The Carbonels Part 11

observed Nancy Morris; at which they all laughed shrilly.

"As though I'd take pattern by her," exclaimed Nanny Barton. "I'd liefer take pattern by Softy Sam, or Goodenough's old scarecrow."

"Whatever's that?" demanded Tirzah, coming out of the "Fox and Hounds."

"What have they been after now?"

"Just the lady's been a preachin' down at that there school, how that she don't want no curl-papers there, and that all the poor children's heads is to be clipped like boys, and setting up that there Rachel Mole's bowl-dish of a poll to set the fashion."

"There! As I telled you," said Tirzah. "That's the way gentry always goes on if they gets their way."

"They just hates to see a curl or a bit of ribbon," added Betsy Seddon.

"Or to see one have a bit of pleasure," added Nancy Morris.

"Pucklechurches and Mole, they never durst send their poor children to the fair--"

"And to hear the lady run out agin' me for just having a drop of beer,"

exclaimed Nanny Barton. "Nothing warn't bad enough for me! As if she hadn't her wine and all the rest of it, and a poor woman mayn't touch one draught, if it is ever so--"

"Well, you know, Nan, you'd had a bit more than enough," said Tirzah.

"Well, and what call to that was hern or yourn?" cried Nancy, facing upon her.

"A pretty job I had to get you home that night," said Tirzah; and they all laughed. "And you wouldn't be here now if Tom Postboy hadn't pulled up his horses in time."

"And was it for her to cast up to me if I was a bit overtaken?" demanded Nanny.

It may be supposed that after such a conversation as this there was not much chance of the bowl-dish setting the fashion. There was not the same ill-temper and jealousy of Susan Pucklechurch being held up as an example, for her family were the natural hangers-on of Greenhow, and were, besides, always neater and better dressed than the others; but Mrs Mole was even poorer than themselves, and had worked with them, even while "keeping herself to herself," a great offence in their eyes.

Thus n.o.body was inclined to follow the clipped fashion, except one or two meeker women, who had scarcely seen that their girls' hair was getting beyond bounds. It is to be remembered that seventy years ago, long hair could hardly be kept in respectable trim by busy mothers working in the fields, and with much less power of getting brushes and combs than at present; so that the crops were almost the only means of securing cleanliness and tidiness, and were worn also by all the little daughters of such gentry as did not care for fashion, nor for making them sleep on a ring of lumps as big as walnuts. So that Mrs Carbonel and her sisters really wished for what was wholesome and proper when they tried to make the children conform to their rules, if the women could only have seen it so, instead of resenting the interference.

Sunday brought George Hewlett's two girls with their hair fastened up in womanly guise, and their cousins becurled as before; but there was nothing particularly untidy, and Mary held her peace.

However, the war was not over, and one day, when, after a short absence, Dora and Sophy went into the school, they found five or six girls bristling with twists of old newspapers, and others in a still more objectionable condition, with wild unkempt hair about their necks, and the half-dozen really neat ones were on the form around Mrs Thorpe, who proceeded to tell Dora that she was quite in despair, the more she spoke to the girls about tidy heads, the worse they were, and she was really afraid to let her own children or the clean ones sit near the dirty ones.

Dora's spirit was roused. "Very well," she said, "Mrs Carbonel and I will not be disobeyed. Come here, Lizzie Barton. Your head is disgraceful. Lend me your scissors, Mrs Thorpe."

Lizzie Barton began to cry, with her knuckles in her eyes, and would not stir; but Dora was resolute. One child made a rush for the door; but Dora desired Sophy to stand by the door and bar the pa.s.sage, and called Mrs Thorpe to hold Lizzie Barton, who certainly was a spectacle, with half-a-dozen horns twisted out of old advertis.e.m.e.nt papers, but the rest of her hair flying in disgusting elf-locks. She was cowed, however, into standing quiet, till her appendages had been sheared off by the determined scissors. "There, I am sure you must be much more comfortable," Dora a.s.sured her. "Get your mother to wash your head, and you will look so nice to-morrow. Now then, Betsy Hewlett."

Betsy cried, but submitted; but the next victim, Sally French, howled and fought, and said, "Mammy would not have it done." But Dora sternly answered, "Then she should keep your head fit to be seen." And Mrs Thorpe held down her hands, with whispers of "Now, my dear, don't."

And so it went on through nineteen girls, the boys sn.i.g.g.e.ring all the time. Some cried and struggled, but latterly they felt it was their fate, and resisted no longer. Even Mary c.o.x, who had a curly head by nature, stood still to be clipped. Dora's hands were in a dreadful state, and her mind began to quail a little; but, having once started, she felt bound to go on and complete her work, and when she finally dismissed the school, there was a very undesirable heap of locks, brown, black, and carroty, interspersed with curl-papers, on the floor. The girls looked, to her mind, far better, and Mrs Thorpe, a little doubtful, gave her a basin of water to wash her hands.

Home the two sisters went, their spirits rising as they laughed over their great achievement, and looked forward to amusing Mary with the account of the various behaviour of the victims.

So they burst upon her, as she was planting bulbs in the garden, and Edmund helping her by measuring distances.

"Oh, Mary, such fun!" cried Sophy. "We have been cutting all the children's hair."

"What do you mean, Sophy?"

"They had their heads worse than ever," said Dora, "so I took Mrs Thorpe's scissors and clipped them all round."

"My dear Dora, I wish you had not been so hasty," Mary was gently saying; but Edmund was standing up, looking quite judicial.

"Did you get their parents' permission?" he demanded.

"No, of course I never should."

"Then what right had you to meddle with the children?"

"They were quite horrid. My hands! They'll never recover," said Dora, spreading out her fingers.

"Very likely; but the children were not your slaves. You have a perfect right to forbid them to enter your school except on certain conditions, but not to tyrannise over them when there. You have done more harm than you will undo in a hurry."

"I am afraid so," murmured Mary.

Dora had a temper, and answered angrily, "Well, I'm sure I did it for the best."

"I don't approve of opinionative young ladies," said Edmund, who was really from old habit quite like an elder brother.

"Oh, Dora," sighed Mary, "don't!"

Dora felt impelled to argue the matter out on the spot, but something in Mary's look withheld her. She went away, stepping high and feeling stately and proud; but when she had walked up and down her own room a few times, her better sense began to revive, and she saw that she had acted in anger and self-will quite as much as from a sense of propriety, and she threw herself on her bed and shed some bitter tears.

They would have been still more bitter if she could have heard the exclamations of the mothers over their gates that evening.

"Well, to be sure, that a young lady should have treated my poor like that!"

"Her father says, says he, 'I'll have the law of she.'"

"My Jenny, she come home looking like a poor mad woman. 'Whatever has thee been arter?' says I. ''Tis the lady,' says she."

"Lady! She ought to be ashamed on herself, a-making such Betties of the poor children."

"Ah! didn't I tell you," gibed Tirzah, "what would come of making up to the gentlefolk, with their soft words and such. They only want to have their will of you, just like the blackamoors."

"You'll not find me a sending my Liz and Nan," cried Mrs Morris, "no, not if her was to offer me a hundred goulden guineas."

"I don't let my gal go to be made into a guy!" was the general sentiment; and Mrs Verdon, in her bed, intensified it by warning her neighbours that the cropping their heads was "a preparation for sending them out to them foreign parts where they has slaves."

And on Sunday, there were only ten of the female pupils at school, and poor Dora and Sophia both cried all church time. They thought their hasty measures had condemned their poor girls to be heathens and good-for-nothings for ever and ever.

Tirzah Todd laughed at them all. The Todds had gipsy connections; Todd himself was hardly ever visible. He was never chargeable to the parish, but he never did regular work except at hay and harvest times, or when he was cutting copsewood. Then old Pucklechurch's brother, Master Pucklechurch of Downhill, who always managed the copse cutting, used to hire him, and they and another man lived in a kind of wigwam made of chips, and cut down the seven years' growth of underwood, dividing it into pea-sticks from the tops, and splitting the thicker parts to be woven into hurdles, or made into hoops for barrels. They had a little fire, but their wives brought them their food, and little Hoglah, now quite well only with a scarred neck, delighted to toddle about among the chips, and cry out, "Pitty! pitty!" at the primroses.

Copse cutting over, Joe Todd haunted fairs and drove cattle home, or did anything he could pick up. He lived in a mud hovel which he and Tirzah had built for themselves on the border land, and where they kept a tall, thin, smooth-haired dog, with a grey coat, a white waistcoat, a long nose and tail, and blue eyes, which gave him a peculiarly sinister expression of countenance, and he had a habit of leaping up and planting his fore feet on the gate, growling, so that Dora and Sophy were very much afraid of him, and no one except Mr Harford had ever attempted to effect an entrance into the cottage. It was pretty well understood that Joe Todd and his lurcher carried on a business as poachers, and Tirzah going about with clothes'-pegs, rush baskets, birch brooms, and in their season with blackberries, whortleberries, or plovers' eggs, was able to dispose of their game to the poulterers at Minsterham, with whom she had an understanding. Her smiling black eyes, white teeth, and merry looks, caused a great deal of business to be done through her, and servants were not unwilling to carry in her stories about rabbits knocked down unawares by a stick, and pheasants or partridges killed by chance in reaping. Indeed, she had a little trade in dripping and other sc.r.a.ps with sundry of these servants, which rendered them the more disposed to receive her.

CHAPTER TWELVE.