"Must be a county fair near here!" exclaimed Rebecca. "But will ye listen to the gibberish an' see their clothes!"
Indeed, the language and the costumes were most perplexing to good New England ears and eyes, and Rebecca knew not whether to advance or to retreat.
The women all wore very wide and rather short skirts, the petticoat worn exposed up to where a full over-skirt or flounce gave emphasis to their hips. The elder ones wore long-sleeved jackets and high-crowned hats, while the young ones wore what looked like low-necked jerseys tied together in front and their braided hair hung from uncovered crowns.
The men wore short breeches, some full trunk hose, some tighter but puffed; their jackets were of many fashions, from the long-skirted open coats of the elders to the smart doublets or shirts of the young men.
The children were dressed like the adults, and most of them wore wreaths and garlands of flowers, while in the hands of many were baskets full of posies.
Phœbe gazed from her sister's side with the keenest delight, saying nothing, but turning her eyes hither and thither as though afraid of losing the least detail of the scene.
Presently two young girls approached, each with a basket in her hand. They moved slowly over the grass, stopping constantly to pick the violets under their feet. They were so engrossed in their task and in their conversation that they failed to notice the two sisters half hidden by the shrubbery.
"Nay—nay!" the taller of the two was saying, "I tell thee he made oath to't, Cicely. Knew ye ever Master Stephen to be forsworn?"
"A lover's oaths—truly!" laughed the other. "Why, they be made for breaking. I doubt not he hath made a like vow to a score of silly wenches ere this, coz!"
"Thou dost him wrong, Cicely. An he keep not the tryst, 'twill only be——"
"'Twill only be thy first misprision, eh?"
"Marry, then——"
Here their words were lost as they continued to move farther away, still disputing together.
"Well!" exclaimed Rebecca, turning to Phœbe. "Now I know where we've ben carried to. This is the Holy Land—Jerusalem or Bethlehem or Canaan or some sech place. Thou—thee—thy! Did ye hear those girls talkin' Bible language, Phœbe?"
Phœbe shook her head and was about to reply when there was a loud clamour of many tongues from the road near by.
"The May-pole! The May-pole!" and someone started a roaring song in which hundreds soon joined. The sisters could not distinguish the words, but the volume of sound was tremendous.
There was the tramp of many rushing feet and a Babel of cries behind them. They turned to see a party of twenty gayly clad young men bearing down upon them, carrying a mighty May-pole crowned with flowers and streaming with colored ribbons.
Around these and following after were three or four score merry lads and lasses, all running and capering, shouting and dancing, singly or in groups, hand in hand.
In a trice Rebecca found herself clinging to Phœbe with whom she was borne onward helpless by the mad throng.
The new-comers were clad in all sorts of fantastic garbs, and many of them were masked. Phœbe and her sister were therefore not conspicuous in their long scant black skirts and cloth jackets with balloon sleeves. Their costumes were taken for disguises, and as they were swallowed up in the mad throng they were looked on as fellow revellers.
Had Rebecca been alone, she would probably have succeeded in time in working her way out of this unwelcome crowd, but to her amazement, no sooner had they been surrounded by the young roysterers than Phœbe, breaking her long silence, seized her sister by the hand and began laughing, dancing, and running with the best of them. To crown all, whatwas Rebecca's surprise to hear her sister singing word for word the madcap song of the others, as though she had known these words all her life. She did not even skip those parts that made Rebecca blush.
It was incredible—monstrous—impossible! Phœbe, the sweet, modest, gentle, prudish Phœbe, singing a questionable song in a whirl of roystering Jerusalemites!
Up the broad road they danced—up to the northward, all men making way for them as, with hand-bag and umbrella flying in her left hand, she was dragged forward on an indecorous run by Phœbe, who held her tightly by the right.
On—ever on, past wayside inn and many a lane and garden, house and hedge. Over the stones and ruts, choking in clouds of dust.
Once Rebecca stumbled and a great gawky fellow caught her around the waist to prevent her falling.
"Lips pay forfeit for tripping feet, lass!" he cried, and kissed her with a sounding smack.
Furious and blushing, she swung her hand-bag in a circle and brought it down upon the ravisher's head.
"Take that, you everlastin' rascal, you!" she gasped.
The bumpkin dodged with a laugh and disappeared in the crowd and dust, cuffing, pushing, scuffling, hugging, and kissing quite heedless of small rebuffs.
When they had proceeded thus until Rebecca thought there was nothing left for it but to fall in her tracks and be trampled to death, the whole crowdcame suddenly to a halt, and the young men began to erect the May-pole in the midst of a shaded green on one side of the main road.
