I must here clear myself on a point which has no doubt caused the reader some indignation. "We remarked," he or she will say, "that, some chapters back, the Admiral described Troy as a 'beautiful little town.' Why, then, have we had no description of it, no digressions on scenery, no word-painting?"
To this I answer—Dear sir, or madam, no one who has known Troy was ever yet capable of describing it. If you doubt me, visit the town and see for yourself. I will for the moment suppose you to do so. What happens?
On the first day you take a boat and row about the harbour. "Scenery!" you exclaim, "why, what could you have more? Here is a lovely harbour flanked by bold hills to right and left; here are the ruined castles, witnesses of the great days when Troy sent ships to carry the English army to Agincourt; here axe grey houses huddled at the water's edge, hoary, battered walls and quay-doors coated with ooze and green weed. Such is Troy, and on the further shore quaint Penpoodle faces it, where a silver creek, dividing, runs up to Lanbeg; further up, the harbour melts into a river where the old ferry-boat plies to and from the foot of a tiny village straggling up the hill; further yet, and the jetties mingle with the steep woods beside the roads, where the vessels lie thickest; ships of all builds and of all nations, from the trim Canadian timber-ship to the corpulent Billy-boy. Why, the very heart of the picturesque is here. What more can you want?"
On the second day you will see all this from the harbour again, or perhaps you will cross the ferry and climb the King's Walk on the opposite bank; you will see it all, but with a change. It is more lovely, but not the same.
On the third day you will cast about in your mind to explain this; and so in time you will come to find that it is the spirit of Troy that plays this trick upon you. For you will have learnt to love the place, and love, as you know, dear sir or madam, is apt to affect the eyesight.
The eyes of Mr. Fogo, as Caleb pulled sturdily up with the tide, were passing through the first of these stages.
"This," he said at length, reflectively, "is one of the loveliest spots I have looked upon."
Caleb, in whom humanity and Trojanity were nicely compounded, flushed a bright copper-colour with pleasure.
"'Tes reckoned a tidy spot," he answered modestly, "by them as cares for voos an' such-like."
"There, now," he went on, after a pause, and turning round, "yonder's Kit's House, wi' Kit's Cottage, next door. You can't see the house so plain, 'cos 'tes behind the trees. But there 'tes, right enough."
"Is the cottage uninhabited, too?"
"Both on 'em. Ha'nted theydosay. By the way, I niver axed 'ee whether you minded ghostes?"
"Ghosts?"
"Iss, ghostes. This 'ere place was a Lazarus one time, where they kept leppards."
"Leopards? How very singular!" murmured Mr. Fogo.
"Ay, leppards as white as snow, as the sayin' goes."
"Oh, I see," said Mr. Fogo, suddenly enlightened. "You mean that this was a Lazar-house."
"That's so—a Lazarus. The leppards used to live there together, and when they died, they was berried at dead o' night down at thicky spit you sees yonder. No one had dealin's wi' 'em nor went nigh 'em, 'cept that they was allowed to make ropes. 'Tesn' so many years that the rope-walk was moved down to th' harbour mouth."
Caleb stopped rowing, and leant forward on his paddles.
"These 'ere leppards in time got to be quite a happy famb'ly—'cept, of course, they warn't happy, 'cos nobody wudn' have nuthin' to say to 'em. Well, the story goes as one on 'em got falled in love wi' by a very nice gal down in Troy, and one fine day she ups an' tells her sorrowin' parents that she's agoin' to marry a leppard. 'Not ef we knows et,' says they; 'we forbids the banns'; and wi' that they went off to bed thinkin' as they'd settled et. 'But,' says Parson Lasky—"
"Who was he?" interrupted Mr. Fogo.
"On'y a figger o' speech, sir, and nothin' to do wi' the yarn, as the strollin' actor said when his theayter cotched a-fire. Wot I meant was, that very night the gal gets a boat an' rows up to Kit's House, arter leavin' a letter to say as she'd drownded hersel'. An' there she lived in hidin', 'long wi' the leppards for the rest of her days, which, by the tale, warn't many, an' she an' her sweetheart was berried in wan grave." Caleb paused for breath.
"And the ghosts?" said Mr. Fogo, much interested.
"Some ha' seed her rowin' about here in a boat, o' dark nights; and others swear to seein' all the leppards a-marchin' down wi' her corpse to the berryin'-ground. Leastways, that's the tale. Jan Spettigue was the last as seed 'em, but as he be'eld three devils on his own chimbly-piece the week arter, along o' too much rum, p'r'aps he made a mistake. Anyways, 'tes a moral yarn, an' true to natur'. These young wimmen es a very detarmined sex, whether 'tes a leppard in the case or a Rooshan."
Mr. Fogo had fallen into a reflective silence.
"'Tes a thousand pities this 'ere place should be empty, wi' a lean-to Crystal Pallis—by which I means a conserva-tory, sir—an' gardens, an' room for a cow, an' a Pyll o' ets own—"
"A what?"
