CHAPTER XXVIIFOUR OPINIONSTHOUGHMr. Fenton had told the Vicar of Crishowell that he would write to him, he was in no hurry to do so. Harry’s love affair was a nuisance, and he put off the consideration of it for a week, merely looking askance upon his son when he came across him. To his wife he observed that Harry was making an ass of himself, and it was not till she insisted on his telling her everything he knew that the matter was discussed.Lady Harriet was dismayed; she had hitherto understood her eldest son so well that his evident admiration of Miss Ridgeway had not disturbed her, for she classed her with the thousand and one other goddesses who had shed their glamour upon him at various times during the last ten years. They made a long procession, beginning with the little girls he had admired in his early school days. His safeguard, so far, had been that no one had taken him seriously.But now he had apparently proposed to and been accepted by a young woman who knew extremely well what she was about, and one, moreover, whom his mother, with all her good sense and tolerance, had not been able to like. Putting aside the fact that she was anything but a good match for Harry, she knew that the whole atmosphere of Isoline’s world was a lower one than that in which he lived. He was a man who, with the right woman, might develop much, and, with the wrong one, deteriorate as much. He was generous, loyal to a fault, and eminently lovable. He was so affectionate that disenchantment by the woman he loved would make himsuffer acutely, and he had not hardness of character enough to be able to make himself a life apart from that of his daily companions. Sorrow warps natures that have no pivot other than their own feelings; the centre is within themselves and all the weight comes upon it. And what sorrow is there more grinding than the knowledge that what we loved was a mean thing, what we admired, an unworthy one, what we dreamed about, a poor and squalid shadow?There are small disenchantments in all married lives, but those who have learned to look at the whole and not at its part know their true value. The proverb says, “Straws show which way the wind blows,” and, like many proverbs, it is a half-truth. Some are merely rough receipts for wisdom, made to save fools the trouble of thinking for themselves. Though small acts undeniably give clues to many things in men and women’s natures, men and women cannot be judged on their evidence alone. So much goes to determine a deed beside the actual character behind it. When a man behaves unexpectedly, we call him inconsistent, because every influence which has converged on his act does not happen to tally with our private, preconceived idea of himself. But it is not so much his inconsistency as our own ignorance of things which none know clearly but the Almighty. It is the essence, the atmosphere which a character radiates, the effect it produces in those who come in close enough contact to be influenced by it, whereby a soul can be judged.But even had he not been so much in love, Harry was far too elementary to judge Isoline rightly or wrongly; it had never occurred to him to look down very deep into the well where Truth sits, and, had he done so, he would have understood little he saw. He would be elementary to the end of his days, and the elements were all good. Whether they would remain so with Isoline as an interpreter of life, his mother doubted.The Squire, when he had brought himself to face the matter, raged immoderately, and his rage had the common effect ofdriving his son farther than ever along the way in which he did not want him to go. They had a difficult interview, from which the young man emerged with the stormy assurance ringing in his ears that he would get nothing more than his ordinary allowance, and that, were he to marry without his father’s consent, even that would be reduced. He had spoken of getting work to do, and been answered by a sneer which certainly came ill from a man who had refused to give his son a profession. They parted wrathfully.From the smoking-room in which they had met (it was after dinner) Mr. Fenton went up to bed. Their talk had been late and continued long, and the house was still as he ascended the staircase with his lighted candle; the storm in him was subsiding into a mist of irritation through which flying glimpses of other interests began to appear. By the time he had reached his wife’s bedroom door his thoughts were circling round a speech he had mapped out in the afternoon and meant to deliver at a coming tenants’ dinner.The Squire could never be driven far from his personal interests, a peculiarity which was at once his strong point and his weak one. People who make houses for themselves and live in them perpetually are among the happiest of mortals; the only drawback