Rebecca stood, angry and breathless, trying to flick the dust off her bag with her handkerchief, while Phœbe, at her side, her eyes bright and cheeks rosy, showed her pretty teeth in a broad smile of pleasure, the while she tried to restore some order to her hair. As for her hat, that had long ago been lost.
"I declare—I declare to goodness!" panted Rebecca, "ef anybody'd told me ez you, Phœbe Wise, would take on so—so like—like a—a——"
"Like any Zanny's light-o-love," Phœbe broke in, her bosom heaving with the violence of her exercise. "But prithee, sweet, chide me not. From this on shall I be chaste, demure, and sober as an abbess in a play. But oh!—but oh!" she cried, stretching her arms high over her head, "'twas a goodly frolic, sis! I felt a three-centuries' fasting lust for it, in good sooth!"
Rebecca clutched her sister by the arm and shook her.
"Phœbe Wise—Phœbe Wise!" she cried, looking anxiously into her face, "wake up now—wake up! What in the universal airth——"
A loud shout cut her short, and the two sisters turned amazed.
"The bull! The bull!"
There was an opening in the crowd as four menapproached leading and driving a huge angry bull, which was secured by a ring in his nose to which ropes were attached. Another man followed, dragged forward by three fierce bull-dogs in a leash.
The bull was quickly tied to a stout post in the street, and the crowd formed a circle closely surrounding the bull-ring. It was the famous bull-ring of Blackman Street in Southwark.
A moment later the dogs were freed, and amid their hoarse baying and growling and the deep roaring of their adversary, the baiting began—the chief sport of high and low in the merry days of good Queen Bess.
The sisters found themselves in the front of the throng surrounding the raging beasts, and, before she knew it, Rebecca saw one of the dogs caught on the horns of the bull and tossed, yelping and bleeding, into the air.
For one moment she stood aghast in the midst of the delighted crowd of shouting onlookers. Then she turned and fiercely elbowed her way outward, followed by her sister.
"Come 'long—come 'long, Phœbe!" she cried. "We'll soon put a stop to this! I'll find the selectmen o' this town an' see ef this cruelty to animals is agoin' on right here in open daylight. I guess the's laws o' some kind here, ef itisBethlehem or Babylon!"
Hot with indignation, the still protesting woman reached the outskirts of the throng and looked abouther. Close at hand a tall, swaggering fellow was loafing about. He was dressed in yellow from head to foot, save where his doublet and hose were slashed with dirty red at elbows, shoulders, and hips. A dirty ruff was around his neck, and on his head he wore a great shapeless hat peaked up in front.
"Hey, mister!" cried Rebecca, addressing this worthy. "Can you tell me where I can find one o' the selectmen?"
The stranger paused in his walk and glanced first at Rebecca and then, with evidently increased interest, at Phœbe.
"Selectmen?" he asked. "Who hath selected them, dame?"
He gazed quizzically at the excited woman.
"Now you needn't be funny 'bout it," Rebecca cried, "fer I'm not goin' to take any impidence. You know who I mean by the selectmen jest's well as I do. I'd be obliged to ye ef ye'd tell me the way—an' drop that Bible talk—good every-day English is good enough fer me!"
"In good sooth, dame," he replied, "'tis not every day I hear such English as yours."
He paused a moment in thought. This was May-day—a season of revelry and good-natured practical joking. This woman was evidently quizzing him, so it behooved him to repay her in kind.
"But a truce to quips and quillets, say I," he continued. "'Twill do me much pleasure an your ladyship will follow me to the selectman. As it happens,his honor is even now holding court near London Bridge."
"London Bridge!" gasped Rebecca. "Why, London ain't a Bible country, is it?"
Deigning no notice to a query which he did not understand, the young fellow set off to northward, followed closely by the two women.
"Keep close to him, Phœbe," said Rebecca, warningly. "Ef we should lose the man in all this rabble o' folks we would not find him in a hurry."
"Thou seest, sweet sister," Phœbe replied, "'tis indeed our beloved city of London. Did I not tell thee yon village was Newington, and here we be now in Southwark, close to London Bridge."
Rebecca had forgotten her sister's ailment in the fierce indignation which the bull-baiting had aroused. But now she was brought back to her own personal fears and aims with a rude shock by the strange language Phœbe held.
She leaped forward eagerly and touched their guide's shoulder.
"Hey, mister!" she exclaimed, "I'd be obliged to ye if ye'd show us the house o' the nearest doctor before we see the selectman."
The man stopped short in the middle of the street, with a cunning leer on his face. The change of purpose supported his belief that a May-day jest was forward.
"Call me plain Jock Dean, mistress," he said. "And now tell me further, wilt have a doctor of laws,of divinity, or of physic. We be in a merry mood and a generous to-day, and will fetch forth bachelors, masters, doctors, proctors, and all degrees from Oxford, Cambridge, or London at a wink's notice. So say your will."