"Pyll, sir, otherwise a creek—'c, r, double e, k—an arm o' the sea,' as the spellin' book says."
A curious fascination stole over Mr. Fogo as he looked earnestly at the house round which these memories hung. Standing on an angle formed by the bending river, and the little creek, and behind a screen of trees—elms almost too old to feel the sap of spring, a chestnut or two, and a few laurels and sombre firs, that had cracked with their roots the grey garden wall and sprawled down to the beach below—the stained and yellow frontage looked down towards the busy harbour, as it seemed with a sense of serene decay, haunted but without disquietude, like the face of an old lady who has memories and lives in them, though she deigns to contemplate a life from which her hopes, with her old friends and lovers, have dropped out. Perhaps Mr. Fogo had some sympathy with this mood; for Caleb, after waiting some time for his reply, took to his paddles again with a will, and presently the boat, sweeping round a projecting rock, passed into a very different scene.
Here the river, shut in on the one side with budding trees to the water's edge, on the other with bracken and patches of ploughed land to where the cliffs broke sheer away, stretched for some miles without bend or break. Far ahead a blue bank of woodland closed the view. Not a sound disturbed the stillness, not a sail broke the placid expanse of water.
But a true Trojan must still be talking. Presently Caleb resumed.
"'Tes a luvly spot, as you said, sir. Mr. Moggridge down at the customs—he's a poet, as maybe you know—has written a mint o' verses about this 'ere place. 'Natur', he says:—"
"Natur' has 'ere assoomed her softest garb;'Ere would I live an' die
"Natur' has 'ere assoomed her softest garb;'Ere would I live an' die
"Natur' has 'ere assoomed her softest garb;'Ere would I live an' die
"—which I calls a very touchin' sentiment, an' like what they says in a nigger song."
With such conversation Mr. Trotter beguiled the way until they came abreast of a tiny village almost buried in apple trees and elms. On the opposite bank, a thin column of blue smoke was curling up from among the dense woodland.
Caleb headed the boat for this smoke, ran her nose on the pebbles beneath a low cliff, and stepped out.
"'Ere we are, sir."
"But I don't see any house," said Mr. Fogo, perplexed.
"All in good time, sir," replied Mr. Trotter, and having fastened up the boat, led the way.
A narrow flight of steps, hewn out of the rock, led up to the little cliff. At the top, and almost hidden by bushes, stood a low gate. Thence the path wound for a space between walls of budding hazel, and at its end quite unexpectedly a tiny cottage burst upon Mr. Fogo's view.
Little dreaming that the owner of Kit's House could live in such humility, he was considerably surprised when Caleb stepped up and struck a rousing knock upon the door.
It was opened by a comely girl with a white apron pinned before her neat stuff gown, and a face as fresh and healthful as a spring day.
"Why, Caleb," she cried, "who would have thought it? Come inside; you're as welcome as flowers in May."
"And you," replied Caleb gallantly, "are a-lookin' so sweet as blossom. Here's a gentlem'n come to call upon 'ee, my dear. An' how's Peter an' Paul? Brave, I hopes."
"Both, thank you, Caleb," said the maiden, curtseying without embarrassment to Mr. Fogo. "Won't you come in, sir?"
It was noticeable that Mr. Fogo at this point became very nervous, but he crossed the threshold in answer to this invitation. Mr. Trotter followed.
The fragrant smoke of a wood fire filled the room in which Mr. Fogo found himself. It was a rude kitchen, with white limeash floor, and for ceiling, a few whitewashed beams and the planching of the bedroom above. All was scrupulously clean. In the flickering obscurity of the chimney depended a line of black pot-hooks and hangers; a trivet and a pair of bellows furnished the hearth; from the capacious rack hung a rich stock of hams and sides of bacon, curing in the smoke; an English clock stood in one corner, a tall cupboard in another, and a geranium in the window-seat. Along the side opposite the door, and parallel to a dresser of shining crockery, ran a strong deal table. Some high-backed chairs, a pair of brass candlesticks with snuffers, a book or two, a few old hats, and a lanthorn, on various pegs, completed the furniture of the place.
But Mr. Fogo's gaze was riveted on two men who rose together at his entrance from the table where they were seated, side by side, at their tea.
Both tall, both adorned with crisp curls of black hair—with clean-shaven, mahogany faces, and the gentlest of possible smiles, the twins came forward to greet the stranger. So appallingly alike were they that Mr. Fogo felt a ridiculous desire to run away, nor could help fancying himself the victim of a disordered dream.
The Twins advanced upon him simultaneously with outstretched horny palms. He noticed that even their dress was precisely similar, with the single exception that one wore a red, the other a yellow bandanna handkerchief loosely knotted about his throat.
The Twins advanced upon him simultaneously.The Twins advanced upon him simultaneously.
The Twins advanced upon him simultaneously.The Twins advanced upon him simultaneously.
"You'm kindly welcome, sir," said the Twin with the red bandanna; and the Twin with the yellow neck-cloth murmured "kindly welcome," like an echo.
