached, would be the first of her customers, and the most helpful of her friends.Isaid so because I knew.
"Itwouldlook like all Dublin Castle and Sackville Street!" said Mrs. Donnan, visibly flinching as her own inner eye built up the green figs, and decorated the épergne with the leaves that had proved so useful early in the history of the world.
"Well," I answered, taking my leave, "Hugh John and I will be round about four to see if it is as fine as you say."
"It will be finer," cried Mrs. Donnan eagerly; "I have got another idea entirely since I set eyes on it."
But after all it was the deft hands of Elizabeth Fortinbras which decorated our long-condemned and dusty épergne. She polished it, she set it on foot again as good as new, mingling the tawny-red-bitten oak-leaves and acorns with the deep green figs, and making the thing a joy, if not for ever, at least for as long as it remained in Mrs. Donnan's window.
This, however, was not for long.
For Fuz—yes, the very old Fuz as ever was—coming home from a tramp with his eyes apparently mooning, but really registering everything as remorselessly as a calculating machine marshals figures, spied the green figs in Mrs. Donnan's window. Hardly in Edam was there any one else, at that date, who so much as knew what they were. He saw. He admired. There was a little dinner at our house that night to which just a couple of neighbors were coming. The idea of a surprise germinated in the mind of Fuz, and he came home the happy possessor of his own épergne, with the green and yellow leaves cinturing it round!
Poor Mrs. Donnan dared not say a word, and as for Elizabeth, it was not her business. Moreover, she had far too great a sense of the ridiculous. You see, Fuz carried his own parcel off, with his invariable remark that "it is a proud horse that will not carry his own corn!"
Nothing like Fuz's pride that night! Nothing more knowing than the smiles of the initiated! Only Hugh John did not consider it "quite the square thing," and obstinately refused to attend the banquet, which, however, passed off very well without him. Fuz became quite poetic over his new acquisition. To find such a thing in Edam! These cherubs' heads now! Just look at them. They reminded him of—I think, something in the Cathedral at Florence which you had to strike matches to see—little cublets squirming about a font or something. He had quite forgotten having ordered the identical thing into the ignominy of a dungeon for obscuring the prospect. Now it was the finest piece of "Dresden" he had ever set eyes upon.
And he promised—if I were a good girl—to give it to me as a wedding present.
That is Fuz all over. He says he is Scotch, but his part of Scotland is so near Ireland that (according to the best authorities) Saint Patrick swam across with his head between his teeth. Perhaps Fuz did too. But don't tell Hugh John that I said so.
Well, when Hugh John would not dress and come for dinner on account of us letting Fuz be taken in about the épergne, he went off on one of his long rides. Or so at least he thought. For really he got no farther than the Gypsies' Wood, and then that took place which was bound to take place sooner or later.
For, you see, Elizabeth Fortinbras owned a cycle also, and she used it to run home to see her people—even during her short half-hour in the afternoon she would go, no matter how hot it was. And she was teaching her sister Matilda to house-keep. She had had a row the first time or two, of course. But that was to be expected. Once she had gone back between two or three of the afternoon—which was slack time at the confectionery shop opposite the Market Hill, and when she arrived, lo! her mother was deep in one ragged volume, Matilda sat crouched in a corner of the sofa with another, and from the garret came the sound of hammering, where Mr. Fortinbras the unfortunate was working out another epoch-making invention.
Flies buzzed about the greasy, unwashed plates and dishes where breakfast had been pushed aside to make way for early dinner.
Elizabeth thrust her head into a bedroom. The clothes trailed on the floor, and the very windows had not been opened. The air of night, warmed through blindless windows by an autumn sun, had produced an atmosphere which might have been cut with a knife. Elizabeth shuddered. She demanded the reason why the house had not been "done up."
"Well," said Matilda, lifting her head languidly, "you had hidden the knife-board when you went away, and as to the beds, I knew you were coming home to-day, and you might just as well help me as not."
Elizabeth helped her by going out without a word, and not returning till her father, who at least could not be called idle, had intimated to her that Matilda was beginning to take her household duties seriously.
