Brownsmith's Boy Part 44

"Smash his gla.s.s!" growled Ike, digging away like a machine.

"I'm going to-day," I said after a pause, and with all a boy's longing for a sympathetic word or two.

"Oh! are you?" he said sulkily.

"Yes, and I don't know when I shall get over here again."

"Course you don't," growled Ike, smashing another clod. I stood patting the cat, hoping that Ike would stretch out his great rough hand to me to say "Good-bye;" but he went on digging, as if he were very cross.

"I didn't know it till to-day, Ike," I said.

"Ho!" said Ike with a snap, and he bent down to chop an enormous earthworm in two, but instead of doing so he gave it a flip with the corner of his spade, and sent it flying up into a pear-tree, where I saw it hanging across a twig till it writhed itself over, when, one end of its long body being heavier than the other, it dropped back on to the soft earth with a slight pat.

Still Ike did not speak, and all at once I heard Old Brownsmith's voice calling.

"I must go now, Ike," I said, "I'll come back and say 'Good-bye.'"

"And after the way as I've tried to make a man of yer," he said as if talking to his mother earth, which he was chopping so remorselessly.

"It isn't my fault, Ike," I said. "I'll come over and see you again as soon as I can."

"Who said it war your fault?"

"No one, Ike," I said humbly. "Don't be cross with me."

"Who is cross with yer?" cried Ike, cleaning his spade.

"You seemed to be."

"Hah!"

"I will come and see you again as soon as I can," I repeated.

"n.o.body don't want you," he growled.

"Grant!"

"Coming, sir," I shouted back, and then I turned to Ike, who dug away as hard as ever he could, without looking at me, and with a sigh I hurried off, feeling that I must have been behaving very ungratefully to him.

Then there was a sense as of resentment as I thought of how calmly everybody seemed to take my departure, making me think that I had done nothing to win people's liking, and that I must be a very unpleasant, disagreeable kind of lad, since, with the exception of Mrs Dodley and the cat, n.o.body seemed to care whether I went away or stayed.

CHAPTER TWENTY.

A COLD START IN A NEW LIFE.

Brother Solomon loitered about the garden with Old Brownsmith, and it was not until we had had an early tea that I had to fetch down my little box to put in the cart, which was standing in the yard with Shock holding the horse, and teasing it by thrusting a barley straw in its nostrils and ears.

As I came down with the box, Mrs Dodley said "Good-bye" very warmly and wetly on my face, giving as she said:

"Mind you send me all your stockings and shirts and I'll always put them right for you, my dear, and Goodbye."

She hurried away, and as soon as my box was in the cart I ran down the garden to say "Good-bye" to Ike; but he had gone home, so I was told, and I came back disappointed.

"Good-bye, Shock!" I said, holding out my hand; but he did not take it, only stared at me stolidly, just as if he hated me and was glad I was going; and this nettled me so that I did not mind his sulkiness, and drawing myself up, I tried hard to smile and look as if I didn't care a bit.

Brother Solomon came slowly towards the cart, rolling the stalk of a rosebud in his mouth, and as he took the reins he said to one of the chimneys at the top of the house:

"If I was you, Ez, I'd plant a good big bit with that winter lettuce.

You'll find 'em go off well."

I knew now that he was talking to his brother, but he certainly seemed to be addressing himself to the chimney-pot.

"I will, Sol, a whole rood of 'em," said Old Brownsmith, "and thank ye for the advice."

"Quite welkim," said Brother Solomon to the horse's ears. "Jump up."

He seemed to say this to Shock, who stared at him, wrinkled up his face, and shook his head.

"Yes, jump up, Grant, my lad," said Old Brownsmith. "Fine evening for your drive."

"Yes, sir," I said, "good-bye; and say good-bye to Ike for me, will you, please?"

"Yes, to be sure, good-bye; G.o.d bless you, lad; and do your best."

And I was so firm and hard just before, thinking no one cared for me, that I was ready to smile as I went away.

That "G.o.d bless you!" did it, and that firm pressure of the hand. He did like me, then, and was sorry I was going; and though I tried to speak, not a word would come. I could only pinch my lips together and give him an agonised look--the look of an orphan boy going off into what was to him an unknown world.

I was so blinded by a kind of mist in my eyes that I could not distinctly see that all the men and women were gathered together close to the cart, it being near leaving time; but I did see that Brother Solomon nodded at one of the gate-posts, as he said:

"Tlck! go on."

And then, as the wheels turned and we were going out of the gate, there was a hoa.r.s.e "_Hooroar_!" from the men, and a shrill "_Hurray_!" from the women; and then--_whack_!

A great stone had hit the panel at the back of the cart, and I knew without telling that it was Shock who had thrown that stone.

Then we were fairly off, with Brother Solomon sitting straight up in the cart beside me, and the horse throwing out his legs in a great swinging trot that soon carried us past the walls of Old Brownsmith's garden, and past the hedges into the main road, on a glorious evening that had succeeded the storm of the previous night; but, fast as the horse went, Brother Solomon did not seem satisfied, for he kept on s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g up his lips and making a noise, like a young thrush just out of the nest, to hurry the horse on, but it had not the slightest effect, for the animal had its own pace--a very quick one, and kept to it.

I never remember the lane to have looked so beautiful before. The great elm-trees in the hedgerow seemed gilded by the sinking sun, and the fields were of a glorious green, while a flock of rooks, startled by the horse's hoofs, flew off with a loud cawing noise, and I could see the purply black feathers on their backs glisten as they caught the light.

The wheels spun round and seemed to form a kind of tune that had something to do with my going away, while as the horse trotted on and on, uttering a snort at times as if glad to be homeward bound, my heart seemed to sink lower and lower, and I looked in vain for a sympathetic glance or a word of encouragement and comfort from the silent stolid man at my side.

"But some of them were sorry I was going!" I thought with a flash of joy, which went away at once as I recalled the behaviour of Ike and Shock, towards whom I felt something like resentment, till I thought again that I was for the second time going away from home, and this time among people who were all as strange as strange could be.

At any other time it would have been a pleasant evening drive, but certainly one wanted a different driver, for whether it was our crops at Old Brownsmith's, or the idea that he had undertaken a great responsibility in taking charge of me, or whether at any moment he antic.i.p.ated meeting with an accident, I don't know. All I do know is that Mr Solomon did not speak to me once, but sat rolling the flower-stalk in his mouth, and staring right before him, aiming straight at some place or another that was going to be my prison, and all the while the st.u.r.dy horse trotted fast, the wheels spun round, and there was a disposition on the part of my box to hop and slide about on the great knot in the centre made by the cord.

Fields and hedgerows, and gentlemen's residences with lawns and gardens, first on one side and then on another, but they only suggested hiding-places to me as I sat there wondering what would be the consequences if I were to slip over the back of the seat on to my box when Mr Solomon was not looking, and then over the back of the cart and escape.