"Stop a bit," interposed Caleb, "let's do a bit of introducin'. This here es Mr. Fogo, gent, as es thinkin' of rentin' Kit's House, and es come for that puppos'. That there es Peter Dearlove—him wi' the red neckercher; likewise Paul Dearlove—him wi' the yaller. An', beggin' yer pardon for passin' over the ladies, this es Tamsin Dearlove (christ'n'd Thomasina), dearly beloved sister o' the same," concluded Caleb, with a sudden recollection of having read something like this on a tombstone.
Tamsin curtseyed, and the two horny palms were again presented. Not knowing which to take first,
Mr. Fogo held his umbrella between his knees and gave them a hand a-piece.
"I am afraid, Mr.—" He hesitated with a suspicion that he ought to say "Messrs."
"Dearlove," suggested Caleb; "an' reckoned a purty name, too."
"I am afraid, Mr. Dearlove," repeated Mr. Fogo, compromising matters by staring hard between the Twins, "that we have interrupted you."
"Not at all, sir," said Peter. "Sit down, sir, ef you'm not proud. Tamsin, bring a cup for the gentleman. A piece o' pasty, sir? Tamsin es famous for pasties."
Mr. Fogo, remembering that, with the exception of the mug of beer at the "King of Prussia," he had not broken his fast since the morning, and seeing also that the hospitality was anxiously sincere, complied. In a few moments both he and Caleb were seated before a steaming pasty.
Tamsin poured out the tea. She was a full twenty years younger than her brothers, as could be seen notwithstanding their boyish look, which came from innocence and clean-shaven faces. It was pleasant to see their almost fatherly pride in her. Mr. Fogo noted it vaguely, but an inexplicable nervousness seemed to have overtaken him since entering the cottage.
"I came," he said at last, "to inquire about Kit's House, which I hear is to let."
"Thankin' you kindly, sir," answered Peter; "an' I won't say but what we shall be glad to let et. But Paul and I ha' been puttin' our heads togither, and we allow 'tes for Tamsin to say."
Here he looked at Paul, who nodded gravely and repeated, in his former mechanical tone, "for Tamsin to say."
Mr. Fogo looked more distressed than ever.
"I beg your pardon, I'm sure," he began, with a quick glance at the girl, who was quietly pouring tea; "I did not know."
"No offence, sir. On'y, don't you see, 'tes this way. Kit's House es a gran' place wi' a slaty roof an' a I-talian garden, and a mighty deal too fine for the likes of Paul an' me. But wi' Tamsin 'tes another thing. We both agree she ought to be a leddy—not but what she's a better gal than tens o' thousands o' leddies—an' more than once we've offered to get her larnt the pi-anner an' callysthenics, an' the use o' globes, an' all such things which we knows to be usual in gran' sussiety; on'y she sticks to et to bide along wi' we. God bless her! I say, an' a rough life et must be for her."
Tamsin turned away towards the fireplace, and became very busy among the pot-hooks and hangers. Her brother pulled out a red handkerchief—a fellow to the one around his neck—mopped his face and proceeded—
"Well, as I was a-saying, seein' she was bent on bein' wi' us, Paul and me allowed to each other that we'd set up in fine style at Kit's House, so as not to rob her of what es her doo: that es to say—one of us wou'd live down there wi' a car'ge and pair o' hosses, and cut a swell wi' dinner parties an' what-not, while the other bided here an' tilled 'taties, turn and turn about. But she wudn' hear o' that, neither. She's a terrible stubborn gal, bless her!"
"We shou'd ha' been slow at larnin' the ropes, just at fust," he resumed after a moment's silence, "not bein' scholards, partikler at the use o' globes, which Ihaveheerd es diffycult, though very entertainin' in company when you knows how 'tes done. But we was ready to try a hand—on'y she wudn' have et, an' so et has gone on. But, beggin' your pardon, sir, and hopin' no offence, she shall give her answer afore 'tes too late. Eh, Paul?"
"You have spoken, Peter," said the other twin, very slowly, "like a printed book. Let Tamsin speak her mind about et."
The girl came forward from the fireplace, and Mr. Fogo, as he stole a glance at her, could see that her eyes were red.
"What do 'ee say, Tamsin? Must we let Kit's House, or shall we leave th' ould place an' go an' make a leddy of 'ee?"
Tamsin's reply was to fall on her knees before the speaker and break into a fit of weeping.
"Don't ask me, don't ask me! I don't want to be a lady, an' Iwon'tleave you. Don't ask me, my dear, dear brothers!"
Peter stroked the dark head buried in his lap, while Paul blew his nose violently in a yellow bandanna, and replied to Mr. Fogo.
"Very well, sir, so be et. There's the key of Kit's House yonder on the nail. Ef you likes to look over the place, one of us will follow you presently, and then, supposin' et to be to your likin', us can talk over terms."
"Well, sir," said Caleb Trotter, when the boat was pushed off, "what do 'ee think of 'em?"
Mr. Fogo, whose wits had been wool-gathering, came to himself with a start. "I think they are very good people."