Rebecca would have returned a sharp reply to this banter, but she was very anxious to find a physician for Phœbe, and so thought it best to take a coaxing course.
"What I want's a doctor," she said. "I think my sister's got the shakes or suthin', an' I must take her to the doctor. Now look here—you look like a nice kind of a young man. I know it's some kind of antiques and horribles day 'round here, an' all the folks hes on funny clothes and does nothin' on'y joke a body. But let's drop comical talk jest fer a minute an' get down to sense, eh?"
She spoke pleadingly, and for a moment Jock looked puzzled. He only understood a portion of what she was saying, but he realized that she was in some sort of trouble.
"Why bait the man with silly questions, Rebecca," Phœbe broke in. "A truce to this silly talk of apothecaries. I have no need of surgeons, I. My good fellow," she continued, addressing Jock with an air of condescension that dumfounded her sister, "is not yonder the Southwark pillory?"
"Ay, mistress," he replied, with a grin. "It's there you may see the selectman your serving-maid inquired for."
Rebecca gasped and clinched her hands fiercely on her bag and umbrella.
"Serving-maid!" she cried.
"Ahoy—whoop—room! Yi—ki yi!"
A swarm of small white animals ran wildly past them from behind, and after them came a howling, laughing, scrambling mob that filled the street. Someone had loosed a few score rabbits for the delight of the rabble.
There was no time for reflection. With one accord, Jock and the two women ran with all speed toward the pillory and the bridge, driven forward by the crowd behind them. To have held their ground would have been to risk broken bones at least.
Fortunately the hunted beasts turned sharply to the right and left at the first cross street, and soon the three human fugitives could halt and draw breath.
They found themselves in the outskirts of a crowd surrounding the pillory, and above the heads of those in front they could see a huge red face under a thatch of tousled hair protruding stiffly through a hole in a beam supported at right angles to a vertical post about five feet high. On each side of the head a large and dirty hand hung through an appropriate opening in the beam.
Under the prisoner's head was hung an account of his misdeeds, placed there by some of his cronies. These crimes were in the nature of certain breaches of public decorum and decency, the details of whichthe bystanders were discussing with relish and good-humor.
"Let's get out o' here," said Rebecca, suddenly, when the purport of what she heard pierced her nineteenth-century understanding. "These folks beat me!"
She turned, grasping Phœbe's arm to enforce her request, but she found that others had crowded in behind them and had hemmed them in. This would not have deterred her but, unaccountably, Phœbe did not seem inclined to move.
"Nay—nay!" she said. "'Tis a wanton wastrel, and he well deserves the pillory. But, Rebecca, I've a mind to see what observance these people will give the varlet. Last time I saw one pilloried, alas! they slew him with shards and paving-stones. This fellow is liker to be pelted with nosegays, methinks."
"Mercy me, Phœbe! Whatever—what—oh, goodness gracious grandmother, child!" Poor Rebecca could find only exclamations wherein to express her feelings. She began to wonder if she were dreaming.
At this moment a sprightly, dashing lad, in ragged clothing and bareheaded, sprang to the platform beside the prisoner and waved his arms for silence.
There were cries of "Hear—hear!" "Look at Baiting Will!" "Ho—ho—bully rook!" "Sh-sh-h!"
After a time the tumult subsided so that Baiting Will could make himself heard. He was evidently a well-known street wag, for his remarks were received with frequent laughter and vocal applause.
"Hear ye—hear ye—all good folk and merry!" he shouted. "Here ye see the liege lord of all May merry-makers. Hail to the King of the May, my bully boys!"
"Ho—ho! All hail!"
"Hurrah—crown him, crown him!"
"The King of the May forever!"
By dint of bawling for silence till he was red in the face, the speaker at length made himself heard again.
"What say ye, my good hearts—shall we have a double coronation? Where's the quean will be his consort? Bring her forward, lads. We'll crown the twain."
This proposal was greeted with a roar of laughter and approval, and a number of slattern women showing the effects of strong ale in their faces stepped boldly forward as competitors for coronation.
But again Baiting Will waved his arms for a chance to speak.
"Nay, my merry lads and lasses," he cried, "it were not meet to wed our gracious lord the king without giving him a chance to choose his queen!"
He leaned his ear close to the grinning head, pretending to listen a moment. Then, standing forward, he cried:
"His gracious and sovereign majesty hath bid me proclaim his choice. He bids ye send him up for queen yon buxom dame in the black doublet and unruffed neck—her wi' the black wand and outland scrip."
He pointed directly at Rebecca. She turned white and started to push her way out of the crowd, but those behind her joined hands, laughing and shouting: "A queen—a queen!"