From the first Elizabeth had given half her wages to her father, on the distinct understanding that the money was to be used for housekeeping, and not for perfecting any new invention which was to alter the center of gravity of the earth, and give back equal rights in sunshine and moisture to all the world.
Well, it chanced that this evening of the September dinner Elizabeth Fortinbras was returning from her daily visit of inspection. She was in a happier mood than usual. For Matilda had really made a start, and at home she had discovered less to find fault with than usual. She was reckoning up her wages, which the Donnans, generous in all things, were freely advancing—perhaps even too frequently to suit Elizabeth's spirit of independence. Some day she might manage to let her people have a servant!
From the first the two old folk of Erin Villa—old only in the number of their years—had looked upon Elizabeth Fortinbras as doing honor to their business, almost, indeed, as a daughter born to their old age.
Hugh John had leaned his bicycle against a tree at the corner of the Gypsies' Wood. Far above, his keen gray eye caught the slight purple stain among the rocks of the hillside which marked the mouth of his Cave of Mystery. For a moment he had an idea of climbing up there and watching the twilight sinking into dark, as he had done so many times before. But the instinctive respect of a good rider for his cycle restrained him. He knew of one or two hiding-places safe enough, it was true. But on such a night, immediately before the Edam September fair, who might not be abroad? All the gypsies of three counties were converging on Edam, and so, with a sigh, Hugh John abode where he was.
Now of course anybody who did not know both Hugh John and Elizabeth Fortinbras would have come to a wrong conclusion. For Elizabeth, after a day in the shop followed by an evening visit of inspection and assistance to Matilda, took it into her head that a spin round by the Gypsies' Wood would freshen her up, and so put her in trim for a good day's work on the morrow.
That is why she encountered Hugh John, stretched long and lazy by the side of the stream. He rose as soon as he saw Elizabeth. They did not shake hands. They did not say, "How-d'ye-do—Very-well-thank-you!" which is the correct Edam fashion for all concerned.
But Hugh John indicated the most comfortable portion of an old half-submerged trunk, and Elizabeth sat down without dispute. Hugh John disposed himself where he could see her profile without looking at her. It was only when he was making up his mind about you that Hugh John regarded you fixedly. He had long made up his mind about Elizabeth.
"Well, Elizabeth?" said Hugh John (I will tell you afterwards how I know).
"Well, Hugh John?"
Then ensued a long pause. The water sang its lucid continual song. How many had sat and watched it, thus singing, glide on and on? Well, as Hugh John says, that did not matter. He was only occupied in finding "soorocks" for Elizabeth Fortinbras, and Elizabeth busied herself in eating them.
"About Nipper?" said Elizabeth softly. "I can't have it, you know."
"No, of course not!" said Hugh John.
Having knownhim, it was impossible that Elizabeth could decline upon Nipper Donnan. Hugh John did not, as you may well imagine, put it that way. The thing was simply unthinkable, that was all. He could no more let it happen than he would to his sister. He turned ever so little, and saw Elizabeth Fortinbras' face pale against the sunset.
Elizabeth looked at the boy, and her lips quivered a little. Hugh John became a shade more rigid.
"Letmespeak to Nipper Donnan!" said Hugh John in a level tone.
"No," said the girl, "I do not wish to go back home again—tothat!"
She meant to slatternly makeshift and lightly disguised lying.
"No need!" said a fierce voice immediately behind them, and Nipper Donnan leaped the stone wall from behind which he had been watching Elizabeth and Hugh John.
"Ah, Nipper!" said Hugh John lazily, handing up another sorrel stem to Elizabeth; "glad to see you, Nipper. Sit down and help to look for fat ones!"
"You are mocking me, both of you!" cried poor Nipper blackly. His face was hot and angry, his eyes injected like his father's when in wrath, and his hands were clinched tight.
"You came here to talk about me," he said hoarsely, bending forward towards them like a beast ready for the spring.
"Nonsense!" said Hugh John; "we met by pure accident. I did not want any dinner, and Elizabeth wanted a breath of fresh air."
"You lie! I do not believe you!" cried Nipper.
