Hocken and Hunken Part 6

"Losh, here's visitors!" exclaimed Dinah.

Mrs Bosenna turned with the prettiest start of surprise, and sprang to her feet. If there was a suspicion--a shade--of overacting, the twilight concealed it. She had a charming figure, very supple and maidenly: she bought her corsets in London. The kneeling posture and the swift rise from it were alike noticeably graceful, even in the dusk.

"Visitors?" she echoed. "And me in this state to receive 'em, earthed up to the wrists!" She plucked off her gardening-gloves, handed them to Dinah, and stooped to s.n.a.t.c.h up one of a pair of white cuffs--badges of her widowhood--that she had laid aside on the turf before starting to work. While slipping it over her wrist she found time to glance up at Captain Cai, who fumbled confusedly with the rim of his tall hat.

"Excuse me, madam--no wish to intrude. We'll take ourselves off this minute, eh?" He turned to the child, who, however, did not budge.

"Please, don't go. You are--?"

"Caius Hocken, ma'am--of the _Hannah Hoo_--at your service."

"Dear me, what a very pleasant surprise!" (Oh, Mrs Bosenna!) She held out a hand. "I am glad to make your acquaintance, Captain Hocken."

"I hope I see you well, ma'am?" Captain Cai took the hand and dropped it nervously.

"Quite well, I thank G.o.d. . . . They told me your ship had arrived, sir; but I could not count--could I?--on your coming to inspect the house so soon."

"If I've been over hasty, ma'am--"

"Not at all," she interrupted. "There now! I put things so clumsily at times! I meant to excuse _myself_; for, you see, the house has been yours since Lady-day--that's to say, if you sign the lease,--and Lady-day's more than a week past. So 'tis _I_ that am the intruder.

. . .But pa.s.sing the garden yesterday, I'd a notion that half a dozen dwarf roses would improve it, without your knowledge. You're not offended, I hope, now that you've caught me? I dote on roses, for my part."

"I--I take it very kindly, ma'am."

"'Tis a funny time o' the year to be plantin' roses, isn't it?" asked Fancy.

"Eh?" In the dusk Mrs Bosenna treated her to a disapproving stare.

"Is that Elijah Tabb's child? . . . You've grown such a lot lately, I hardly recognised you."

"I noticed that," said the child with composure, "though I didn't guess the reason. But 'tis a funny time to be plantin' roses, all the same."

"And pray, child, what do you know about roses?"

"Nothing," answered Fancy, "'cept that 'tis a funny time to be plantin'

'em."

"When you grow a little older," said Mrs Bosenna icily, "you'll know that anything can be done with roses in these days--with proper precautions. Why"--she turned to Captain Cai--"I've planted out roses in July month--in pots, of course. You break the pots in the October following. But there must be precautions."

"Meanin' manure?"

"Cow," interposed Dinah tersely, "it's the best. Pig comes next, for various reasons."

"We need not go into details," said Mrs Bosenna. "I sent down a cartload this morning and had it well dug in. Provided you dig it deep enough, and don't let it touch the young roots--"

"I thank you kindly, ma'am," said Captain Cai, "and so will my friend 'Bias Hunken when he hears of it."

"Ah, my other tenant?--or tenant in prospect, I ought to say. He has not arrived yet, I understand."

"He's due to-morrow, ma'am, by th' afternoon train."

"You must bring him over to Rilla Farm, to call on me," said Mrs Bosenna graciously.

Captain Cai rubbed his chin. He was taken at unawares; and not finding the familiar beard under his fingers, grew strangely helpless. "As for that, ma'am," he stammered, "I ought to warn you that 'Bias isn' easily caught."

"G.o.d defend me!" answered the widow, who had a free way of speaking at times. "Who wants to catch him?"

"You don't take my meanin', ma'am, if you'll excuse me," floundered Captain Cai in a sweat. "I ought to ha' said that 'Bias, though one in a thousand, is terrible shy with females--or ladies, as I should say."

"He'll be all the more welcome for that," said Mrs Bosenna relentlessly.

"You must certainly bring him, Captain Hocken."

Before he could protest further, she had shaken hands, gathered up trowel and kneeling-pad, given them into Dinah's keeping, unpinned and shaken down the skirt of her black gown, and was gone--gone up the twilit path, her handmaiden following,--gone with a fleeting smile that, while ignoring Fancy Tabb, left Captain Cai strangely perturbed, so nicely it struck a balance between understanding and aloofness.

He rubbed his chin, then his ear, then the back of his neck.

"Lord!" he groaned suddenly, "where was my manners?"

"Eh?"

"I never said a word about her affliction."

"What might _that_ be, in your opinion?"

"Her first husband, o' course--or, as I _should_ say, the loss of him.

Shockin' thing to forget. . . . I've almost a mind now to follow her an'

make my excuses."

"Do," said Fancy; "I'd like to hear you start 'pon 'em."

"Well, you can if you will. Come over with me to Rilla to-morrow forenoon. I'll get leave for you."

"That'd spoil the fun," said Fancy, not one risible muscle twitching; "but go you'll have to. Mrs Bosenna has left one of her cuffs behind."

She pointed to a white object on the turf. Captain Cai stooped, picked it up, and held it gingerly in his hand.

"She didn' seem a careless sort, neither," he mused.

"Not altogether," the child agreed with him.

"Dinah," said Mrs Bosenna, halting suddenly as they walked homeward in the dusk, "I've left one of my cuffs behind!"

"Yes, mistress."

"'Yes, mistress,'" Mrs Bosenna mimicked her. "If 'twas anything belonging to you, you'd be upset enough."

"I'd have more reason," said Dinah stolidly. "Do 'ee want me to run back an' fetch it?"