Mary Anerley : a Yorkshire Tale Part 42

"Who was turned out first, they or him? Five-and-twenty years of tent, open sky, jungle, and who knows what, for him--but eider-down, and fireside, and fat of land for them! No, no, sir; whatever shall happen there, will be G.o.d's own justice."

"Of His justice who shall judge?" said Insie's father, quietly. "But is there not a young man grown, who pa.s.ses for the heir with every one?"

"Ay, that there is; and the best game of all will be neck and crop for that young scamp. A bully, a coward, a puling milksop, is all the character he beareth. He giveth himself born airs, as if every inch of the Riding belonged to him. He hath all the viciousness of Yordas, without the pluck to face it out. A little beast that hath the venom, without the courage, of a toad. Ah, how I should like to see--"

Jack of the Smithies not only saw, but felt. The Yordas blood was up in Pet. He leaped through the hedge and struck this man with a sharp quick fist in either eye. Smithies fell backward behind the bench, his heels danced in the air, and the stump of his arm got wedged in the stubs of a bush, while Lancelot glared at him with mad eyes.

"What next?" said his companion, rising calmly, and steadfastly gazing at Lancelot.

"The next thing is to kill him; and it shall be done," the furious youth replied, while he swung the gentleman's big stick, which he had seized, and danced round his foe with the speed of a wild-cat. "Don't meddle, or it will be worse for you. You heard what he said of me. Get out of the way."

"Indeed, my young friend, I shall do nothing of the sort." But the old man was not at all sure that he could do much; such was the fury and agility of the youth, who jumped three yards for every step of his, while the poor old soldier could not move. The boy skipped round the protecting figure, whose grasp he eluded easily, and swinging the staff with both arms, aimed a great blow at the head of his enemy. Suddenly the other interposed the bench, upon which the stick fell, and broke short; and before the a.s.sailant could recover from the jerk, he was a prisoner in two powerful old arms.

"You are so wild that we must make you fast," his captor said, with a benignant smile; and struggle as he might, the boy was very soon secured. His antagonist drew forth a red bandana handkerchief, and fastened his bleeding hands behind his back. "There, now, lad," he said, "you can do no mischief. Recover your temper, sir, and tell us who you are, as soon as you are sane enough to know."

Pet, having spent his just indignation, began to perceive that he had made a bad investment. His desire had been to maintain in this particular spot strict privacy from all except Insie, to whom in the largeness of love he had declared himself. Yet here he stood, promulged and published, strikingly and flagrantly p.r.o.nounced! At first he was like to sulk in the style of a hawk who has failed of his swoop; but seeing his enemy arising slowly with grunts, and action nodose and angular--rather than flexibly graceful--contempt became the uppermost feature of his mind.

"My name," he said, "if you are not afraid of it, that you tie me in this cowardly low manner, is--Lancelot Yordas Carnaby."

"My boy, it is a long name for any one to carry. No wonder that you look weak beneath it. And where do you live, young gentleman?"

Amazement sat upon the face of Pet--a genuine astonishment, entirely pure from wrath. It was wholly beyond his imagination that any one, after hearing his name, should have to ask him where he lived. He thought that the question must be put in low mockery, and to answer was far beneath his dignity.

By this time the veteran Jack of the Smithies had got out of his trap, and was standing stiffly, pa.s.sing his hand across his sadly smitten eyes, and talking to himself about them.

"Two black eyes, at my time of life, as sure as I'm a Christian!

Howsomever, young chap, I likes you better. Never dreamed there was such good stuff in you. Master Bert, cast him loose, if so please you. Let me shake hands with 'un, and bear no malice. Bad words deserve hard blows, and I ask his pardon for driving him into it. I called 'un a milksop, and he hath proved me a liar. He may be a bad 'un, but with good stuff in 'un. Lord bless me, I never would have believed the lad could hit so smartly!"

Pet was well pleased with this tribute to his prowess; but as for shaking hands with a tenant, and a "common man"--as every one not of gentle birth was then called--such an act was quite below him, or above him, according as we take his own opinion, or the truth. And possibly he rose in Smithies' mind by drawing back from bodily overture.

Mr. Bert looked on with all the bliss of an ancient interpreter. He could follow out the level of the vein of each, as no one may do except a gentleman, perhaps, who has turned himself deliberately into a "common man." Bert had done his utmost toward this end; but the process is difficult when voluntary.

"I think it is time," he now said, firmly, to the unshackled and triumphant Pet, "for Lancelot Yordas Carnaby to explain what has brought him into such humble quarters, and induced him to turn eavesdropper; which was not considered (at least in my young days) altogether the part of a gentleman."