Two or three stout fellows from just beneath the pillory elbowed their way to her side and grasped her arms.
She struggled and shrieked in affright.
Phœbe with indignant face seized the arm of the man nearest her and pulled lustily to free her sister.
"Stand aside, you knaves!" she cried, hotly. "Know your betters and keep your greasy hands for the sluttish queans of Southwark streets!"
The lads only grinned and tightened their hold. Rebecca was struggling fiercely and in silence, save for an occasional shriek of fear.
Phœbe raised her voice.
"Good people, will ye see a lady tousled by knavish street brawlers! What ho—a rescue—a Burton—a Burton—a rescue—ho!"
Her voice rose high above the coarse laughter and chatter of the crowd.
"What's this? Who calls?"
The crowd parted to right and left with screams and imprecations, and on a sudden two horsemen reined up their steeds beside the sisters.
"Back, ye knaves! Unhand the lady!" cried the younger of the two, striking out with his whip at the heads of Rebecca's captors.
Putting up their hands to ward off these blows, the fellows hastily retreated a few steps, leaving Rebecca and Phœbe standing alone.
"What's here!" cried the young man. "God warn us, an it be not fair Mistress Burton herself!"
He leaped from his horse, and with the bridle in one hand and his high-crowned hat in the other, he advanced, bowing toward the sisters.
He was a strongly built young man of middle height. His smooth face, broad brow, and pleasant eyes were lighted up by a happy smile wherein were shown a set of strong white teeth all too rare in the England of his time. His abundant blond hair was cut short on top, but hung down on each side, curling slightly over his ears. He wore a full-skirted, long-sleeved jerkin secured by a long row of many small buttons down the front. A loose lace collar lay flat over his shoulders and chest. His French hose was black, and from the tops of his riding-boots there protruded an edging of white lace.
He wore a long sword with a plain scabbard and hilt, and on his hands were black gloves, well scented.
Phœbe's face wore a smile of pleased recognition, and she stretched forth her right hand as the cavalier approached.
"You come in good time, Sir Guy!" she said.
"In very sooth, most fair, most mellific damsel, your unworthy servitor was erring enchanted in the paradise of your divine idea when that the horrific alarum did wend its fear-begetting course throughthe labyrinthine corridors of his auricular sensories."
Phœbe laughed, half in amusement half in soft content. Then she turned to Rebecca, who stood with wide-open eyes and mouth contemplating this strange apparition.
"Be not confounded, sweetheart," she said. "Have I not told thee I have ta'en on another's self. Come—thou art none the less dear, nor I less thine own."
She stepped forward and put her hand gently on her sister's.
Rebecca looked with troubled eyes into Phœbe's face and said, timidly:
"Won't ye go to a doctor's with me, Phœbe?"
There was a rude clatter of hoofs as the elder of the new-comers trotted past the two women and, with his whip drove back the advancing crowd, which had begun to close in upon them again.
"You were best mount and away with the ladies, Sir Guy," he said. "Yon scurvy loons are in poor humor for dalliance."
With a graceful gesture, Sir Guy invited Phœbe to approach his horse. She obeyed, and stepping upon his hand found herself instantly seated before his saddle. She seemed to find the seat familiar, and her heart beat with a pleasure she could scarce explain when, a moment later, the handsome cavalier swung into place behind her and put one arm about her waist to steady her.
Rebecca started forward, terror-stricken.
"Phœbe—Phœbe!" she cried. "Ye wouldn't leave me here!"
"Nay—nay!" said a gruff but kindly voice at her side. "Here, gi'e us your hand, dame, step on my foot, and up behind you go."
Sir Guy's horse was turning to go, and in her panic Rebecca awaited no second bidding, but scrambled quickly though clumsily to a seat behind the serving-man.
They were all four soon free of the crowd and out of danger, thanks to the universal respect for rank and the essential good nature of the May-day gathering.
The horses assumed an easy ambling gait, a sort of single step which was far more comfortable than Rebecca had feared she would find it.
The relief of deliverance from the rude mob behind her gave Rebecca courage, and she gazed about with some interest.
On either side of the street the houses, which hitherto had stood apart with gardens and orchards between them, were now set close together, with the wide eaves of their sharp gables touching over narrow and dark alleyways. The architecture was unlike anything she had ever seen, the walls being built with the beams showing outside and the windows of many small diamond-shaped panes.
They had only proceeded a few yards when Rebecca saw the glint of sunbeams on water before them and found that they were approaching a great squaretower, surmounted by numberless poles bearing formless round masses at their ends.
With one arm around her companion to steady herself, she held her umbrella and bag tightly in her free hand. Now she pointed upward with her umbrella and said:
"Do you mind tellin' me, mister, what's thet fruit they're a-dryin' up on thet meetin'-house?"