"You will have to, Nipper," said Hugh John, who had not moved an inch.
"Andwhy?"
"BecauseIsay it!" said Hugh John quietly. "I do not tell lies!"
"A likely story!" growled Nipper. "You were talking about me! I heard you. You will have to fight me—Hugh John Picton Smith!"
"That we shall see," said Hugh John coolly. "What must be, must be. But there is a word or two to say first."
"Talk!" cried Nipper. "Oh, that does no good to a fellow like me. You shall fight me, I tell you!"
"Not before Elizabeth Fortinbras!" said Hugh John, taking off his cap with a quick, instinctive gesture of respect. "You and I can't behave like two angry dogs before her!"
"You're afraid!"
"Possibly," said Hugh John, "but not in any wayyouwould understand."
Then Elizabeth Fortinbras took up speech.
"Nipper Donnan," she said, "I won't pretend I don't know what you mean. You are driving me from the single happy place of refuge I have on earth. I cannot stay with your father and mother unless you stop pestering me. And then you talk about fighting. Why, Hugh John is nearly five years younger than you are——"
"He is as tall!" growled Nipper.
"Taller!" corrected Elizabeth coolly. "But if you behave like a whole menagerie of brutes, that won't make me care more about you. Hugh John is my brother; I have no other!"
"Umph!" snorted Nipper, "he doesn't come and sit out by Esk-waterside with his sisters."
I know that at that moment Hugh John's eye sought the deep purple stain of the Cave of Mystery, where he and I so often sat together. But he said nothing at all to his adversary. It might have been mistaken. It was to Elizabeth he spoke.
"I have something to say to Nipper which you had better not hear," he remarked quietly. "Here is a special handful of sorrel to take home with you. Let me see you as far as the first lamp-post on my cycle. Then I will come back and speak with Nipper."
They went, and Nipper sat on the empty log, gloomily cursing fate—but, educated by the experience of many years, never for a moment doubting that Hugh John would keep his word.
He even timed him. He knew to within half-a-minute when the bright bull's-eye of his acetylene lantern would turn the corner of the Gypsies' Tryst. He saw it come. He stood up on his feet, and jerked his clenched hands once or twice forward into the gloaming.
Then Hugh John leaped from his cycle by the wall.
"Sit down, Nipper," he said. "I have something to say to you."
"Oh, I dare say," said Nipper; "you want to get out of fighting."
"Very well—you think so. I shall show you!" said Hugh John. "But first you have got to listen. You are troubling Elizabeth Fortinbras. She does not mean to be troubled. She will go away if you do not stop going into the shop. She told me so. She has always been my friend, and my sister's friend. Her father and mother are no use to such a girl. That is why I have tried to be a brother to her——"
"Brother, is it?" shouted Nipper, clenching his fists. "I will show you what it is to take a girl from Nipper Donnan. You were making love to her."
"I am her brother. She is my sister," Hugh John repeated, with his usual quiet persistency. "She is not yours in any way. Therefore I cannot take from you what you never possessed."
"I love her, and I will kill you, Hugh John Picton Smith!" moaned poor Nipper, his whole body shaking with impotent anger.
"Very well, you can try, though you are older," said Hugh John; "only, if I win, you will let Elizabeth Fortinbras alone."
"All right," said Nipper, "I agree. And if I lick you, you will stop prejudicing her against me!"
"You won't win!" prophesied Hugh John still more quietly.
And that is why Elizabeth Fortinbras' afternoons and evenings at New Erin Villa were thenceforward full of peace. Also why no young butcher hung any more over the counter, and why Mr. Nipper Donnan spent his evenings in the kitchen with Meg Linwood. It explains also why, when he came to say good-by to Elizabeth Fortinbras, Hugh John had a split lip.
Yet the girl asked no questions of her champion. She did not appear to notice the slight wound, and she sent away Hugh John with a single token of (sisterly) gratitude, and the curious reflection that a split lip does not spoil kissing nearly so much as a fellow might think.
November 2. The same Age.
[It is really the first of the month, but I date it the second, because the first is a Sunday, you see.]
