Читать книгу Strawberry Roan - A. G. Street - Страница 7

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Next morning at about four-thirty Fernditch Farm commenced another day. The first man on the scene was the old dairyman, an ancient named Frederick Simmons. He walked through the yards, opened the gate leading to the pasture beyond, and plodded away up the field in a dense mist, calling, “Cup, cup, come along,” repeatedly.

Presently the dull shapes of cows loomed through the mist, as they meandered purposefully through the gate leading to the buildings.

Wold Dolly’s calf was rather hoarse by this time but she achieved yet one more raucous “Mawrr” as the herd entered the cow yard. This sent them all off in repeated moos and bellows, causing Mrs. Morley to wake from a troubled sleep, and to wonder once again why she had been so foolish as to marry a farmer.

While the dairyman was rounding up the stragglers of the herd, Bill Gurd and two more milkers arrived. Bill fetched the two nag horses from a nearby pasture into their stable, while the other men proceeded to let the cows into the long cowhouse. Presently Bill joined them. There was considerable noise for a few minutes—the clanking of the cow chains, the “Git awver oot” of the men who were tying the cattle up in their respective stalls, and the crisp remarks of Bill Gurd to one or two of the more refractory beasts, from which anyone within a hundred yards of the buildings could have gathered that while Gipsy was merely a bitch, and Duchess a swine, Bluebell would get warmed smartish if she didn’t behave.

At last they were all tied up, and soon the only sound was the soothing noise of the milk streaming from the teats into the pails, punctuated every so often by the new calf’s hungry “Mawrr”.

At six-thirty Bill left the cowhouse to put the saddle on the Guvnor’s cob. Mr. Morley left the farmhouse about the same time, went to the carthorse stable to give out the orders for the plough teams to the head carter, and then passed through the cowhouse, pausing near the dairyman to say, “Morning, Fred. Everything all right?”

Receiving a satisfactory answer he went out to his waiting cob, and just as he greeted Bill with the customary “Morning, Bill,” his passenger of the previous afternoon gave tongue once more.

“For God’s sake, Bill, tell Fred to get some grub into that blaring calf. Been on all night,” said Mr. Morley, as he clattered out of the yard on his way up to the sheepfold.

Bill explained the urgency of the case to the dairyman on their way home to breakfast, and that worthy promised to “zee to ut vust thing atter grub”.

On his return to the buildings the dairyman set one of his helpers to clean out the cowhouse, and the other to feed the eleven calves, which had already learnt the gentle art of drinking. Then he proceeded to attend to the new arrival.

First he put some milk into a bucket and warmed it by immersing the bucket in the dairy copper. Then having got it to the required temperature, which he ascertained by dipping his hand into the milk, he carried the bucket to the loose-box, where Wold Dolly’s calf had spent an unhappy night.

This young lady was not pleased to see him. She was hungry and miserable. She wanted her mother, not this funny old man with a pail. She backed away from him, as he entered, to the farthest corner of the box.

“Coom on then, my pretty. Coom along. I ’low thee bist hungry,” said the dairyman, advancing towards her.

The calf dodged round him.

“Coom on, zilly. I bain’t gwaine to ’urt thee. Ah well, I shall ’a to ketch thee, I ’low. Thee’t ’a more zense in a day er two.”

He hustled the frightened animal into a corner, and tried to force its head into the bucket. The calf objected, and in jerking her head to free it from the old man’s arm, splashed the warm milk all over her face.

The dairyman released her head, but still kept her a prisoner in the corner of the box. She blinked at him, shook her milky head, and then her tongue came out of her mouth and darted like a snake into each nostril in turn. This was milk, she thought, as the flavour of the splashings tickled her palate. It brought back delicious memories of that warm fluid she had been in the habit of sucking from her mother’s ample udder.

The old man surveyed her licking procedure with approval. “Bain’t zo bad then, young un, be it? Coom on, p’raps thee’t trust I a bit now.”

He got her head into the bucket again with much less difficulty, for the smell of the warm milk attracted her, and with infinite, tender patience he coaxed her to suck his milky fingers, and sometimes to dip her muzzle into the milk.

“She ain’t gwaine to be much trouble,” he reported to Bill Gurd later in the day. “Cunnin’ young madam, that be. I’ll ’a she awver wi’ tother-me in a few days.”

The old man’s prophecy was correct. Each succeeding night there were fewer and fewer hungry “Mawrrs” to disturb Mrs. Morley’s rest, and by the end of a week the latest arrival was over in the calf shed with the others, drinking like an old hand.

Life at Fernditch proceeded that winter according to schedule without any untoward happening. Mr. Morley made his peace with his wife, and promised that, when times were better, a small car should be purchased for the exclusive use of his wife and daughter. A safe promise this, he thought, for, as everyone knew, farming times never did get better.

The winter wheat was got in by the end of November; last season’s wheat stubble was ploughed up in December in preparation for the spring corn; the water meadow ditches were cleaned out; preparations for the lambing of the flock in January were got well in hand; the milk went to London daily; and Wold Dolly’s calf throve amazingly.

Over this kingdom Mr. Morley reigned in cheerful content, varied by occasional days of vicious irritability. Behind him, his Prime Minister, Bill Gurd, spurred everyone to increased activity when the Guvnor was cheerful, and took the delinquent’s part, when Mr. Morley was on the rampage. Alone of all the farm’s inhabitants, he dared to argue with the Guvnor.

“I’ve ’a telled the dairyman as ’ow ’ee kin ’ave thic rick o’ vield hay up in the Long Acre,” he said one day to his master. “ ’Tis nice and ’andy fer un to git at, and ’ee do want a bit o’ good hay fer they Fall calvers. Shepherd be main put out awver it, zo I telled un as I’d name it to ’ee.”

At first Mr. Morley said that it was impossible. The sheep must have all the field hay, and the dairyman must manage with the pasture rick in the yard. “You know we never reckon for the cows to have any field hay, Bill. That won’t do.”

“Wun’t it?” said Bill. “Course you knows best an’ all that, but thic rick in yard ain’t much better nor straw fer milk. You kin mind we spoiled ’ee last summer. You don’t want to take all shep says as gospel. Shepherds be allus ’ungry. ’Ee’d feed I to ’is flock, if zo be as they’d eat I. I tell ’ee we got plenty fer the sheep wi’out thic rick.”

“I’d sooner not, Bill. If we once start that game, dairyman’ll want it every year.”

“Well, wot if ’ee do? You be allus thinkin’ about they sheep. Wot about thic milk cheque now? I be thinkin’ o’ ’ee. ’Ee’ll be right ’andy, I ’low. You let I tell Fred as ’ee kin ’ave a bit o’ thic rick. They calves do want a pick at zummat zweet. I’ll zee as tain’t wasted.”

The upshot of this conversation was that, as in most things, Bill got his own way, and left Mr. Morley to make his peace with the shepherd.

Apart from the farm Bill had only one interest. He loved a bargain, and whenever opportunity occurred, he went in for private dealing on his own account. Not, of course, in livestock, as he had no accommodation for them, but he would buy almost anything else. Bicycles, furniture, perambulators, wheelbarrows, anything which, in his opinion, could be resold at a profit.

In December Mr. Morley was invited to go for a day’s shooting. It so happened that this engagement fell on a market day, so he arranged that Bill should go to market in his stead, and carry out the one or two commissions which had to be executed in Winchbury that day.

By this time the calves had been practically weaned off milk on to calf meal, and in addition to his other errands Bill was instructed to bring back five hundredweight of this foodstuff in the milk float. Mr. Morley was well aware of Bill’s private trading, so as he set off in his car he said to him, “You don’t need to hurry back from market, Bill. So long as you’re back in time for the float to take the milk to the station ’ll do. Give you time to find a bargain or two in market somewhere.”

Bill drove into Winchbury as instructed, and took with him two calves about ten days old. When he had got them safely tied up in the auctioneer’s shed, he proceeded to get his load of meal, and then to put his horse up at the Blue Lion. Having done several other small commissions, he went back to the market to see what he could find.

There seemed to be nothing much in his line that day amongst the varied assortment of dead stock in Smith’s auction, and the only possibility was a wooden tea chest filled with books of all kinds. Bill decided to risk a half-crown on these as a speculation.

When the auctioneer came to this lot he could not get a bid of any kind. “Come on, gentlemen,” he said, “start me somewhere. We must get on.”

Someone facetiously bid a shilling, which after a few moments the auctioneer took, and just as he was going to knock the lot down, Bill Gurd bid eighteenpence.

There was a general chuckle, as Bill’s dealing propensities were well known. “Some scholard, you be, Bill,” remarked one wag, and “Knock ’em down, Guvnor. Bill here, ’ee’s studyin’ fer an exam,” cried another.

In a moment or two the auctioneer and crowd passed on, leaving Bill the owner of the box of books for eighteenpence. “An’ I bain’t gwaine to lose no sleep awver that,” said he to himself, as he wandered over to the calf sale to see how his passengers were selling.

About an hour afterwards he was back, examining his purchase, when a Mr. Wheeler, who kept a book and antique shop in Winchbury, came up to him.

“Ah, my man,” he said to Bill. “I understand that you have purchased these books.”

“Well, wot about it then?” said Bill.

“Unfortunately I could not get here when they were sold, but I can do with them. How much do you want for them?”

“I dunno much about books, mister, but you kin ’ave ’em fer ten shillin’, cash,” said Bill.

“But Mr. Smith told me that you only paid eighteenpence for them,” expostulated Mr. Wheeler.

“You gie Mr. Bloody Smith my compliments, an’ tell ’im as ’ow ’ee an’t got no right to blab ’is client’s bizniss broadcast. Wot I gied fer ’em’s no odds to nobody. I wants two ov ’em fer meself, an’ ten bob fer tother-me. Take ’em er lave ’em.”

“Which two do you want to keep?” asked Mr. Wheeler.

“I wants thic Bible. ’Tis bad luck to trade in they; an’ I wants this un too. ’Ee’s writ by a bloke called Shakespeare. I’ve a yerd ’ee well spoke ov.”

“Well, I’ll give you five shillings for them. Come along. Books aren’t in your line.”

“No, but they be in yourn. That’s wot do count now. Be you gwaine to take ’em at ’alf a quid er not, cause else I be gwaine to take they whoam? I kin do wi’ they.”

“Look here, I’ll make it six shillings. They’re no good to you.”

“Bain’t ’em? ’Ow dost thee know? There’s a matter o’ fifty books in thic box. Damme, ten bob’s cheap. ’Tis only a bob fer vive. Wot about it then?”

“Oh, all right,” said Mr. Wheeler, producing a ten shilling note. “Have it your own way, but you must deliver them over to my shop for that.”

“Right,” said Bill, pocketing the note, “but if I does that, thee dussent ’ave the box.”

Mr. Wheeler groaned in despair, and left it at that. Bill borrowed one of the auctioneer’s barrows, delivered the books, and then took the empty box to the egg market, where he sold it to an egg buyer for a shilling. “An’ a very tidy deal all roun’,” he said to himself as he drove back to Fernditch and his manifold duties.

Of the two books he brought home Bill kept but one. He presented the Bible to his old mother, and kept the Shakespeare for his own reading. He must have read it to some purpose that winter, for later on towards the end of January, he put his knowledge of that poet’s work to good account.

The Rector met him one morning, and asked him if he could get anyone to do the hedge at the bottom of the Rectory garden.

“Why don’t ’ee zee George Avery, zur? ’Ee do usually do yer jobs,” said Bill.

“I’ve asked him,” replied the Rector, “but he says that he doesn’t see his way.”

“All right,” grunted Bill. “I’ll zee wot I kin do.”

That night Bill visited the village pub, and after standing George Avery a pint of beer, he got out of him what a Wiltshire man calls “the true innards” of the situation. It appeared that if the Rector employed anyone by the week, he paid up on Saturdays as was customary, but a contract job like doing a hedge was a case of sending in a bill, which possibly might not be settled for perhaps three months.

“Like that, is it?” said Bill to himself, as he walked home that night. “Course old George couldn’ never wait fer ’is money. Allus lived ’and to mouth. Well, I reckon as I kin fix it.”

A day or two afterwards Bill met young Jack Lever, who had been hurdle making all the winter in the big wood at the top of Fernditch Farm.

“Got a job fer thee, Jack, when thee canst git away from ’ood fer a few days. Old Cholly,” for such was the irreverent way in which most of the villagers referred to the Rector, “want’s ’is ’edge done proper. ’Er’s reel bad. ’Er an’t felt iron fer nigh on fourteen year. Thee’t jist the chap fer to do un.”

“Ay, ’er do want doin’, but not fer I, Bill,” replied Jack.

“Why not? Thee canst do ’ee well. Bin chinnin’ it awver wi’ George Avery, I ’low, and thee’t afraid thee’t ’ave to wait fer thee aypence.”

“That’s about the zize ov it, Bill.”

“Well, look at yer,” said Bill. “Thee do the ’edge, make a vust class job ov un, and I’ll zee as thee gits thee money on the dot.”

“An’ I be dealin’ wi’ thee, not wi’ Old Cholly, Bill?”

“Damme, ah!”

“Right you be, then,” agreed Jack.

In due course Jack proceeded with the job, and when it was finished he sought out Bill.

“Many hours ’ast put in?” asked Bill.

“Thirty-nine.”

“Well, ’ow much an hour?”

“Ginilly reckons about ninepence.”

“Gawd,” said Bill. “ ’Ave a pride in thee craft. Thee’s done a good job. Sposin’ we calls it forty hours at a bob. You wur standin’ in water on the meadow zide ov un the main o’ the time.”

“Wull ’er stand fer it?” asked Jack.

“Damme, thee’t dealin’ wi’ I not wi’ old Cholly. Ull two quid satisfy thee?”

“Not arf.”

“Well, there thee at then,” said Bill, drawing the money from his pocket. “Now thee’t finished wi’ it.”

Jack went away well pleased, and that night Bill sat down to make out his bill for the Rector. “I’ve a zeed to it fer un, an’ I’ve feenanced the bizniss,” he said to himself. “I maun ’ave a bit fer me time an’ trouble.” After some cogitation he produced the following bill, which he delivered at the Rectory next day.

The Rev. Charles Guthrie

to

William Gurd

Plashing and layering 9 rod of hedge, with stakes and binders all complete at 5s. a rod. 45s. in all.

A few days afterwards as Bill was passing the Rectory, he met the Rector.

“Ah, Gurd,” said Mr. Guthrie. “I’ve received your bill for getting my hedge done.”

“Well, wot about it then?” said Bill.

“It’s a lot more than I expected,” said the Rector. “Are you sure that you’ve reckoned it correctly?”

“Wot do ’ee take me fer?” asked Bill. “I bain’t no scholard, but I’ve a put down the price of a good job. If you ’as vust class workmanship, you maun expect to pay accordin’. You mid be a good judge o’ sermons, Rector, but I do know wot’s wot about doin’ an ’edge an’ you don’t.”

“True,” said the Rector, “I don’t know, so I must get some advice before I settle with you.”

Bill sensed the true state of affairs at once. ’Tis now er never, he thought. If I doan’t draw to-day, I’ll ’a to wait. Aloud he said: “Look at yer, Rector, I’ve a treated ’ee fair. You couldn’t git thic ’edge done wi’out I. I bain’t one o’ they as runs about the village sayin’ as you don’t pay up. I does wot you asks an’ charges ’ee accordin’. Wot about it, then?”

This beat the Rector completely. The tithes had not come in very promptly that season, and one or two of his investments had passed their dividends. He was well aware that he had one or two long outstanding accounts still unpaid in the village. The best way would be to pay up at once, and put this aggressive yokel in his place.

“Come with me, Gurd,” he said, “and I’ll pay you now. You’re a bit of a Jew, so I would prefer not to be in your debt for any length of time.”

“Jew, be I?” said Bill, stung to the quick. “Wot be you? You be keen enough after yer pound o’ flesh, when ’tis a matter o’ tithes, bain’t ’ee? I an’t asked ’ee fer more than me pound neet less, which is accordin’ to the poets, as you do well know.”

“Good heavens,” said the astonished Rector, and as he was writing out the cheque he kept murmuring, “A little knowledge, a little knowledge.”

Bill did not know what the clergyman meant by these mutterings, but he pocketed the cheque, signed a receipt, and went away well pleased with himself.