The horseman glanced upward for a moment and then replied, with something of wonder in his voice:
"Why, those are men's heads, dame. Know you not London Bridge and the traitors' poles yet?"
"Oh, good land!" said the horrified woman, and shut her mouth tightly. Evidently England was not the sort of country she had pictured it.
They rode into a long tunnel under the stones of this massive tower and emerged to find themselves upon the bridge. Again and again did they pass under round-arched tunnels bored, as it were, through gloomy buildings six or seven stories high. These covered the bridge from end to end, and they swarmed with a squalid humanity, if one might judge from the calls and cries that resounded in the vaulted passageways and interior courts.
As they finally came out from beneath the last great rookery, the sisters found themselves in London, the great and busy city of four hundred thousand inhabitants.
They were on New Fish Street, and their nostrils gave them witness of its name at once. Farther upthe slight ascent before them they met other and far worse smells, and Rebecca was disgusted.
"Where are we goin'?" she asked.
"Why, to your mistress' residence, of course."
Rebecca was on the point of objecting to this characterization of her sister, but she thought better of it ere she spoke. After all, if these men had done all this kindness by reason of a mistake, she needed not to correct them.
The street up which they were proceeding opened into Gracechurch Street, leading still up the hill and away from the Thames. It was a fairly broad highway, but totally unpaved, and disgraced by a ditch or "kennel" into which found their way the ill-smelling slops thrown from the windows and doors of the abutting houses.
"Good land o' Goshen!" Rebecca exclaimed at last. "Why in goodness' name does all the folks throw sech messes out in the street?"
"Why, where would you have them throw them, dame?" asked her companion, in surprise. "Are ye outlandish bred that ye put me such questions?"
"Not much!" she retorted, hotly. "It's you folks that's outlandish. Why, where I come from they hev sewers in the city streets an' pavements an' sidewalks an' trolley cars. Guess I've ben to Keene, an' I ought to know."
She tossed her head with the air of one who has said something conclusive.
The man held his peace for a moment, dumfounded. Then he laughed heartily, with head thrown back.
"That's what comes of a kittenish hoyden for a mistress. Abroad too early, dame, and strong ale before sunrise! These have stolen away your wits and made ye hold strange discourse. Sewers—side-walkers forsooth—troll carries, ho—ho!"
Rebecca grew red with fury. She released her hold to thump her companion twice on the arm and nearly fell from the horse in consequence.
"You great rascal!" she cried, indignantly. "How dare ye talk 'bout drinkin' ale! D'you s'pose I'd touch the nasty stuff? Me—a member of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union! Me—a Daughter of Temperance an' wearin' the blue ribbon! You'd ought to be ashamed, that's what you ought!"
But the servant continued to laugh quietly and Rebecca raged within. Oh how she hated to have to sit thus close behind a man who had so insulted her! Clinging to him, too! Clinging for dear life to a man who accused her of drinking ale!
They turned to the left into Leadenhall Street and Bucklesbury, where the two women sniffed with delighted relief the spicy odor of the herbs exposed on every hand for sale. They left Gresham's Royal Exchange on the right, and shortly afterward stopped before the door of one of the many well-to-do houses of that quarter.
Sir Guy and the two women dismounted, and, while the groom held the horses, the others approached the building before which they had paused.
Rebecca was about to address Phœbe, whose blushing face was beaming with pleasure, when the door was suddenly thrown open and a happy-looking buxom woman of advanced middle age appeared.
"Well—well—well!" she cried, holding up her fat hands in mock amazement. "Out upon thee, Polly, for a light-headed wench! What—sneaking out to an early tryst! Fie, girl!"
"Now, good mine aunt," Phœbe broke in, with a smile and a courtsey, "no tryst have I kept, in sooth. Sir Guy is my witness that he found me quite by chance."
"In very truth, good Mistress Goldsmith," said the knight, "it was but the very bounteous guerdon of fair Dame Fortune that in the auspicious forthcoming of my steed I found the inexpressible delectancy of my so great discovery!"
He bowed as he gave back one step and kissed his hand toward Phœbe.
"All one—all one," said Dame Goldsmith, laughing as she held out her hand to Phœbe. "My good man hath a homily prepared for you, mistress, and the substance of it runneth on the folly of early rising on a May-day morning."
Phœbe held forth her hand to the knight, who kissed it with a flourish, hat in hand.
"Shall I hear from thee soon?" she said, in an undertone.
"Forthwith, most fairly beautiful—most gracious rare!" he replied.
Then, leaping on his horse, he dashed down the street at a mad gallop, followed closely by his groom.