"You may say that! The likes o' those Twins you won't see again, not ef you live to be a hundred. Seems to me," he went on reflectively, "that Natur', when she turned out the fust, got so pleased wi' herself that she was bound to try her hand at a dooplicity, just to relieve her feelin's."
"A what?"
"A dooplicity, sir, otherwise another of the same identical."
"Oh, I see."
"Iss, sir. 'Tes like that rhyme about the Force o' Natur' what cudn' no furder go, and you can't do 't agen, not ef you try all you know."
"You are fond of poetry, I see," said Mr. Fogo, with a smile.
"Puffec'ly dotes on et, sir."
"Have you ever composed any yourself?"
"Once 'pon a time, sir," said Caleb, pausing in his work, and leaning forward very mysteriously. "Ef you cares to hear, I don't mind tellin' 'ee; on'y you must gi' me your Davy you won't let et out to nobody."
Mr. Fogo gave the required promise.
"Well, 'twas in this way. Once 'pon a time, me an' old Joe Bonaday was workin' a smack round from Bristol. TheBetsy Annwas her name, No. 1077 o' Troy. Joe was skipper, an' me mate; there was a boy aboard for crew, but he don't count. Well us got off Ilfrycombe one a'ternoon—August month et was, an' pipin' hot—when my blessed parlyment, says Molly Franky—"
"Who was she?"
"Another figger o' speech, sir, that's all. Well, as I was a-sayin', on a sudden, lo and be'old! the breeze drops dead. Ef you'll believe me, sir, 'twas calm as the Sar'gossa Sea. So there we was stuck—the sail not so much as flappin'—for the best part o' two hour; at the end o' which time (Joe not bein' a convussational man beyond sayin' 'thankye' when he got hes vittles) I was gettin' a bit dumb-foundered for topicks to talk 'pon. 'Cos, as for the weather, there 'twas, an', as Joe remarked, 'twasn' going to move any more for our discussin' of et, nor yet cussin' for that matter."
"I see."
"Well, sir, we was driven at last to singin' a hymn to keep our speerits up. Leastways, the boy an' me sang, an' Joe beat time. Then says Joe, 'Look 'ere, I'm a-goin' to allee-couchee ef et lasts like this.' 'Well,' I says, for I was gettin' desprit, 'have 'ee ever tried to make poetry?' 'No,' says he, 'can't say I have.' 'Well,' I says, 'I've oft'n wanted to. Let's ha' a shy. You go aft and think of a verse, an' I'll go forra'd an' make another, an' then us'll see which sounds best.' 'Done,' says he, an' off he goes.
"Well, I sits there for mor'n an hour, thinkin' hard, and terrable work I found et. At last Joe shouts across, 'Hav'ee done? Time's up'; and I told 'un I'd done purty middlin'. So us stepped amidships, and spoke out what us had made."
Caleb made a long pause.
"I should like to hear the verses, if you remember them," said Mr. Fogo.
"Should 'ee now?" Caleb asked with fine modesty. "Well, I don't mind, on'y you mus'n' expect 'em to be like Maister Moggridge's. Mine went thicky way." He recited very slowly, with a terrific rolling of syllables:—
"See her glidin' dro' the water,Far, far away!Many a true heart's niver to be found.
"See her glidin' dro' the water,Far, far away!Many a true heart's niver to be found.
"See her glidin' dro' the water,Far, far away!Many a true heart's niver to be found.
"The last line alludes to my gal wot had recently e-loped wi' the Rooshan," Caleb explained.
"Was that all?"
"That was all o' mine, sir, but Joe's was p'ints better. Just listen:—"
"Fare thee well, Barnstaple steeple,—"
"Fare thee well, Barnstaple steeple,—"
"Fare thee well, Barnstaple steeple,—"
"(He was a Barnstaple man, sir, was Joe)—"
"Fare thee well, I say,Never shall I see thee, once agen, a long time ago."
"Fare thee well, I say,Never shall I see thee, once agen, a long time ago."
"Fare thee well, I say,Never shall I see thee, once agen, a long time ago."
"Well, sir, we was just a-goin' to step back an' have another shy, when the breeze sprang up a'most as sudden as et fell, and the consikence es, sir, that I've niver made no more poetry from that day to this."
The sun was getting low, as Mr. Fogo and Caleb stepped ashore on the ruined quay at Kit's House, not far from the spit of land where the lazars were buried. Kit's Cottage stood plain to see at a short distance from the water, but Kit's House lay to the right, behind its screen of laurels and elms. A narrow flight of steps and a path along the cliff's edge brought the visitors to the front door.
It was a long, low house, with pointed windows on the upper storey, and a deep verandah shading the ground-floor rooms. It faced the south, and although few flowers were out, the ruined garden was luxuriant with decay. One could see where the old Lazar-house had been overlaid with the taste of more recent inhabitants, but, as Caleb said, no one had lived here now for a dozen years or more. The walls were smeared with green vegetation; the iron gate creaked heavily with rust. On the roof the stonecrop flourished, and the swallows had built their nests about the chimneys.