to their plan is, that, when they are obliged to come out, they find they have lost their eye for the country and all sense of proportion in the landscape which they are accustomed to see only from the window. Oh, that sense of proportion! If we had it completely what things might we not do? To what heights of worth and wisdom might we not attain? The man who could get a bird’s-eye view of his own conduct would have no further excuse for missing perfection.Lady Harriet’s door was ajar and she pushed it further open as she heard his step; she knew what had been going on, and was waiting. He had not meant to plunge himself again in the obnoxious subject, and a look of impatience crossed his face. She stood on the threshold, brush in hand, her silver hair falling long and thick about her plain figure; the glow of thefire behind her in the room threw up its brilliance. He entered, and they stood together on the hearth. He began to lash himself up into wrath again.“Well?” began his wife anxiously.“Your son is a perfect fool!” burst out Mr. Fenton, who, when displeased with his boys, was accustomed to refer to them as exclusively Lady Harriet’s property.She plied her brush, waiting.“I did not mince matters, you may be sure. I told him my opinion of him and his nonsense, and with a few facts to back it. He won’t get one extra sixpence from me—where is it to come from, I should like to know? You know that as well as I do. Young idiot! I said, ‘Look here, boy, mind me. You make a fool of yourself about this girl and marry her without my consent, and I’ll draw a cheque every New Year’s Day for fifty pounds. That’s all you’ll get from me!’”He paused.“And what did Harry say?” inquired Lady Harriet.“Say? What should he say? Some rubbish about getting work. Work indeed! I should like to see Harry work. I laughed at that. ‘My dear young man,’ I said, ‘you aren’t fit to work; you’ve been an idler all your life. What you boys are coming to,Idon’t know.’”“I sometimes think,” said his wife reflectively, “that perhaps you made a mistake when you would not let him go into the army, Edward.”“Pshaw! What nonsense! Really, one might think you were on his side.”“I dislike Miss Ridgeway, and should dislike beyond all to see him married to her. Have you written to Mr. Lewis?”“Why should I write to Lewis?”“You said you meant to,” replied she.“How can I write? I can’t say to Lewis, ‘Your niece is not good enough,’ can I?”“There is nothing of that sort necessary. The money questionalone is sufficient. Why not write to-morrow, Edward? We ought to do something.”“I must go to Presteign to-morrow. I shall have no time for letters. I think it would be the best plan if you went over to Crishowell in the phaëton, for then you could see Lewis yourself. Yes, that will do very well.”And Mr. Fenton took up his candle and went into his dressing-room.While her husband was on his way to Presteign next day Lady Harriet ordered the phaëton. In more prosperous days this vehicle had run behind a pair of well-matched fourteen-hand grey ponies, but these had been swept away along with many other things on the tide of economy, and a strong, elderly cob, accustomed to odd jobs, replaced them. The old servant who sat behind was thinking much of these departed glories as they trotted along, and wondered, noticing the care on his mistress’ face, whether she was remembering them too. But it was the future that weighed on her rather than the past.She did not look forward to her errand, and the feeling that it was not hers by right made it all the more disagreeable. She stayed herself up by thinking that with no one could she enter on a difficult subject so well as with the Vicar.Her sincere hope was that she would not be called upon to see Isoline. Though she was so completely out of sympathy with her, she had that pity for the struggles, the hopes, the blank, black despairs of youth, the desperate straits of those who standin frontof the defences of experience, that she dreaded the trouble she was bringing her. Poor though these defences are, the young have to do without them. We are apt to forget that. But she might have spared herself.Llewellyn was still at Crishowell. Howlie was making steps towards recovery, but he had suffered cruelly and was very weak, and though the doctor thought better of his injuries than he had done at first, hoping to save the use of both his hands, it was a slow business. His dependence on Llewellyn was absolute, and the old woman who came in dailyfrom the village to keep the sick boy’s room in order being useless for any other purpose, the Vicar wondered what he should have done without him.Isoline had been down once or twice to see Howlie, but her visits had scarcely been profitable. As he began to get some relief from pain his usual nature also began to re-assert itself, and the expression which flitted on his face as he stared at her—which he always did—gave her a sensation of not being appreciated. It was during one of these visits that the wheels of Lady Harriet’s phaëton were heard stopping at the gate, and Llewellyn, who had gone to look out, put his head in at the door.The slim, white figure sitting very upright by the bed turned in inquiry.