The youth had not seen quite enough of the world to be pat with a fertile lie as yet; especially under such searching eyes. However, he did as much as could be well expected.

"I was just looking over my property," he said, "and I thought I heard somebody cutting down my timber. I came to see who it was, and I heard people talking, and before I could ask them about it, I heard myself abused disgracefully; and that was more than I could stand."

"We must take it for granted that a brave young gentleman of your position would tell no falsehood. You a.s.sure us, on your honor, that you heard no more?"

"Well, I heard voices, sir. But nothing to understand, or make head or tail of." There was some truth in this; for young Lancelot had not the least idea who "Sir Duncan" was. His mother and aunt had kept him wholly in the dark as to any lost uncle in India. "I should like to know what it was," he added, "if it has anything to do with me."

This was a very clever hit of his; and it made the old gentleman believe him altogether.

"All in good time, my young friend," he answered, even with a smile of some pity for the youth. "But you are scarcely old enough for business questions, although so keen about your timber. Now after abusing you so disgracefully, as I admit that my friend here has done, and after roping your pugnacious hands, as I myself was obliged to do, we never can launch you upon the moor, in such weather as this, without some food.

You are not very strong, and you have overdone yourself. Let us go to the house, and have something."

Jack of the Smithies showed alacrity at this, as nearly all old soldiers must; but Pet was much oppressed with care, and the intellect in his breast diverged into sore distraction of anxious thought. Whether should he draw the keen sword of a.s.surance, put aside the others, and see Insie, or whether should he start with best foot foremost, scurry up the hill, and avoid the axe of Maunder? Pallas counselled this course, and Aphrodite that; and the latter prevailed, as she always used to do, until she produced the present dry-cut generation.

Lancelot bowed to the gentleman of the gill, and followed him along the track of grit, which set his little pearly teeth on edge; while Jack of the Smithies led, and formed, the rear-guard. "This is coming now to something very queer," thought Pet; "after all, it might have been better for me to take my chance with the hatchet man."

Brown dusk was ripely settling down among the mossy apple-trees, and the leafless alders of the brook, and the russet and yellow memories of late autumn lingering in the glen, while the peaky little freaks of snow, and the cold sighs of the wind, suggested fireside and comfort. Mr. Bert threw open his cottage door, and bowing as to a welcome guest, invited Pet to enter. No pa.s.sage, no cold entrance hall, demanded sc.r.a.pes of ceremony; but here was the parlor, and the feeding-place, and the warm dance of the fire-glow. Logs that meant to have a merry time, and spread a cheerful noise abroad, ere ever they turned to embers, were snorting forth the pointed flames, and spitting soft protests of sap. And before them stood, with eyes more bright than any flash of fire-light, intent upon rich simmering scents, a lovely form, a grace of dainties--oh, a G.o.ddess certainly!

"Master Carnaby," said the host, "allow me, sir, the honor to present my daughter to you, Insie darling, this is Mr. Lancelot Yordas Carnaby.

Make him a pretty courtesy."

Insie turned round with a rosy blush, brighter than the brightest fire-wood, and tried to look at Pet as if she had never even dreamed of such a being. Pet drew hard upon his heart, and stood bewildered, tranced, and dazzled. He had never seen Insie in-doors before, which makes a great difference in a girl; and the vision was too bright for him.

For here, at her own hearth, she looked so gentle, sweet, and lovely. No longer wild and shy, or gayly mischievous and watchful, but calm-eyed, firm-lipped, gravely courteous; intent upon her father's face, and banishing not into shadow so much as absolute nullity any one who dreamed that he ever filled a pitcher for her, or fed her with grouse and partridge, and committed the incredible atrocity of kissing her.

Lancelot ceased to believe it possible that he ever could have done such a thing as that, while he saw how she never would see him at all, or talk in the voice that he had been accustomed to, or even toss her head in the style he had admired, when she tried to pretend to make light of him. If she would only make light of him now, he would be well contented, and say to himself that she did it on purpose, for fear of the opposite extreme. But the worst of it was that she had quite forgotten, beyond blink of inquiry or gleam of hope, that ever in her life she had set eyes on a youth of such perfect insignificance before.

"My friend, you ought to be hungry," said Bert of the Gill, as he was proud to call himself; "after your exploit you should be fed. Your vanquished foe will sit next to you. Insie, you are hara.s.sed in mind by the countenance of our old friend Master John Smithies. He has met with a little mishap--never mind--the rising generation is quick of temper.

A soldier respects his victor; it is a beautiful arrangement of Providence; otherwise wars would never cease. Now give our two guests a good dish of the best, piping hot, and of good meaty fibre. We will have our own supper by-and-by, when Maunder comes home, and your mother is ready. Gentlemen, fall to; you have far to go, and the moors are bad after night-fall."