Indoors it was as bad. Rich papers hung and rotted from the walls; rats scampered about the floors overhead; a smell of damp and mouldiness pervaded every room.
"Deary me, sir!" said Caleb in despair, "I'd no idee 'twas as bad as this, or I wou'dn' have mentioned the place to 'ee."
An old barrel stood on end before the French-window of the drawing-room. Mr. Fogo seated himself on this, and gazed meditatively out on the mellow glory of the evening.
"Caleb," he said very quietly, after a while, "I think I shall take this house."
"You will, sir?"
"I fancy there will be no difficulty in arranging about the rent. And now I want to speak with you on another question. You are a single man, you say. Have you any employment?"
"Why, sir, I mostly picks up my livin' on the say, on'y I thought as how I'd like a spell ashore for a change; but the end o' that you saw for yourself this very a'ternoon."
"Do you think that for a pound a week you could look after me?"
"I'd like the chance."
"That would exclude your food and clothes."
Caleb hesitated for a moment, and then said, with Trojan independence—
"You beant' a-goin' to rig me out in a yaller weskit an' small-clothes wi' a stripe down the leg, by any chance?"
"I was proposing that you should dress exactly as you do at present."
"Then done wi' you, sir, an' thank 'ee. When be I to enter on my dooties?"
"At once."
"An' where, sir?"
"Here."
"Be you a-goin' to sleep the night in this moloncholy place?"
"Certainly."
"Very well, sir. Please yoursel', as Dick said to the press-gang. An' what be I to do fust?"
Mr. Fogo perhaps did not hear the question, for he was gazing out at the falling shadows: when he spoke again it was upon another subject.
"It is right that you should know," said he, "the kind of life you will be wanted to lead. In the first place, I am extraordinarily subject to fits of abstraction—absence of mind, in other words. It is an affection to which my style of life has made me particularly prone: it has led me before now into absurd, and sometimes into dangerous situations.
"Ihaveheard tell," said Caleb, "of an old gentl'm'n as carefully tucked hes umbrella in bed an' put hissel' in the corner. Es that the style o' thing, sir?"
"It is something similar," said his master, "and within certain limits I should expect you to look after me and as far as possible prevent such accidents: however, I shall not, of course, expect you to have more than one pair of eyes. My tastes are simple—I read a little, sketch a little, botanise, dabble in chemistry, am fond of carpentering—boat-building especially. My very absence of mind makes me indifferent to surroundings. In short, I am a mild man."
Mr. Fogo got off his barrel, went to the window, sighed softly, and returned. Something in his manner imposed silence on Caleb.
"We shall live here alone," he resumed. "It is even possible that, to ensure solitude, I shall rent the cottage as well, and install you there. Above all things, remember," with sudden sternness, "that no woman is to come near this house—I shall even expect you to do your utmost to prevent their landing on the quay below. That, I think, is all. I now wish you to row down to the station and get my portmanteau. After that, with this money procure a couple of hammocks, besides provisions and whatever will be necessary for the night, not forgetting soap and candles. To-morrow we will take in further stock."
Caleb was about to make some answer when the garden gate creaked heavily, and Peter Dearlove appeared in the dusk outside the window; so he merely took the money, touched his forelock by way of acknowledging his new employment, and retired. But it was noticeable that once or twice on his way to the boat he had to pull himself up and think a bit. Arrived on the quay, too, he stood for a moment or so beside the boat in profound meditation.
"Come, Caleb Trotter!" he exclaimed, suddenly jumping in and seizing the paddles; "this sort o' thing won't do, nohow. Here you be paid for lookin' arter a gentl'm'n as wanders in hes wits, and fust news es, you be doin' the same yoursel'. 'Tes terribul queer, though," he added, and with that began to row towards town with an energy that set the boat quivering.
When he returned, in less than two hours' time, he found Mr. Fogo with a barrel full of water and the stump of a decayed broom, washing out the back kitchen. The Twin had gone.
"Here we be, sir. Pound o' candles, pound o' tea, two loaves o' bread, knives, forks, two cups, three eggs—one on 'em smashed, in my trowsy pocket—saucepan, kettle, tea-pot, an' a hunk o' cold beef as salt as Lot's wife's elbow. That's the fust load. There's more in the boat, but I must ax'ee to bear a hand wi' thicky portmanty o' youm, 'cos 'tes mortal heavy. I see'd Jan Higgs's wife a-fishin' about two hundred yards from the quay, on my way up, an' warned her to keep her distance. There's a well o' water round at the back, an' I've fetched a small sack o' coal, and ef us don't have a dish o' tay ready in a brace o' shakes, then Tom's killed an' Mary's forlorn."
With the statement of which gloomy alternative Mr. Caleb Trotter broke into a smile of honest pride.
"Caleb," said Mr. Fogo from his hammock in the back kitchen at about eleven o'clock on the same night.
"Aye, aye, sir."
"Are you comfortable?"