“It is my mother,” said Llewellyn. “You would like to see her, Howlie, wouldn’t you? She is sure to come down.”He disappeared in the direction of Lady Harriet’s voice.Isoline made good her escape and slipped out through the kitchen and up into her room, her face flushing.She knew very well that her uncle had been expecting a letter from Mr. Fenton daily, and would not let his visitor go without reference to it; he had been rather annoyed by the silence. She would not be dragged into it if she could help it, and, as she was unable to act until the Squire’s decision had been heard, there was no object in facing a needless trial. She snatched up her hat and ran down-stairs, across the orchard, down by the brookside and over the bridge. On it she paused a moment, then, reflecting that she was barely out of earshot, turned up into the fields through which Harry had chased Rebecca.Lady Harriet had quick feelings, and they were always stirred by acts such as the one which had cost poor Howlie so much. She sat with him for some time, leaving behind her, when she went, a basket of things the like of which he had never tasted. He made an attempt to put up his hand to his forelock, which resulted in a twinge of pain.The Vicar was waiting for her outside, and they strolled into the garden.“Perhaps you have something to say to me, Lady Harriet,” he remarked.“Yes,” she replied. “My husband had business to-day, and he and I—he couldn’t come himself. Mr. Lewis, I hope you will not be annoyed at my news, but this marriage is impossible. You know, I am sure, that we are anything but well off, and he says he cannot afford to do anything for Harry.”“I know, I know,” said the Vicar.“I am very sorry,” she went on, “sorry if I am hurting you, my friend, sorry for my boy, for he seems bent upon it, and sorry for your niece too.”“Do not think of me,” said he, “and do not suppose that I cannot understand Mr. Fenton’s feelings. You have every right to expect Harry to make a much better marriage; and, even were it not so, I cannot quite feel that they are suited. I sometimes doubt if they would be happy.”“Will she be very much distressed?” inquired Lady Harriet. “I know her so little. But one hates to give pain to people, especially young people who hope so much from life.”“I hardly know her better than you do, that is the truth.”“She seems a very unlikely niece for you to have,” said his companion, after a pause.Mr. Lewis smiled. “I very often do not understand her,” he said, with a sigh.“Do you think I ought to see her?” hazarded she, throwing herself upon the point she dreaded; “it seems so unkind not to say a word to her. What shall I do?”She stopped short in their walk.The Vicar did not know what to say. He had been unable to get any response to his own sympathy when Isoline had wept at breakfast, but he thought that perhaps another woman might help her when he could not. Then he remembered that she had said she did not care for Lady Harriet. He was puzzled.“I will find her,” he said, “but if she feels she cannot speak about it, you will understand, will you not?”“Poor child, of course. If you knew how I hate this, Mr. Lewis!”He went into the house and she returned to Howlie’s room. Isoline was not to be found anywhere. He went all over the Vicarage, into the orchard, down to the brook, and, finally, gave up the search.“I do not know where Isoline is,” said he, as he stood by Howlie’s bedside. “I have looked everywhere.”The window fronted towards the water and the fields; the sill was low and Howlie could see over it into the green beyond.“Oi seed ’er ’alf-an-hour ago,” said he, “slinkin’ out an’ up into they meadows. Goin’ fast she was too, for ’er.”“Are you sure it was Miss Ridgeway?” inquired the Vicar.“S’pose oi am. There ain’t many round ’ere ’as theire noses in the air loike miss.”Llewellyn bit his lip.“She has evidently gone off for a long walk,” explained Mr. Lewis, rather embarrassed. “She has taken to it so much since she has been here, and I have encouraged it.”“It is such a great thing when girls like it,” responded Lady Harriet, anxious to say something pleasant; “I have always thought they are kept too much in the house.”She was so much relieved that she could have given thanks to Heaven aloud.“It’s a funny thing miss didn’t want to see the loidy,” observed Howlie to Llewellyn after the phaëton had rolled away. Since his illness he had become very much at home with the young man.