Rebecca stood stupefied, gazing first at one and then at the other, till she was rudely brought to her senses by no other than Dame Goldsmith herself.
"What, Rebecca!" she exclaimed. "Hast breakfasted, woman—what?"
"Ay, aunt," Phœbe broke in, hurriedly. "Rebecca must to my chamber to tire me ere I see mine uncle. Prithee temper the fury of his homily, sweet aunt."
Taking the dame's extended hand, she suffered herself to be led within, followed by Rebecca, too amazed to speak.
On entering the street door they found themselves in a large hall, at the farther end of which a bright wood fire was burning, despite the season. A black oak table was on one side of the room against the wall, upon which were to be seen a number of earthen beakers and a great silver jug or tankard. A carved and cushioned settle stood against the opposite wall, and besides two comfortable arm-chairs at the two chimney-corners there were two or three heavy chairs of antique pattern standing here and there. The floor was covered with newly gathered fresh-smelling rushes.
A wide staircase led to the right, and to this Phœbe turned at once as though she had always lived there.
"Hast heard from my father yet?" she asked, pausing upon the first stair and addressing Dame Goldsmith.
"Nay, girl. Not so much as a word. I trow he'll have but little to say to me. Ay—ay—a humorous limb, thy father, lass."
She swept out of the room with a toss of the head, and Phœbe smiled as she turned to climb the stairs. Immediately she turned again and held out one hand to Rebecca.
"Come along, Rebecca. Let's run 'long up," she said, relapsing into her old manner.
She led the way without hesitation to a large, light bedroom, the front of which hung over the street. Here, too, the floor was covered with sweet rushes, a fact which Rebecca seemed to resent.
"Why the lands sakes do you suppose these London folks dump weeds on their floors?" she asked. "An' look there at those two beds, still unmade and all tumbled disgraceful!"
"Why, there's where we slept last night, Rebecca," said Phœbe, laughing as she dropped into a chair. "As for the floors," she continued, "they're always that way when folks ain't mighty rich. The lords and all have carpets and rugs."
Rebecca, stepping very high to avoid stumbling in the rushes, moved over to the dressing-table and proceeded to remove her outer wraps, having first deposited her bag and umbrella on a chair.
"I don't see how in gracious you know so much about it," she remarked, querulously. "'Pon myword, you acted with that young jackanapes an' that fat old lady downstairs jest's ef you'd allus known em."
"Well, so I have," Phœbe replied, smiling. "I knew them all nearly three hundred years before you were born, Rebecca Wise."
Rebecca dropped into a chair and looked helplessly at her sister with her arms hanging at her sides.
"Phœbe Wise—" she began.
"No, not now!" Phœbe exclaimed, stopping her sister with a gesture. "You must call me Mistress Mary. I'm Mary Burton, daughter of Isaac Burton, soon to be Sir Isaac Burton, of Burton Hall. You are my dear old tiring-woman—my sometime nurse—and thou must needs yield me the respect and obedience as well as the love thou owest, thou fond old darling!"
The younger woman threw her arms about the other's neck and kissed her repeatedly.
Rebecca sat mute and impassive, making no return.
"Seems as though I ought to wake up soon now," she muttered, weakly.
"Come, Rebecca," Phœbe exclaimed, briskly, stepping to a high, carved wardrobe beside her bed, "this merry-making habit wearies me. Let us don a fitter attire. Come—lend a hand, dearie—be quick!"
Rebecca sat quite still, watching her sister as she proceeded to change her garments, taking from wardrobe and tiring chest her wide skirts, long-sleevedjacket, and striped under-vest with a promptitude and readiness that showed perfect familiarity with her surroundings.
"There," thought Rebecca, "I have it! She's been reading those old letters and looking at that ivory picture so long she thinks that she's the girl in the picture herself, now. Yes, that's it. Mary Burton was the name!"
When Phœbe was new-dressed, her sister could not but acknowledge inwardly that the queer clothes were mightily becoming. She appeared the beau ideal of a merry, light-hearted, healthy girl from the country.
On one point, however, Rebecca could not refrain from expostulating.
"Look a-here, Phœbe," she said, in a scandalized voice, as she rose and faced her sister, "ain't you goin' to put on somethin' over your chest? That ain't decent the way you've got yerself fixed now!"
"Nonsense!" cried Phœbe, with a mischievous twinkle in her eye. "Wouldst have me cover my breast like a married woman! Look to thine own attire. Come, where hast put it?"
Rebecca put her hands on her hips and looked into her sister's face with a stern determination.
"Ef you think I'm agoin' to put on play-actor clothes an' go round lookin' indecent, Phœbe Wise, why, you're mistaken—'cause I ain't—so there!"