"Thank'ee, sir, gettin' on nicely. Just a bit Man-Fridayish to begin wi', but as corrat as Crocker's mare."
"What did you say?"
"Figger o' speech agen, sir, that's all. Good-night, sir."
"Good-night, Caleb."
Mr. Fogo settled himself in his hammock, sighed for a second time and dropped asleep.
Meanwhile, curiosity in Troy was beating its wings against the closed doors of "The Bower." The early morning train next day brought three domestics to supplement the youth in buttons, and supplant the charwoman. Miss Limpenny, indeshabille(but at a decent distance from the window), saw them arrive, and called Lavinia to look, with the result that within two minutes the sisters had satisfied themselves as to which was the cook, which the parlour-maid, and which the kitchen-maid.
Later in the day, a van-load of furniture arrived, though "The Bower" was already furnished; but, as Miss Limpenny said, in all these matters of comfort and refinement, "there are degrees." On this occasion the Admiral, who had been prevailed upon to leave his bed, executed a manoeuvre the audacity of which should have commanded success.
He crossed the road, and opened a conversation with the driver.
But success does not always wait on the brave. The van-driver happened to have a temper as short as the Admiral's, and far less reverence.
"Good-morning," said the Admiral, cheerily.
"Mornin'."
"What's a-foot to-day?"
"Same as yesterday—twelve inches."
The Admiral was rather taken aback, but smiled, nevertheless, and persevered.
"Ha, ha! very good. You are a wit, I perceive."
But the driver's conversation teemed with the unexpected.
"Look 'ere, Ruby-face! give me any more of your sass an' I'll punch yer 'ed for tuppence."
This was conclusive. The Admiral struck his flag, re-crossed the street, went indoors, and had it out with Mrs. Buzza. Indeed, at the end of half-an-hour that poor lady's feelings were so overwrought, and, in consequence, her sobs so loud, that the Admiral had perforce to get out his double-bass and play a selection of martial music to prevent Miss Limpenny's hearing them on the other side of the partition.
All this happened early in the afternoon. Towards five o'clock Miss Limpenny, who had only left her post twice, and on each occasion to snatch a hurried meal, was rewarded for her patience. The front door of "The Bower" opened, and Mr. and Mrs. Goodwyn-Sandys appeared, dressed, as Miss Limpenny could see, for a walk.
"Now, I wonder," reflected that kind soul, "which direction they will take. Personally, of course, I should prefer them to pass this window; but I hope I can subdue private inclination to public spirit, and for Troy's sake I hope they will visit the Castle first. The salubrity of the air, as well as the expansiveness of the view, would be certain to impress them favourably. Dear, dear! I wish I could advise them. Should they take the direction of the town, I know by experience they will be apt to meet with an effluvium of decaying fish, and I shouldsolike their stay among us to be begun under pleasant auspices."
But almost before Miss Limpenny had concluded these reflections, the strangers had determined on the direction. They turned neither towards the Town nor up the hill towards the Castle and the harbour's mouth; but down the little road which led to Bower Slip and the Penpoodle Ferryboat.
"Gracious me!" exclaimed Miss Limpenny; "they are going to take a boat."
The words were scarcely out of her mouth, when she was seized with a sudden idea—an idea so alluring, yet so bold withal, that the blood flew from her cheeks. She made a step forward, paused, took another step, and returned to the window. The strangers had turned down the road and were out of sight.
For a full minute she stood there, tapping her foot.
"I will," she said, with sudden determination. "I will!" On Miss Limpenny's maiden lip the words were as solemn as though she spoke them at the altar. "I will,—and—I don't care what happens!"
Awful words! Awful in themselves, more awful from such lips, but surely most awful as making the second-step in the moral decadence of Troy!
Yet I would not have my readers too excited. They were words to shudder at, indeed; but the immediate consequences were not bloody— they were only to a limited degree tragic. It must be remembered that the magnificence of all actions is relative to the performer, nor would I seek to exalt Miss Limpenny to the level of a Semiramis or a Dido; only, when I say that she bore a great soul in a little body, I say no more than that she was a Trojan.
In short, Miss Limpenny did not, as the reader may have expected, take a boat and pursue after the strangers. What she did was simply to descend swiftly to the front hall, take down from its stand an antique, brass-bound telescope of enormous proportions, and with it make her way swiftly to the back door.
The back gardens of Alma Villas ran parallel to each other, and were terminated by a high wall, with a quay-door apiece, a tall ladder leading from the door straight down to the water. At the end of the garden, and built against this wall, in each case a stone terrace with a flight of steps allowed any one who chose to climb, and even perform a limited promenade while enjoying a full view of the harbour beyond.
It was to this flight of steps that Miss Limpenny, with a prayer on her lips and the telescope under her arm, made her way.
Both terrace and steps were rickety to a degree. To help you to estimate her conduct at its full temerity I may mention that Miss Limpenny had never attempted the climb before in her life. But whatever qualms she may have felt, they did not appear in her behaviour. Gingerly, but without hesitation, and clutching the telescope, which impeded her as an ice-axe the rock-climber, she essayed all the perils of this maiden ascent.