After the fine weather of July came a horrid rainy spell. Now I don't mind so much when the days are short, the trees bare, and the time for winter lamps and winter fires is come. Then you can just shut yourself up, get some books you have been promising yourself for a long time to look at—and there you are.
But deluged park, dripping shrubbery, Esk-water growling turbidly at the foot of the Low Park, all the noble marine architecture of the two Torres Vedrases deep under swirling froth—that is what I hate, and especially with light to see it by—oh, good fourteen to sixteen hours of it. Pitter, patter on the roof, a sprinkle of broad drops on the window-panes from the trees swishing in the wind outside. After the first three days it grows unbearable.
It was a weary time, and a mockery for any one to call "holidays," especially after such a noble summer and autumn. But it cleared after Hugh John had been a week or two at college. During the wet weather I often went into the shop to see Elizabeth Fortinbras. I could now, you see, because Nipper Donnan was not always there.
More than once, however, I encountered his father, Butcher Donnan, who went about smiling and rubbing his hands—as ifhehad stopped the whole business. Of course I let him think so. For it is no good setting Grown-ups right. They always know better.
Well, and do you know, every time I went Elizabeth asked all about Hugh John, and if I had heard from him. At first I thought, as, of course, any girl would, that Elizabeth was only foxing to take me in. But afterwards I found out that they really did not write to one another. She owned, though, to having kissed him good-by. But that was only on account of his split lip and what he had done about Nipper.
Hugh John's explanation of his silence, given later, was that there were no sorrel stalks near the college, and that if Elizabeth really wanted anything, he knew that she would write and ask him.
Now, on the face of it, you would never believe this. It simply could not be, you would say. Yet it was. Even Nipper, who held out longest, ended by believing it. I, who had a sneaking liking for a love-story, of any sort, was secretly disappointed. Mrs. Donnan could not move in her kitchen for Nipper, who came home early now to talk to Meg Linwood.
Have you ever noticed that when any one has got a back-set in love, or what they think is love, they are quite apt to fly off at a tangent, and marry the least likely person in the world?
To the common eye, no one could have been less likely to engage Nipper's attention—with his lost love still in the front shop—than Meg Linwood in the back.
She was plump, rotund, rosy, where Elizabeth Fortinbras was slender, willowy, like Diana in the pictures and statues of her in the oldArt JournalsandIllustrated London Newsof the Exhibition year—I mean 1851. (As a child I always liked those volumes. There were such a lot of pictures in them, and so little reading.)
But it was lost labor advising Nipper Donnan. He would show Elizabeth Fortinbras what she had missed. He would have the finest shop, the best meat, the most regularly paid monthly accounts, the biggest, squarest stone house with stables for the smartest trap to drive out his wife in. And then Elizabeth would awake to her folly. But too late! Too late! Elizabeth's goose was cooked.
Nipper avoided the first outbreak of parental wrath by running off with Meg Linwood, and Mrs. Donnan consoled her husband by her usual reflection that all was for the best. There are, indeed, very few things breakable about a butcher's shop, and if Meg had stayed at New Erin Villa, a complete set of crockery would have been required at an early date.
From Dumfries and Glasgow, Nipper sent very brief letters expressive of a desire to come to terms with his father. He was married. That could not be altered or amended. Meg came of a respectable family, and (save the breakages) no fault could be found with her.
True, Mrs. Donnan sighed. She would rather have seen Nipper going proudly down the aisle with another than Meg Linwood on his arm. As for Butcher Donnan himself, as soon as he got over dwelling upon the thrashing he meant to give Nipper when he caught him, the outlines of a broader, farther reaching, less arbitrary settlement began to form themselves in his mind.
He saw his lawyer, Mr. John Liddesdale, and what they said to one another bore fruit afterwards. But it was a busy ten days for Butcher Donnan. He had to spend the early morning of every day in the down town shop. He had the rooms above it cleaned out, new furniture installed—and he abused his son as he went.
"The young fool!" was the best word for Nipper, forgetting that he himself had married at eighteen. Each afternoon he was out in the blue and gold van with the collapsible rain-hood. In the evenings he looked into the ashes of the kitchen fire and thought. It was then that Elizabeth proved herself above rubies to the old folks of New Erin.