“Does she like visitors?” inquired Llewellyn, with a view of drawing him out.“She don’t like yew,” said Howlie.“How do you know?”Howlie looked infinitely subtle, as subtle as a person with a rabbit mouth can look—but took no notice of the question.“She loikes the young general, though.”“Who?” asked his companion, with much interest.“Yewre brother. ’Im as is with the soljers an’ comes ’ere now an’ again. Oi saw them coming down the fields the other day. They’d been sitting up by the cherry-tree. ’E was lookin’ at ’er soime as father looks at a jug o’ beer after e’s dug six foot of a groive.”“You talk too much, boy,” observed Llewellyn, with an attempt at dignity.“Oi don’t, mostly. But oi ’aven’t no objection to talkin’ to yew,” said Howlie reassuringly.“Miss is a rare one,” he began again, “can’t moike nothin’ out of ’er. One day she’ll be off walkin’ an’ not get ’ome till dark an’ long after. ’Nother day, if Parson do call ’er to come out i’ the orchard, she’ll go steppin’ loike a turkey i’ the long grass. ’Froid of ’er dress, looks loike, an’ yet oi’ve seed ’er come back with ’er petticoats scram-full o’ broiers an’ mud.”“Well, she knows her own business best and it’s none of ours,” said Llewellyn, inwardly curious and outwardly correct.“Yewre roight there. She knows ’er own moind, she does. Moy! she was pleased when she went wi’ Parson to Waterchurch, an’ yew should a’ seen ’er when she come back, too. Nothin’ weren’t good enough for ’er. Ye’d a’ thought the ’ouse was a work’ouse, an’ me an’ cook an’ Parson was the paupers in it, she was that ’oigh wi’ us.”Llewellyn turned his back. He did not want to laugh, yet his mouth widened in spite of him.“Now, stop talking,” he said, “you’ve had enough excitement to-day and you’ll get tired.”“She’s after the young general,” added Howlie coarsely.But his information was not up to date.
THOUGHMr. Fenton had told the Vicar of Crishowell that he would write to him, he was in no hurry to do so. Harry’s love affair was a nuisance, and he put off the consideration of it for a week, merely looking askance upon his son when he came across him. To his wife he observed that Harry was making an ass of himself, and it was not till she insisted on his telling her everything he knew that the matter was discussed.
Lady Harriet was dismayed; she had hitherto understood her eldest son so well that his evident admiration of Miss Ridgeway had not disturbed her, for she classed her with the thousand and one other goddesses who had shed their glamour upon him at various times during the last ten years. They made a long procession, beginning with the little girls he had admired in his early school days. His safeguard, so far, had been that no one had taken him seriously.
But now he had apparently proposed to and been accepted by a young woman who knew extremely well what she was about, and one, moreover, whom his mother, with all her good sense and tolerance, had not been able to like. Putting aside the fact that she was anything but a good match for Harry, she knew that the whole atmosphere of Isoline’s world was a lower one than that in which he lived. He was a man who, with the right woman, might develop much, and, with the wrong one, deteriorate as much. He was generous, loyal to a fault, and eminently lovable. He was so affectionate that disenchantment by the woman he loved would make himsuffer acutely, and he had not hardness of character enough to be able to make himself a life apart from that of his daily companions. Sorrow warps natures that have no pivot other than their own feelings; the centre is within themselves and all the weight comes upon it. And what sorrow is there more grinding than the knowledge that what we loved was a mean thing, what we admired, an unworthy one, what we dreamed about, a poor and squalid shadow?
There are small disenchantments in all married lives, but those who have learned to look at the whole and not at its part know their true value. The proverb says, “Straws show which way the wind blows,” and, like many proverbs, it is a half-truth. Some are merely rough receipts for wisdom, made to save fools the trouble of thinking for themselves. Though small acts undeniably give clues to many things in men and women’s natures, men and women cannot be judged on their evidence alone. So much goes to determine a deed beside the actual character behind it. When a man behaves unexpectedly, we call him inconsistent, because every influence which has converged on his act does not happen to tally with our private, preconceived idea of himself. But it is not so much his inconsistency as our own ignorance of things which none know clearly but the Almighty. It is the essence, the atmosphere which a character radiates, the effect it produces in those who come in close enough contact to be influenced by it, whereby a soul can be judged.
But even had he not been so much in love, Harry was far too elementary to judge Isoline rightly or wrongly; it had never occurred to him to look down very deep into the well where Truth sits, and, had he done so, he would have understood little he saw. He would be elementary to the end of his days, and the elements were all good. Whether they would remain so with Isoline as an interpreter of life, his mother doubted.
The Squire, when he had brought himself to face the matter, raged immoderately, and his rage had the common effect ofdriving his son farther than ever along the way in which he did not want him to go. They had a difficult interview, from which the young man emerged with the stormy assurance ringing in his ears that he would get nothing more than his ordinary allowance, and that, were he to marry without his father’s consent, even that would be reduced. He had spoken of getting work to do, and been answered by a sneer which certainly came ill from a man who had refused to give his son a profession. They parted wrathfully.
From the smoking-room in which they had met (it was after dinner) Mr. Fenton went up to bed. Their talk had been late and continued long, and the house was still as he ascended the staircase with his lighted candle; the storm in him was subsiding into a mist of irritation through which flying glimpses of other interests began to appear. By the time he had reached his wife’s bedroom door his thoughts were circling round a speech he had mapped out in the afternoon and meant to deliver at a coming tenants’ dinner.
The Squire could never be driven far from his personal interests, a peculiarity which was at once his strong point and his weak one. People who make houses for themselves and live in them perpetually are among the happiest of mortals; the only drawback to their plan is, that, when they are obliged to come out, they find they have lost their eye for the country and all sense of proportion in the landscape which they are accustomed to see only from the window. Oh, that sense of proportion! If we had it completely what things might we not do? To what heights of worth and wisdom might we not attain? The man who could get a bird’s-eye view of his own conduct would have no further excuse for missing perfection.
Lady Harriet’s door was ajar and she pushed it further open as she heard his step; she knew what had been going on, and was waiting. He had not meant to plunge himself again in the obnoxious subject, and a look of impatience crossed his face. She stood on the threshold, brush in hand, her silver hair falling long and thick about her plain figure; the glow of thefire behind her in the room threw up its brilliance. He entered, and they stood together on the hearth. He began to lash himself up into wrath again.
“Well?” began his wife anxiously.
“Your son is a perfect fool!” burst out Mr. Fenton, who, when displeased with his boys, was accustomed to refer to them as exclusively Lady Harriet’s property.
She plied her brush, waiting.
“I did not mince matters, you may be sure. I told him my opinion of him and his nonsense, and with a few facts to back it. He won’t get one extra sixpence from me—where is it to come from, I should like to know? You know that as well as I do. Young idiot! I said, ‘Look here, boy, mind me. You make a fool of yourself about this girl and marry her without my consent, and I’ll draw a cheque every New Year’s Day for fifty pounds. That’s all you’ll get from me!’”
He paused.
“And what did Harry say?” inquired Lady Harriet.
“Say? What should he say? Some rubbish about getting work. Work indeed! I should like to see Harry work. I laughed at that. ‘My dear young man,’ I said, ‘you aren’t fit to work; you’ve been an idler all your life. What you boys are coming to,Idon’t know.’”
“I sometimes think,” said his wife reflectively, “that perhaps you made a mistake when you would not let him go into the army, Edward.”
“Pshaw! What nonsense! Really, one might think you were on his side.”
“I dislike Miss Ridgeway, and should dislike beyond all to see him married to her. Have you written to Mr. Lewis?”
“Why should I write to Lewis?”
“You said you meant to,” replied she.
“How can I write? I can’t say to Lewis, ‘Your niece is not good enough,’ can I?”
“There is nothing of that sort necessary. The money questionalone is sufficient. Why not write to-morrow, Edward? We ought to do something.”
“I must go to Presteign to-morrow. I shall have no time for letters. I think it would be the best plan if you went over to Crishowell in the phaëton, for then you could see Lewis yourself. Yes, that will do very well.”
And Mr. Fenton took up his candle and went into his dressing-room.
While her husband was on his way to Presteign next day Lady Harriet ordered the phaëton. In more prosperous days this vehicle had run behind a pair of well-matched fourteen-hand grey ponies, but these had been swept away along with many other things on the tide of economy, and a strong, elderly cob, accustomed to odd jobs, replaced them. The old servant who sat behind was thinking much of these departed glories as they trotted along, and wondered, noticing the care on his mistress’ face, whether she was remembering them too. But it was the future that weighed on her rather than the past.
She did not look forward to her errand, and the feeling that it was not hers by right made it all the more disagreeable. She stayed herself up by thinking that with no one could she enter on a difficult subject so well as with the Vicar.
Her sincere hope was that she would not be called upon to see Isoline. Though she was so completely out of sympathy with her, she had that pity for the struggles, the hopes, the blank, black despairs of youth, the desperate straits of those who standin frontof the defences of experience, that she dreaded the trouble she was bringing her. Poor though these defences are, the young have to do without them. We are apt to forget that. But she might have spared herself.
Llewellyn was still at Crishowell. Howlie was making steps towards recovery, but he had suffered cruelly and was very weak, and though the doctor thought better of his injuries than he had done at first, hoping to save the use of both his hands, it was a slow business. His dependence on Llewellyn was absolute, and the old woman who came in dailyfrom the village to keep the sick boy’s room in order being useless for any other purpose, the Vicar wondered what he should have done without him.
Isoline had been down once or twice to see Howlie, but her visits had scarcely been profitable. As he began to get some relief from pain his usual nature also began to re-assert itself, and the expression which flitted on his face as he stared at her—which he always did—gave her a sensation of not being appreciated. It was during one of these visits that the wheels of Lady Harriet’s phaëton were heard stopping at the gate, and Llewellyn, who had gone to look out, put his head in at the door.
The slim, white figure sitting very upright by the bed turned in inquiry.
“It is my mother,” said Llewellyn. “You would like to see her, Howlie, wouldn’t you? She is sure to come down.”
He disappeared in the direction of Lady Harriet’s voice.
Isoline made good her escape and slipped out through the kitchen and up into her room, her face flushing.
She knew very well that her uncle had been expecting a letter from Mr. Fenton daily, and would not let his visitor go without reference to it; he had been rather annoyed by the silence. She would not be dragged into it if she could help it, and, as she was unable to act until the Squire’s decision had been heard, there was no object in facing a needless trial. She snatched up her hat and ran down-stairs, across the orchard, down by the brookside and over the bridge. On it she paused a moment, then, reflecting that she was barely out of earshot, turned up into the fields through which Harry had chased Rebecca.
Lady Harriet had quick feelings, and they were always stirred by acts such as the one which had cost poor Howlie so much. She sat with him for some time, leaving behind her, when she went, a basket of things the like of which he had never tasted. He made an attempt to put up his hand to his forelock, which resulted in a twinge of pain.
The Vicar was waiting for her outside, and they strolled into the garden.
“Perhaps you have something to say to me, Lady Harriet,” he remarked.
“Yes,” she replied. “My husband had business to-day, and he and I—he couldn’t come himself. Mr. Lewis, I hope you will not be annoyed at my news, but this marriage is impossible. You know, I am sure, that we are anything but well off, and he says he cannot afford to do anything for Harry.”
“I know, I know,” said the Vicar.
“I am very sorry,” she went on, “sorry if I am hurting you, my friend, sorry for my boy, for he seems bent upon it, and sorry for your niece too.”
“Do not think of me,” said he, “and do not suppose that I cannot understand Mr. Fenton’s feelings. You have every right to expect Harry to make a much better marriage; and, even were it not so, I cannot quite feel that they are suited. I sometimes doubt if they would be happy.”
“Will she be very much distressed?” inquired Lady Harriet. “I know her so little. But one hates to give pain to people, especially young people who hope so much from life.”
“I hardly know her better than you do, that is the truth.”
“She seems a very unlikely niece for you to have,” said his companion, after a pause.
Mr. Lewis smiled. “I very often do not understand her,” he said, with a sigh.
“Do you think I ought to see her?” hazarded she, throwing herself upon the point she dreaded; “it seems so unkind not to say a word to her. What shall I do?”
She stopped short in their walk.
The Vicar did not know what to say. He had been unable to get any response to his own sympathy when Isoline had wept at breakfast, but he thought that perhaps another woman might help her when he could not. Then he remembered that she had said she did not care for Lady Harriet. He was puzzled.
“I will find her,” he said, “but if she feels she cannot speak about it, you will understand, will you not?”
“Poor child, of course. If you knew how I hate this, Mr. Lewis!”
He went into the house and she returned to Howlie’s room. Isoline was not to be found anywhere. He went all over the Vicarage, into the orchard, down to the brook, and, finally, gave up the search.
“I do not know where Isoline is,” said he, as he stood by Howlie’s bedside. “I have looked everywhere.”
The window fronted towards the water and the fields; the sill was low and Howlie could see over it into the green beyond.
“Oi seed ’er ’alf-an-hour ago,” said he, “slinkin’ out an’ up into they meadows. Goin’ fast she was too, for ’er.”
“Are you sure it was Miss Ridgeway?” inquired the Vicar.
“S’pose oi am. There ain’t many round ’ere ’as theire noses in the air loike miss.”
Llewellyn bit his lip.
“She has evidently gone off for a long walk,” explained Mr. Lewis, rather embarrassed. “She has taken to it so much since she has been here, and I have encouraged it.”
“It is such a great thing when girls like it,” responded Lady Harriet, anxious to say something pleasant; “I have always thought they are kept too much in the house.”
She was so much relieved that she could have given thanks to Heaven aloud.
“It’s a funny thing miss didn’t want to see the loidy,” observed Howlie to Llewellyn after the phaëton had rolled away. Since his illness he had become very much at home with the young man.
“Does she like visitors?” inquired Llewellyn, with a view of drawing him out.
“She don’t like yew,” said Howlie.
“How do you know?”
Howlie looked infinitely subtle, as subtle as a person with a rabbit mouth can look—but took no notice of the question.
“She loikes the young general, though.”
“Who?” asked his companion, with much interest.
“Yewre brother. ’Im as is with the soljers an’ comes ’ere now an’ again. Oi saw them coming down the fields the other day. They’d been sitting up by the cherry-tree. ’E was lookin’ at ’er soime as father looks at a jug o’ beer after e’s dug six foot of a groive.”
“You talk too much, boy,” observed Llewellyn, with an attempt at dignity.
“Oi don’t, mostly. But oi ’aven’t no objection to talkin’ to yew,” said Howlie reassuringly.
“Miss is a rare one,” he began again, “can’t moike nothin’ out of ’er. One day she’ll be off walkin’ an’ not get ’ome till dark an’ long after. ’Nother day, if Parson do call ’er to come out i’ the orchard, she’ll go steppin’ loike a turkey i’ the long grass. ’Froid of ’er dress, looks loike, an’ yet oi’ve seed ’er come back with ’er petticoats scram-full o’ broiers an’ mud.”
“Well, she knows her own business best and it’s none of ours,” said Llewellyn, inwardly curious and outwardly correct.
“Yewre roight there. She knows ’er own moind, she does. Moy! she was pleased when she went wi’ Parson to Waterchurch, an’ yew should a’ seen ’er when she come back, too. Nothin’ weren’t good enough for ’er. Ye’d a’ thought the ’ouse was a work’ouse, an’ me an’ cook an’ Parson was the paupers in it, she was that ’oigh wi’ us.”
Llewellyn turned his back. He did not want to laugh, yet his mouth widened in spite of him.
“Now, stop talking,” he said, “you’ve had enough excitement to-day and you’ll get tired.”
“She’s after the young general,” added Howlie coarsely.
But his information was not up to date.