Five minutes' stiff climbing, as they say in theAlpine Journal, brought her to a point where she could take breath and look about her. Despite her terror, the excitement and the light breeze now blowing over theareteof garden wall, had brought a flush to her cheek. But scarcely had she resumed and set her foot upon the summit, when the flush suddenly faded, and left her blanched as snow.
For there, not a foot to her right, and above the crest of the partition wall, rose another telescope, the exact counterpart of her own!
The Spectre on the Brocken was nothing to this.
She clutched at the rotten stones and panted for breath. Slowly, very slowly, the rival telescope was tilted up against the harbour-wall; very slowly it rose in air. Then came a pair of hands—of blue cuffs—and then—the crimson face of Admiral Buzza soared into view, like the child's head inMacbeth.
He did not see her yet, being absorbed in adjusting the telescope. Terror-smitten, too fearful to advance or retreat, clinging to the telescope with one hand as a drowning mariner might grasp a spar, and clutching with the other at the crumbling wall, Miss Limpenny stood arrested, wildly staring, scarce venturing to breathe.
The Admiral's telescope was tilted into position, and the Admiral half-turned his head before applying his eye to the hole.
She could not help it. In spite of all her efforts to repress it, a little gasping squeal of affright broke from her. The Admiral, with a start, withdrew his eye quickly from the glass, and looked over the wall.
"Damnation!" (This was the Admiral, by the way.)
What happened exactly at this moment will never be known. Whether a stone underfoot gave way, or whether the Admiral's voice brought down aseracof rotten wall, is not clear. There was a rumbling sound, an oath or two—and then both telescope and Admiral disappeared, with a crash, from view.
Miss Limpenny screamed, dropped her telescope, which went rattling down the steps, cowered desperately against the wall, shut her eyes, screamed again, trod on a tilting slab, hung for a moment, toppled, clutched wildly at space, and shot, with a rush and shower of stones, straight to the very bottom.
Miss Lavinia Limpenny, who, startled by the screams, had rushed to the window and witnessed the last stages of the catastrophe, was out in a minute. Tenderly raising her sobbing sister, she assisted her back to the house, and attended to the bruises with a combination of arnica, vinegar, and brown paper. On the other side of the wall the Admiral lay for some time and bellowed for help, until his frightened family bore him in, and attempted to put him to bed.
But mark the heroism of the truly great. In spite of his late treatment at the hands of his fellow-citizens—treatment which still rankled—here was no Coriolanus to depart in a huff to Antium. The Admiral had a duty to perform, a service due to this ungrateful Town, and on the subject of going to bed he was adamant.
"Cease, Emily. Your tears, your protestations are in vain. Stop, I tell you! Get me my uniform."
Surely some desperate, some decisive step was contemplated when the Admiral ordered out that gold-laced coat and cocked hat that once had shone in the Blue Squadron of Her Majesty's Navy. What could this stern magnificence portend?
The Admiral had made up his mind. He was going to interview Mrs. Snell, the charwoman.
It was a pretty fancy, and one not without parallel in the history of famous men, that inspired him at his crisis to assume his bravest attire. There is to my mind a flavour in the conceit—a bravado lifting the action above mere intrepidity into actual greatness. Nor in this little Iliad are there many figures that I regard with more affection than that of Admiral Buzza at his garden gate waiting for Mrs. Snell.
When at length she issued from "The Bower" and came down the road, the effect of the gold lace was rather striking. She dropped her bundle and her lower jaw together.
"Lawks, sir! how you did frighten me, to be sure! I thought it was the devil!"
This was hardly what the Admiral had expected. He beckoned with his forefinger mysteriously. Mrs. Snell advanced as though not quite sure that her first fright was unfounded.
"Mrs. Snell," inquired the Admiral, in a whisper, "what are they like?" He pointed melodramatically towards "The Bower" as he asked the question.
Again the unexpected happened. Mrs. Snell burst into loud and hysterical sobbing.
"Don't 'ee, sir! don't 'ee! I can't abear it. Not a thing can you do to please 'em, an' the Honorubble Frederic a-dammin' about the 'ouse fit to make your flesh creep. An' that though he might 'ave ate his dinner off the floor, gold studs an' all, as I told 'un at last. For 'twasn't in flesh and blood, sir—not to be ordered this way an' that by a whipper-snapper whose gran'mother I might 'a been, though he'asgot three rows o' shiny buttons on 'is stummick, which is no cause for a proud carriage toward them as 'asn't, nor callin' 'em slow-coaches and names which I won't soil my tongue wi'—an' so I said. Aw dear! aw dear!" And here Mrs. Snell's passion again found vent in violent sobs and cries.
"Hush! Confound it! Hush! I tell you. You'll have the whole town out."