"Nay, nurse!" Phœbe exclaimed, earnestly. "'Tis the costume thou art wearing now that is mummer'sweeds. Come, sweet—come! They'll not yield thee admittance below else."
She concluded with a warning inflection, and shook her finger affectionately at her sister.
Rebecca opened her mouth several times and closed it again in despair ere she could find a reply. At length she seated herself slowly, folded her arms, and said:
"They can do jest whatever they please downstairs, Phœbe. As fer me, I'd sooner be seen in my nightgown than in the flighty, flitter-scatter duds the women 'round here wear. Not but you look good enough in 'em, if you'd cover your chest, but play-actin' is meant for young folks—not fer old maids like me."
"Nay—but——"
"What the lands sakes d'ye holler neigh all the time fer? I'm not agoin' to neigh, an' you might's well make up your mind to't."
Phœbe bit her lips and then, after a moment's hesitation, turned to the door.
"Well, well! E'en have it thy way!" she said.
Followed by Rebecca, the younger woman descended the stairs. As she reached the entrance hall, she stopped short at sight of a tall, heavy man standing beside the table across the room with his face buried in a great stone mug.
He had dropped his flat round hat upon the table, and his long hair fell in a sort of bush to his wide, white-frilled ruff. He wore a long-skirted, loose coatof green cloth with yellow fringe, provided with large side-pockets, but without a belt. The sleeves were loose, but brought in tightly at the wrists by yellow bands. His green hose were of the short and tight French pattern, and he wore red stockings and pointed shoes of Spanish leather.
As he removed the cup with a deep sigh of satisfaction, there was revealed a large, cheerful red face with a hooked nose between bushy brows overhanging large blue eyes.
Phœbe stood upon the lowest stair in smiling silence and with folded hands as he caught her eye.
"Ha, thou jade!" cried Master Goldsmith, for he it was. "Wilt give me the slip of a May-day morn!"
He set down his cup with a loud bang and strode over to the staircase, shaking his finger playfully at his niece.
Rebecca had just time to notice that his long, full beard and mustache were decked with two or three spots of froth when, to her great indignation, Phœbe was folded in his arms and soundly kissed on both cheeks.
"There, lass!" he chuckled, as he stepped back, rubbing his hands. "I told thy aunt I'd make thee do penance for thy folly."
Phœbe wiped her cheeks with her handkerchief and tipped her head impudently at the cheerful ravisher.
"Now, God mend your manners, uncle!" she exclaimed. "What! Bedew my cheeks with the frothof good ale on your beard while my throat lacks the good body o't! Why, I'm burned up wi' thirst!"
"Good lack!" cried the goldsmith, turning briskly to the table. "Had ye no drink when ye first returned, then?"
He poured a smaller cupful of foaming ale from the great silver jug and brought it to Phœbe.
Rebecca clutched the stair-rail for support, and, with eyes ready to start from her head, she leaned forward, incredulous, as Phœbe took the cup from the merchant's hand.
Then she could keep silence no longer.
"Phœbe Wise!" she screamed, "be you goin' to drink ALE!"
No words can do justice to the awful emphasis which she laid upon that last dread word.
Phœbe turned and looked up roguishly at her sister, who was still half-way up the stairs. The young girl's left hand leaned on her uncle's arm, while with her right she extended the cup in salutation.
"Here's thy good health, nurse—and to our better acquaintance," she laughed.
Rebecca uttered one short scream and fled up to their bed-room. She had seen the impossible. Her sister Phœbe with her face buried in a mug of ale!
It was at about this time that Copernicus Droopfinally awakened. He lay perfectly still for a minute or two, wondering where he was and what had happened. Then he began to mutter to himself.
"Machinery's stopped, so we're on dry land," he said. Then, starting up on one elbow, he listened intently.
Within the air-ship all was perfect silence, but from without there came in faintly occasional symptoms of life—the bark of a dog, a loud laugh, the cry of a child.
Droop slowly came to his feet and gazed about. A faint gleam of daylight found its way past the closed shutters. He raised the blinds and blinked as he gazed out into a perfect thicket of trees and shrubbery, beyond which here and there he thought he could distinguish a high brick wall.
"Well, we're in the country, anyhow!" he muttered.
He turned and consulted the date indicator in the ceiling.
"May 1, 1598," he said. "Great Jonah! but we hev whirled back fer keeps! I s'pose we jest whirledtill she broke loose."
He gazed about him and observed that the two state-room doors were open. He walked over and looked in.
"I wonder where them women went," he said. "Seems like they were in a tremendous hurry 'bout gettin' way. Lucky 'tain't a city we're in, 'cause they might'v got lost in the city."