Lancelot, proudly as he stood upon his rank, saw fit to make no objection. Not only did his inner man cry, "Feed, even though a common man feed with thee," but his mind was under the influence of a stronger one, which scorned such stuff. Moreover, Insie, for the first time, gave him a glance, demure but imperative, which meant, "Obey my father, sir."

He obeyed, and was rewarded; for the beautiful girl came round him so, to hand whatever he wanted, and seemed to feel so sweetly for him in his strange position, that he scarcely knew what he was eating, only that it savored of rich rare love, and came from the loveliest creature in the world. In stern fact, it came from the head of a sheep; but neither jaws nor teeth were seen. Upon one occasion he was almost sure that a curl of Insie's lovely hair fell upon the back of his stooping neck; he could scarcely keep himself from jumping up; and he whispered, very softly, when the old man was away, "Oh, if you would only do that again!" But his darling made manifest that this was a mistake, and applied herself sedulously to the one-armed Jack.

Jack of the Smithies was a trencherman of the very first order, and being well wedded (with a promise already of young soldiers to come), it behooved him to fill all his holes away from home, and spare his own cupboard for the sake of Mistress Smithies. He perceived the duty, and performed it, according to the discipline of the British army.

But Insie was fretting in the conscience of her heart to get the young Lancelot fed and dismissed before the return of her great wild brother.

Not that he would hurt their guest, though unwelcome; or even show any sort of rudeness to him; but more than ever now, since she heard of Pet's furious onslaught upon the old soldier--which made her begin to respect him a little--she longed to prevent any meeting between this gallant and the rough Maunder. And that anxiety led her to look at Pet with a melancholy kindness. Then Jack of the Smithies cut things short.

"Off's the word," he said, "if ever I expects to see home afore daylight. All of these moors is known to me, and many's the time I have tracked them all in sleep, when the round world was betwixt us. But without any moon it is hard to do 'em waking; and the loss of my arm sends me crooked in the dark. And as for young folk, they be all abroad to once. With your leave, Master Bert, I'll be off immediate, after getting all I wants, as the manner of the world is. My good missus will be wondering what is come of me."

"You have spoken well," his host replied; "and I think we shall have a heavy fall to-night. But this young gentleman must not go home alone. He is not robust, and the way is long and rough. I have seen him shivering several times. I will fetch my staff, and march with him."

"No, sir, I will not have such a thing done," the veteran answered, st.u.r.dily. "If the young gentleman is a gentleman, he will not be afraid for me to take him home, in spite of what he hath done to me. Speak up, young man, are you frightened of me?"

"Not if you are not afraid of me," said Pet, who had now forgotten all about that Maunder, and only longed to stay where he was, and set up a delicious little series of glances. For the room, and the light, and the tenor of the place, began more and more to suit such uses. And most and best of all, his Insie was very thankful to him for his good behavior; and he scarcely could believe that she wanted him to go. To go, however, was his destiny; and when he had made a highly laudable and far-away salute, it happened--in the shift of people, and of light, and clothing, which goes on so much in the winter-time--that a little hand came into his, and rose to his lips, with ground of action, not for a.s.sault and battery, but simply for a.s.sumpsit.

CHAPTER XL

STORMY GAP

Snowy weather now set in, and people were content to stay at home. Among the scaurs and fells and moors the most perturbed spirit was compelled to rest, or try to do so, or at any rate not agitate its body out-of-doors. Lazy folk were suited well with reason good for laziness; and gentle minds, that dreaded evil, gladly found its communication stopped.

Combined excitement and exertion, strong amazement, ardent love, and a cold of equal severity, laid poor Pet Carnaby by the heels, and reduced him to perpetual gruel. He was shut off from external commune, and strictly blockaded in his bedroom, where his only attendants were his sweet mother, and an excellent nurse who stroked his forehead, and called him "dear pet," till he hated her, and, worst of all, that Dr.

Spraggs, who lived in the house, because the weather was so bad.

"We have taken a chill, and our mind is a little unhinged," said the skillful pract.i.tioner: "careful diet, complete repose, a warm surrounding atmosphere, absence of undue excitement, and, above all, a course of my gentle alteratives regularly administered--these are the very simple means to restore our beloved patient. He is certainly making progress; but I a.s.sure you, my dear madam, or rather I need not tell a lady of such wonderfully clear perception, that remedial measures must be slow to be truly efficacious. With lower organizations we may deal in a more empiric style; but no experiments must be tried here--"

"Dr. Spraggs, I should hope not, indeed. You alarm me by the mere suggestion."