"I beg your pardon, sir—boo-hoo!—but it isn't in natur', sich wickedness in 'igh places, an' pore Maria sick at 'ome wi' the colic an' a leak in the roof you might put your cocked 'at through, an' very fine it looks, sir, beggin' your parding agen, which is all vexashun o' sperrit on a shillin' a day an' your vittles, let alone bein' swore at 'till you dunno whether you be 'pon your 'ed or your 'eels."
With this Mrs. Snell picked up her bundle and marched off down the road. She was quite hopeless, the Admiral determined, as he watched her retreating figure and heard her sobs borne back to him on the evening air. Well, well! it had been another reverse—but not a defeat. His face cleared again as he turned to re-enter the house.
"Let me see: to-morrow is Sunday. They will probably be at church. In the afternoon, though it involve the loss of my usual nap, I will consider. On Monday I will act."
Even the strangers themselves, as they walked up the aisle of St. Symphorian's Church, Troy, on the following morning, could not but perceive something of importance to be in the wind. That the church should be full was not unusual, for in those days Sunday Observance was the rule among Trojans. But on this particular day the Wesleyan and Bible Christian chapels must have been sadly depleted, so great was the crush; and, besides, there was the unwonted magnificence of dress, the stir caused by the simultaneous turning of some hundred bonnets as the Goodwyn-Sandys entered, the audible whispering as they took their seats, the nervousness of the Vicar, who twice dropped his spectacles over the reading desk and once over the pulpit. On this last occasion one of the glasses was broken, and the sermon in consequence became, towards the end, a trifle involved. All this made the service rather hysterical.
Tell me, my Muse, thou who sittest at the tea-table and rejoicest in the rattling of cups: Who were they that attended St. Symphorian's Church on this Sunday morning? First, there were the Misses Limpenny, in black tabbinet dresses and lace shawls; a cameo brooch adorned the throat of each, and from her waist a reticule depended. These first directed the gold-bound optic glass at the strangers' pew. Behind them sat the Doctor and his wife, the one conspicuous for his black stock, the other for a shawl of Paisley workmanship. Next, the Harbour-master, tall Mr. Stripp, with his daughters Tryphena and Tryphosa; nor would Mrs. Stripp have been absent had she not been buried some years before. Yellow-haired were both the daughters, and few knew better the prevailing fashion in dress; these whispered concerning Mrs. Goodwyn-Sandys' costume. By them sat Mr. Moggridge, the poet, good at the responses, and Sam Buzza, his friend, whom few Trojans excelled in casting glances at the female congregation. Then, most gorgeous and bravest of all, the Admiral: he wore again his gold-laced coat, but the cocked-hat rested underneath the seat, and none could fathom the import of his gaze. By him sat his three daughters, a-row, in straight-backed dresses of like cut and colour, and peeped over their prayer-books; and Mrs. Buzza, timorous, in bright green satin. But of the throng of Trojan men and women, not though I had a hundred mouths, etc., etc.
"Her dress must have cost nine shillings a yard if it cost a penny," said Miss Limpenny when they were outside in the open air. She looked at the ground as she said so, for she could forget neither the Nightcap nor the Telescope.
The Admiral was silent.
"She is very lovely," remarked Mrs. Buzza, "and did you remark how the Vicar paused in the Litany when he came to 'all the Nobility'?"
"I was particularly careful to pray for Lord Sinkport," said Calypso, innocently.
Still the Admiral was silent. That afternoon Mrs. Buzza, stealing softly into the back parlour lest she should disturb her lord, was amazed, in place of the usual recumbent form with a bandanna over its face, to find him sitting up, wide awake, and staring gloomily.
"My dear—" she began in her confusion.
The Admiral turned a Gorgon stare upon her, but made no answer. Under its petrifying influence she backed out without another word, to communicate with the girls upon the portent.
This mood of the Admiral's lasted all day. Next morning, at breakfast, he looked up from his bacon, and observed, with the air of a man whose mind is made up—
"Emily, see that the girls have on their best gowns by eleven o'clock sharp. I am going to pay a call."
Consternation sat on every face. Sam Buzza paused in the act of breaking an egg.
"At 'The Bower'?" he asked.
"At 'The Bower.'"
Mrs. Buzza clasped her hands nervously. The girls turned pale.
"Oh, very well," said Sam, tapping his egg. "I shouldn't wonder if I turned up while you were there."
He was a light-haired, ungainly youth, of about twenty, with a reputation for singing a comic song. It was understood that the Admiral designed him for College and Holy Orders, but meanwhile time was passing, and Sam sat "with idle hands at home," or more frequently, in the bar of the "Man-o'-War."
"You!" exclaimed his father.
"Well, I don't see what there is in that to be surprised about," replied the youth, with an aggrieved air. "I met the Honourable Frederic smoking a cigar out on the Rope-walk last night. His cigars are very good; and he asked me to drop in soon and try another. He isn't a bit stuck-up."
The Admiral's feelings were divided between annoyance at the easy success of his son, and elation at finding the stranger so unexpectedly affable. He rose.
"Girls, remember to be punctual. I will show this town of Troy that I am not the man to be laughed at."