"Faith, didn't I tell ye, from the first," cried Butcher Donnan, slapping his thigh mightily, "that's the girl, Cynthia! Nothing she will not turn her hand to—as smart as a jay, and all as sweet and natural as the Queen of Sheba coming it over Solomon!"
"It strikes me, Butcher Donnan," said his wife, "that for an old man you are getting wonderfully fond o' the lass!"
She was smiling also, a loving, caressing, motherly smile, showing mostly about the eyes, as she spoke of Elizabeth Fortinbras, which was very good to see.
"Fond of her, is it?" cried Donnan. "I declare, I'm as fond of her as I wad ha' been o' my own daughter, if it had pleased Mary an' the saints to give us one!"
"And why not?" said Mrs. Donnan, bending suddenly towards her husband, and startling him with the earnestness of her regard.
"Why not—Cynthia, woman? You have been talking to Mr. Liddesdale?"
"Not I," said his wife, smiling. "Youshould not talk in your sleep, that's all, Butcher Donnan, if you want to keep your little secrets."
"Ah, wife, wife, it's you that are the wonderful woman," cried the Butcher-Pastry-Cook; "but if that be so, faith, it's just as well I don't sleep with that Thief-o'-the-Wurrld Kemp, our sugar merchant. But what say you, wife?"
"I say what you say, Butcher Donnan!"
"Do you think she would accept? Would she come to us and be our daughter?"
"By this and that," said his wife, "mind, I take it for granted that you have done what is right by Nipper, and that he and Meg may come home when they like?"
"Not before Saturday!" said the Butcher; "furniture and all won't be in. And if I saw Nipper for the first time on any other day than the blessed Sabbath, I might be tempted even then to break his silly head!"
This from Butcher Donnan was equal to a stage benediction from another. But his wife looked for more light, and in answer to the question in her eyes he told her all.
"Oh, Nipper is all right. He gets more than he deserves, the rascal. I will let him off what he still owes me on the business. The shop and dwelling-house shall be put in his name, and that's a deal more than ever I dreamed of having at his age. As for the dollars—well, we will see about those, when you and I have done with them!"
"What do you think about asking Elizabeth?" said his wife.
It was at this moment that I chanced to come in, and had the whole story told me by Mrs. Donnan. Elizabeth had cycled down to her father's house, and so was safely out of the way. Only our conference was interrupted by the various calls upon Mr. Donnan to answer the sharp "cling" of the bell in the outer shop.
One after the other I heard them in silence, and at last I gave my opinion—which was that they might make their own arrangements, with the help of Mr. John Liddesdale, but that they would do well to wait the return of that long-legged, Minerva-eyed brother of mine, at present engaged in colleging it as hard as need be, to obtain the means of passing with credit through the world.
"He may very well be taken in the same way as Nipper!" said the father of the latter grimly. "She's a mighty fine girl, this Elizabeth."
"He might, indeed, very well," I answered. "I am sureIshould, if I were a man. Only, he isn't, and he won't. I can promise you that. He will advise Elizabeth for the best, with less thought for himself than ifIwere concerned."
"Then he is a most unusual young man!" said Butcher Donnan.
"Hugh Johnissomewhat unusual," I said. "He does not let many people understand him."
"No," said Butcher Donnan; "that other young gent now—him with the uniform! Why, he is up to more tricks than a prize monkey with an Irish mother. As I said before, he is more in my own style about his age. Any one can see whatheis driving at. If he does not break his neck off somebody else's apple-tree, or get shot in a poaching accident, no doubt he may live to be a great and good Admiral of the Fleet. But this here Hugh John—he is always as quiet as pussy, and as polite as a parliamentary candidate come last night from London. Yet he licked my Nipper, licked him good and square—andsaid nothing about it. Nipper told me, though. And now he can be a real safe brother to the prettiest girl in Edam—beggin' your pardon, young lady, butyoulive out o' the town!"