After an attempt to improve his somewhat rumpled exterior, he made his way down the stairs and out into the garden. Once here, he quickly discovered the building which had arrested the attention of the two women, but it being now broad daylight, he was able thoroughly to satisfy himself that chance had brought the Panchronicon into the deserted garden of a deserted mansion.
"Wal, we'll be private an' cosy here till the Panchronicon hez time to store up more force," he said out loud.
Strolling forward, he skirted the high wall, and ere long discovered the very opening through which the sisters had passed at sunrise.
Stepping through the breach, he found himself, as they had done, near the main London highway in Newington village. The hurly-burly of sunrise had abated by this time, for wellnigh all the villagers were absent celebrating the day around their respective May-poles or at bear or bull-baiting.
With his hands behind him, he walked soberly up and down for a few minutes, carefully surveying the pretty wooden houses, the church in the distance, and the stones of the churchyard on the green hill-slope beyond. The architecture was not entirely unfamiliar. He had seen such in books, he felt sure, but he could not positively identify it. Was it Russian, Japanese, or Italian?
Suddenly a distant cry came to his ears.
"Hi—Lizzie—Lizzie, wench! Come, drive the pig out o' the cabbages!"
He stopped short and slapped his thigh.
"English!" he exclaimed. "'Tain't America, that's dead sure. Then it's England. England in 1598," he continued, scratching his head. "Let's see. Who in Sam Hill was runnin' things in 1598? Richard Coor de Lion—Henry Eight—no—or was it Joan of Arc? Be darned ef I know!"
He looked about him again and selected a neighboring house which he thought promised information.
He went to the front door and knocked. There was no reply, despite many attempts to arouse the inmates.
"Might ha' known," he muttered, and started around the house, where he found a side door half hidden beneath the projection of an upper story.
Here his efforts were rewarded at last by the appearance of a very old woman in a peaked hat and coif, apparently on the point of going out.
"Looks like a witch in the story-books," he thought, but his spoken comment was more polite.
"Good-mornin', ma'am," he said. "Would you be so kind as to tell me the name of this town?"
"This be Newington," she replied, in a high, cracked voice.
"Newington," he replied, with a nod and a smile intended to express complete enlightenment. "Ah, yes—Newington. Quite a town!"
"Is that all you'd be askin', young man?" said the old woman, a little suspiciously, eying his strange garb.
"Why, yes—no—that is, can you tell me how far it is to London?" This was the only English city of which he had any knowledge, so he naturally sought to identify his locality by reference to it.
"Lunnun," said the woman. "Oh, it'll be a matter of a mile or better!"
Droop was startled, but highly pleased. Here was luck indeed.
"Thank you, ma'am," he said. "Good-mornin'," and with a cheerful nod, he made off.
The fact is that this information opened up a new field of enterprise and hope. At once there leaped into his mind an improved revival of his original plan. If he could have made a fortune with his great inventions in 1876, what might he not accomplish by the same means in 1598! He pictured to himself the delight of the ancient worthies when they heard the rag-time airs and minstrel jokes produced by his phonograph.
"By hockey!" he exclaimed, in irrepressible delight, "I'll make their gol darned eyes pop out!"
As he marched up and down in the deserted garden, hidden by the friendly brick wall, he bitterly regretted that he had limited himself to so few modern inventions.
"Ef I'd only known I was comin' this fur back!" he exclaimed, as he talked to himself that he might feel less lonely. "Ef I'd only known, I could hev brought a heap of other things jest's well as not. Might hev taught 'em 'bout telegraphin' an' telephones. Could ha' given 'em steam-engines an' parlor matches. By ginger!" he exclaimed, "I b'lieve I've got some parlor matches. Great Jehosaphat! Won't I get rich!"
But at this a new difficulty presented itself to his mind. He foresaw no trouble in procuring patents for his inventions, but how about the capital for their exploitation? Presumably this was quite as necessary here in England as it would have been in America in 1876. Unfortunately, his original plan was impossible of fulfilment. Rebecca had failed him as a capitalist. Besides, she and Phœbe had both completely disappeared.
It was long before he saw his way out of this difficulty, but by dint of persistent pondering he finally lit upon a plan.
He had brought with him a camera, several hundred plates, and a complete developing and printing outfit. He determined to set up as a professionalphotographer. His living would cost him nothing, as the Panchronicon was well stored with provisions. To judge by his surroundings, his privacy would probably be respected. Then, by setting up as a photographer he would at least earn a small amount of current coin and perhaps attract some rich and powerful backer by the novelty and excellence of his process. On this chance he relied for procuring the capital which was undoubtedly necessary for his purpose.
By noon of the next day he had begun operations, having taken two or three views of familiar scenes in the neighborhood, which he affixed as samples to a large cardboard sign on which he had printed, in large type: