Читать книгу The Glad Summer - John Jeffery Farnol - Страница 4

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At Harbourne Nicholas took leave of Bill and, as the sky-blue wagon rumbled away, stood to look about him upon this most beautiful of villages, with its grey old church, its cosy inn and thatched cottages, their gardens abloom with flowers—all clustered about a pleasant green, shaded by trees, most especially one, seemingly old, well-nigh on the church, its mighty branches wide spread. But just at present the usual peaceful hush of this sleepy hamlet was broken by the clamour of troublous voices where labourers, returning from field and farmstead, stood to talk while their womenfolk, in garden and open cottage doorways, looked and listened, shrilling an angry question every now and then; and oftenest recurring, uttered by voices woefully distressed or voices that growled in futile anger, were the three words: “Sir Nicholas Harbourne.”

Now on a seat built around the massive trunk of the aforementioned great old tree on the green two smock-frocked ancients sat cheek by jowl discussing the iniquity of landlords in general and their own new landlord in particular, on this wise:

“I tell ee, Job, ’e should be took and ’ung, ar and jibbeted likewise!”

“No, shot, ’Enery; shot, neat and soldierly.”

“Shootin’ be too good for the likes o’ ’e, Job!”

“Ay, mebbe so. ’Owsever, I’d like to get at ’im wi’ my old baggonet—in ’is bowels——”

“No, I tell ee as ’e should be took and ’ung——”

“Meaning your new landlord, of course,” said Nicholas, pausing beside them.

“Ay,” nodded old Henry fiercely, “ ’im as be our curse and ruination.”

“Ar!” growled old Job, “ ’im as be tekking the clothes off’n our backs and the bread from our children, dang ’im. And ’ow says you, young master?”

“That any landlord who would so misuse his people would deserve hanging.”

“Or get my old baggonet in ’is bowels, eh, sir?” demanded old Henry.

“Well, yes, even that.”

“Young man, though ee be so young, you got uncommon good sense—eh, Job?”

“Ar, no question, ’Enery.”

“Why, then,” said Nicholas, “my good sense suggests three pints at the inn yonder; how say you, Job and Henry?”

As one man the ancients arose and, as one, they replied:

“Ar, drackly minute, sir.”

“With j’y, and thankee, sir.”

So, walking between these two hearty old fellows, Nicholas crossed the wide green and with them entered a certain snug room in this cosy inn of The Soaring Lark. Here they were greeted by a cheery man, very trim as to person, who beamed at them from between a pair of prodigious fiery whiskers, nodded to the ancients, but pulled a non-existent forelock at Nicholas and “made a leg” as only a man-o’-warsman could; wherefore, smiling also, Nicholas enquired:

“How long since you swallowed the anchor, messmate?”

“E’cod, sir,” exclaimed the landlord, beaming more than ever, “you’ve a sailorly eye, for sure! I quit the Navy just afore they spi’led it with steam, being bosun’s mate aboard the old Canopus, eighty-four. Ah, them was the days, sir!” So saying, he vanished, to return with a tray whereon stood three tankards topped by creamy foam. Together the ancients grasped a tankard and together they spoke:

“Good ’ealth, sir!”

“Long life to ee, maister!”

Then together they puffed away the foam, sipped, quaffed deep, and sighed, while Nicholas, beckoning the landlord, enquired:

“Pray, bosun, what’s your name?”

“Will Lawler, sir, at your service.”

“I am Anthony Anson, a stranger hereabouts, and I’m wondering if you could find room—quarters for me here.”

“Quarters, sir?” repeated the bosun, grappling his larboard whisker. “Meaning board an’ lodging, and for how long?”

“Oh, say a month or so.”

“Why, as to that, sir,” said Bosun Will, giving a tug at his whisker, “I’ll have to consult the commander; ex-cuse me!” And away he strode, leaving Nicholas to chat with the ancients and listen to the harsh rumble of angry voices from the adjacent taproom. And after some while back came the bosun, followed by his “commander”, a gentle-eyed woman so comely of face and form that instinctively Nicholas smiled and rose as the bosun said:

“Sir, here is my wife—and commander! Kitty m’ lass, this be the gentleman, Mr. Anson, as wishes to bide with us a spell.”

“Oh, but, sir,” she murmured shyly, “us be nowise used to lodgers, specially o’ the quality; us do be very simple folk, sir.”

“Good!” exclaimed Nicholas heartily. “For, Mrs. Lawler, I am such a very simple fellow that I like all simple things, four walls, a roof and a donkey’s breakfast——”

“He means a straw mattress!” chuckled the bosun.

“ ’Deed, sir,” she smiled, “us can do better nor that. There be a spare room above stairs and a true goose-feather bed! Go wi’ me, sir, if you please, and I’ll show ee.” She led him up a somewhat narrow stair and across a wide landing into a chamber redolent of lavender and so much more than he expected that for the moment he was dumb—mistaking which silence, Mrs. Lawler sighed:

“The carpet’s sadly worn in places, sir, the ewer be cracked and the wash-basin chipped, likewise the armchair bean’t so good as it looks, but ’tis a real feather bed, sir. Yet if this’ll soot ee——”

“Admirably!” he exclaimed fervently. “Mrs. Lawler, I feel at home already!”

“Then as to your meals, sir? I be only the plainest o’ plain cooks——”

“Indeed no!” he retorted. “There is nothing plain about you!” At this she flushed and dimpled, saying:

“Well, Mr. Anson, if you can put up wi’ we, us can put with ee, sure-ly!”

“Mrs. Lawler, I am extremely grateful! Now as to your terms per week?”

“Well, sir,” she answered nervously, “if you think a pound a week right——”

“I do not—we’ll make it two.”

“Oh, but, sir——”

“Mrs. Lawler, considering that feather bed, we ought to make it more.”

“Oh no, sir, no! Two pound be too much.”

“And here is a fortnight’s rent in advance.”

“Four pound!” she murmured. “I don’t know what my Will’ll say. I’ll go an’ ax him.” So away she sped, leaving Nicholas to survey the homely comfort about him with ever-growing content. And after some while to him came Bosun Will, who, having smoothed each fiery, tameless whisker, touched his eyebrow and said:

“Sir, my commander and self, having took counsel con-sarning your too generous offer, begs leave to split the difference, making it one pound ten and very generous indeed.”

“As you will, Will, old seadog; here’s my hand on it with my undying respect for the Navy and especially Bosun Will.”

“Honoured, sir!” growled the bosun as they shook hands.

“Well now,” said Nicholas, “I’ve a couple of valises in Horsham at the King’s Head; how about them, Will?”

“Sir, my man Ned shall fetch ’em in the gig at once.”

“Thanks, Will. And now I suggest ale; how say you?”

“Thankee, sir, but ale being ale, me me, and my commander the commander, I don’t drink except when by thirst com-pelled thereto; wherefore, sir, I begs you’ll ex-cuse me not therein bearing you company.”

Now before this cosy inn pleasantly shaded by trees stood a spacious oaken settle, and here, seated in the sunset glow, tankard on knee, Nicholas gazed wistfully about him on this beautiful village, where this evening, instead of drowsy peace and rustic content, haggard-eyed trouble stirred, while from the taproom nearby voices, louder now and fiercer than ever, uttered fearsome threats and curses against Sir Nicholas Harbourne. Roused presently by sound of approaching horse-hoofs, and glancing round, Nicholas beheld Mistress Joanne Marsden riding slowly towards him, therefore he rose to salute her, hat in one hand, ale-pot in the other, saying:

“Good evening, marm!”

“No—no it is not!” she retorted, checking her horse the better to say it. “This is a bad—a cruel, wicked evening and must be only the first of others—to bring misery upon us every one and ruin to many! And all this the doing of one hatefully, wickedly selfish wretch, a brute I will not foul my lips to name!”

“Then, of course,” said Nicholas, “you can only mean Sir Nicholas Harbourne.”

“Yes, I do! But what can you, a stranger, know about the wretch?”

“That nobody seems to love him——”

“Love him?” she cried and quite ferociously. “I should think not indeed! Who would or could love such a hateful, heartless tyrant? He is a two-legged abomination, a walking pestilence, an all-pervading blight!”

“A most exact description,” said Nicholas, “and, as such, he should be done away with. But how? I have heard it suggested he should be hanged, shot or stabbed, and lately, from the taproom yonder, further suggestions that he should be drowned, strangled, burnt at the stake, and cut to pieces with scythes. Pray, marm, which method do you favour?”

“All of them!” she answered, with fierce nod.

“Which, of course, means none of them.”

“Oh, I suppose so!” she sighed. “But, anyhow, he is a brute beast.”

“No,” said Nicholas gravely, but with dark eyes twinkling, “let him remain your Two-legged Abomination. Yes, indeed, ’tis a phrase to cherish in one’s memory! And now, marm, if you happen to need a handyman, I have one to offer you, a worthy fellow, marm——”

“Do—not call me ‘marm’—as if I were an old woman!”

“An extremely worthy fellow, madam, in every respect, respectful and highly respectable——”

“Meaning yourself, I suppose?”

“Precisely, madam!”

“Well, what can this so worthy fellow do?”

“Anything in reason, Mistress Joanne.”

“Now, sir, you become familiar!”

“But most respectfully and in all humility, dear my lady——”

“Now you are as odiously fulsome!”

“Yet with meekest sincerity. But as regards your would-be handyman——”

“Well,” she demanded, “can this so worthy fellow milk a cow?”

“I fear the art is beyond him—for the present.”

“Can he plough a straight furrow?”

“Straight as an arrow—with practice.”

“Can he thatch a rick, use a scythe, swing a flail or lay a hedge?”

“These are accomplishments he has yet to attain. But with hammer, saw, plane, adze and chisel, you will find him perfectly competent, indeed admirably proficient. Then, besides, he is clean, honest, willing, industrious and remarkably abstemious——”

“So I remark!” she retorted, gesturing towards the tankard in his hand; then she laughed, shook her handsome head and rode away at a graceful canter.

Now, glancing somewhat ruefully at his tankard, Nicholas emptied it at a gulp and, sitting down again, agreed with himself that Joanne was a quaint and lovely name; that, being more than pretty, she must be handsome; that, although grimly valiant of soul, she was also intensely feminine and thus might and could be sweetly gentle and therefore—perfectly adorable. Having arrived at this conclusion, he sighed, rose and, stepping indoors, was there welcomed by Mrs. Lawler with smiling curtsy and the words:

“Sir, your supper be ready—though ’tis only a small duckling, stuffed, and wi’ fresh-picked green peas—but cooked very plain——”

“Hurrah!” he exclaimed in muted rapture. “Mrs. Lawler, pray take my grateful hand, ma’m, and lead me to it.”