Mrs. Donnan reminded her husband that it was owing to Master Hugh John that Elizabeth Fortinbras had come to them first. Also that it was certainly the least they could do to give him the chance of putting the matter to Elizabeth in his own way.
Thus, pending the Christmas holidays, Elizabeth Fortinbras became a child of adoption without knowing it.
Curiously enough, no one seemed to take into consideration any rights of pre-emption which her own father and mother might be supposed to possess upon her.
Written at the Age of Sixteen.
Of all the local events which upheaved the world of children in Edam, undoubtedly the greatest was the Harvest Fair. This happened somewhat late in the year. For Edam lay high on the mountain slopes. Only the herds and the sheep went higher. The harvesting lands were mostly in the valley crofts, in the hidden "hopes" and broad waterside "holms." But here and there a few hundred acres of oats lay angled up against the steep side of a mountain, and in late October afforded a scanty, stocky harvest, "bleached" rather than ripened by the slant, chill sun and sweeping winds of the uplands.
In brief, then, the Harvest Fair was late in Edam. We were near enough to the Borders, however, to be overstocked with gypsies. And it was after them that the Gypsies' Wood and Tryst had been named.
A fine sight was Edam Fair. Far and wide it spread over the green, right down to the verges of Esk-water. Ours was a Fair of the old-fashioned kind. Rustics still stood about unhired with a straw in their mouths—plowmen and "orra" men they! Maidens wore their breast kerchiefs unknotted, and as soon as the bargain for six months was struck, and the silver shilling of "arles" had passed, they knotted it firmly about their throats. They were no longer "mavericks"—masterless cattle. They had the seal of a place and an occupation upon their necks.
It was "Bell, the Byre Lass at Caldons"—"Jess Broon, indoor lass at the Nuik"—"Jeannie Sandilands, 'dairy' at the Boareland of Parton." These were the proud titles of the "engaged" ones who wore the knotted neckerchiefs.
But the "shows" were, after all, the most taking and permanent feature. There was the continual joy of "Pepper's Ghost," where (as Fuz has related) on a certain occasion the hero, new to his part, first of all transfixed the ghost, and then threw down his clattering sword, with the noble words, "Cold Fire is Useless!"
There was "Johnston's Temple of Terpsichore," on entering which you always looked over your shoulder to see if the minister or any of the elders were in sight. But how the girls danced, and how difficult it was to stop watching those who danced on their hands with their feet in the air, in order to observe those who danced on their feet with only their hands in the air! Thus we lost distinction in our joys.
However, both sorts were applauded, and when the people in tights leaped up and stood on each others' feet in order to form a pyramid, the general feeling was that if indeed we were selling our souls to Satan, at least we were getting the worth of our money!
We did not care much, after this, for the legitimate drama—though it was funny, certainly, to see Othello's "livery of the burnished sun" grow patchy, and the grease trickle down from the left corner of Desdemona's nose—which, being naturally rubicund, had been worked up for the occasion.
I was, of course, too much of a young lady to be allowed to visit the Fair under any available escort. In the evening I might possibly, in company with Somebody, be permitted to peruse the outsides of the booths. But the real delights were for the children. Strong in the possession of a half-crown apiece (to be spent as you please without accounting), Sir Toady and the Maid made havoc among the Aunt Sallies and the Cocoa-nut shysters.
A plan of campaign was evolved, simple but effective. Sir Toady, who was a good shot, took over the Maid's half-crown, and bound himself by a great oath to deliver up half the proceeds.
As for me, I caught glimpses of His Majesty's uniform darting from stall to stall, from range to range, followed by a butterfly figure in skimp white. This was the Maid, keeping track of profit and loss. She had good cause. Was she not involved to the extent of two-and-sixpence, her maiden mite?
Sir Toady appeared to be reckless, and put wholesale propositions before the Cocoa-nut shysters, as thus—"Suppose I give you two shillings cash, how many throws can I have for it, and can I pick my own nuts if I win?"
Some refused and some accepted. Those who refused were, commercially speaking, the lucky merchants. Sir Toady's aim was deadly. He did not mind throwing at an Aunt Sally, though this he considered rather old-fashioned play. A bull's-eye trap-door, which opened at the smack of the ball, was his favorite. And he cleaned up one merchant from whom he had secured the easy terms of forty throws for half-a-crown. So completely did he do it that the fellow, who saw his pile of nuts rapidly wasting away, brazenly repudiated his bargain, and would even have tried to lay hands on the pile already in the bag over the Maid's shoulder.
But the shyster reckoned without a knowledge of his Toady. You see, there was not in Edam man, woman, or child who did not know Sir Toady. And though at one time or another most had had their private disagreements with that youth, he was still an Edamite of the Edamites. Stained with early (orchard) crime, he yet retained the sympathy of gentle and simple. The very "smoutchies" of a younger time rallied at his call, and if the nuts had not instantly been paid over, the overturned "gallery" would have been sacked on the instant by promiscuous brigandage, the very police looking on with broad, benignant smiles.
"Such a young codger as he were!" grumbled the man afterwards, half in anger, half in admiration. "I had made a bad bargain. I seethatat once. 'Give me back them nuts. You've 'ad 'em on false pretenses!' sez I.
"'Sorry! So I have!' says he, smooth as butter. And with that he outs of his breast-pocket with his lanyard and blows a whistle like a bo'sum's mate! Then they ran from every quarter. My poor ole stall were on its back in half a jerk, and if it hadn't been for my young gent, so should I—andmauled into the bargain!
"Served me right, you say, for shovin' of my head into such a wasp's nest! But how was I to know?—I puts it to ye, mates. How wasIto know?—me fresh from London!"
I had gone up to the Cave of Mystery, armed with the three-draw telescopes, which Hugh John had left behind him as too precious to be risked in the give-and-take of school—though, according to information received, it was mostly "give" with Hugh John.
I saw a procession detach itself from the dense flow of the crowd, led by the white-frocked Maid and a dark blue Sir Toady, both laden down by sackloads of cocoa-nuts. It was impossible for them to carry them all the way home to the House in the Wood. Equally impossible to trust the youth of Edam, satisfactory enough when fighting was on hand, but unreliable when it came to division of the spoils.
The Imps staggered across the road, pursued by a riotous tail of infantry of no known line. Arrived at the shop door of New Erin Villa, they were met by Mrs. Donnan—who, on such a busy day, had come out for a breath of fresh air.
"What in the world have you got there, children?" cried the Dame, holding up astonished hands to heaven.
"Cocoa-nuts! Wads and lashings of cocoa-nuts!" cried Sir Toady. "I shot for them all. I threw for them. I won them. And when the man would have cheated me, I whistled the whole Fair Green down on him.ThenI saved his life! But I don't know what to do with them now I have them! They won't hatch out, and if they would, I haven't got a big enough hen! Here, you!"
And opening one of the bags, he bowled half-a-dozen of the nuts among the crowd of smoutchies, who instantly became a swarming, fighting anthill on the plainstones of the street.
"Stop, Master Toady," said Mrs. Donnan, "do stop! I will show you what to make of them. Some of them will be good——"
"All are good," asserted Sir Toady; "Ipicked them! At college they teach us, over at the canteen, how to know the good ones from the bad!"
By this time I was down at the shop door, having struck the main road near the Station Bridge. I fled to meet them, passing on the way Butcher Donnan, who for the day had turned the blue and gold van into a fine selling booth on the Market Hill, where he presided over half-a-dozen temporary assistants, keeping a wary eye on all, both buyers and sellers.
The children were tired, and stood panting. Sir Toady was unexpectedly pessimistic. Maid Margaret looked rather world-weary. Both had begun to think that, after all, there were better ways of spending five shillings than shooting for cocoa-nuts.
"What rot!" said Sir Toady, shaking one disgustedly close to his ear. "Can't eat them all—make us ever so sick, and I have to join on Friday! No time to get better! Bah!"
"It was all your fault, Toady," moaned the Maid, "andI want my half-crown back!"
"Nonsense!" cried Toady. "I never will go into partnership with a girl again. They always are sorry afterwards, whatever a chap does for them! There is your bag full of nuts, good and sound. What more do you want?"