Under the Mendips Part 3

Mrs. Falconer darted down upon the ant with her forefinger, and speedily despatched it, exclaiming there was a perfect plague of ants in the larder, and she did not know how to be rid of them.

"Disgusting!" said her son, carefully covering the body of the ant with a leaf which had garnished the pat of b.u.t.ter. "It is enough to make one sick. I must have a little brandy to settle myself, or rather, my breakfast, before I start."

Mrs. Falconer made no response to this request. But the spirit-stand was in the sideboard, and when his mother was gone Melville helped himself to a pretty strong dram, and then lounged about till it was time to mount the "four-wheel" and drive into Wells.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

CHAPTER II.

THE CITY OF THE DEEP SPRINGS.

The squire's high "four-wheel" drew up before the door of the Swan Hotel at Wells about twelve o'clock that day. Mr. Falconer was well-known there, and there was a general rush to meet him. The landlord came briskly to the side of the vehicle to a.s.sist Miss Joyce to alight, while the ostler and stable-boy ran to the head of the mare; and in the dark entrance below the portico the landlady and a waiter with a napkin over his arm, were in readiness.

"Good-day to you," said the squire, in a cheery voice.

"We are proud to see you, sir. Nice weather for the hay. Will you please to walk in, sir? and Mrs. Maltby will receive your orders for dinner."

"Thank ye kindly. Dinner for two at one o'clock. My daughter will go up to the Liberty, to her aunt's."

"Here, you fellow," exclaimed the prototype of the first gentleman in Europe. "Here, can't you get the carriage nearer the pavement? I don't care to set my foot in that puddle."

The ostler backed the horse, and the landlord advanced to give Melville his arm, while a knot of people had a.s.sembled in Saddler Street, watching with some curiosity the movements of the smart young gentleman in the back seat.

The squire, provoked at the tone in which his son had spoken, vanished within the dark lobby of the inn, while Joyce said, laughing:

"Melville, surely you don't want to be helped from the carriage!"

"Look at 'im, now," said a poor woman, who was carrying a basket of vegetables to one of the Canon's houses; "did ye ever see the like? His shoes are made of paper; and, lor! what bows!"

"Take care; you'll be heerd," said an old man, who was leaning on his stick. "Take care. Don't 'ee chatter like a magpie. You'll be heerd, Peggy Loxley."

"Ha, ha!" laughed the woman, "I know why you are affrighted; I know.

You've got your 'nephy' up to-day afore the justices, and you don't want to affront one of the justices; I see."

The old man shook his stick at the woman, and meantime Melville had accomplished his descent without splashing his shoes or the edge of his trowsers.

"I shall want a post-chaise ready, in the afternoon, after the Bath mail arrives," he said. "I expect a friend by the coach."

"Very good, sir," said the landlord, who now reappeared; "very good. The squire has ordered dinner for two at one o'clock."

"Where are you off to, Joyce?" Melville said.

"I am going to do some shopping, and to wait at Aunt Let.i.tia's for father." Then Joyce drew a little nearer Melville. "Why can't your friend ride with you in the back seat?"

"Why? Because I don't choose to let him jog over the roads in such a rough conveyance."

Joyce's lip curled.

"It is good enough for father and for me," she said, "and ought to be good enough for you."

Melville arranged his hair, and touched the ends of his lace cravat.

"My dear child, don't make a scene before witnesses, I beseech you."

Joyce waited to hear no more, but tripped away, turning, through a quaint archway, to the Cathedral Green, where the cathedral stood before her in all its majesty.

The great west front of Wells Cathedral has few rivals, and dull indeed must be the heart that does not respond in some measure to its grandeur.

Involuntarily Joyce said, "How beautiful!" and then, leaving the road, she pa.s.sed through a turnstile and pursued her way under the shadow of a row of limes, which skirted the wide expanse of turf before the cathedral.

The blue sky of the summer day over-arched the stately church, and a few white clouds sailed above the central tower. There were no jarring sounds of wheels, no tread of many feet, no traffic which could tell of trade. Although it was high noontide, the stillness was profound: the jackdaw's cry, the distant voices of children in the market-square, the rustle of the leaves in the trees, and a faint murmur of tinkling water, only seemed to make the quiet more quiet, the silence more complete.

The great west door was open, and Joyce walked towards it, and pa.s.sed under it into the cool shadows of the nave. She had often done this before, going out from the north porch into the Close again, but to-day there seemed, she scarcely knew why, the stirring of a new life within her.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Wells Cathedral.]

It was the moment, perhaps, of crossing the barrier which divides childhood from womanhood; the pause which comes in most young lives, when there is, as it were, a hush before the dawn of the coming day.

Joyce had been silent during the drive from Fair Acres; her father had invited no conversation, and a glance now and then at his profile as he sat on the high box seat at her side, had convinced Joyce that the lines of care on his forehead were not traced there without a reason.

The fop, who condescended to sit in the back seat of the c.u.mbrous vehicle, indulged in sundry grumbles at the bad road, the dust, the slow pace of Mavis the mare, the heat, and such like trifles, which were, however, sufficient to disturb the serenity of Melville Falconer.

Joyce had felt ashamed and annoyed as she had never done before; and when a neighbouring squire jogged past on horseback with his son, and looked back with a smile at the highly-decorated figure in the back seat, Joyce felt sure they were laughing at him! Why could not Melville wear a short riding coat like Charlie Paget, and top-boots, and bear himself like a country gentleman, instead of bringing down London fashions into the heart of Somersetshire, and finding fault with everything in his own home; bring his fine friends there without warning, and behave as if he were indeed monarch of all he surveyed.

Joyce's sweet young face was shadowed with the awakening sense of responsibility and the longing to do something, which might smooth the rough places in her father's life, which her brother apparently made without the slightest compunction.

As Joyce stood in the cathedral, not far from the north porch, her head raised towards the belfry-tower, which the great inverted arches support, a ray of sunshine entering at a window in the south transept touched her figure, and illuminated it with a subdued and chastened beauty. Her head was thrown back, and the high coal-scuttle or gipsy bonnet did not hide the sweet face, which, when she had walked demurely down the nave, had been hardly visible.

The little quaint figure was motionless, and the old verger turned twice to look at it, with a strange and curious thrill of admiration.

Presently the cloister door opposite opened, and the Dean's swift footsteps were heard approaching, with a regular pit-pat, on the floor of the nave.

He, like the verger, was attracted by Joyce's att.i.tude and the rapt expression on her fair face.

"Why, it's Falconer's little girl!" he thought. "She is generally all smiles and sunshine; now she looks like a nun."

As the Dean pa.s.sed her, Joyce started. The brightest colour came to her face, and she turned hastily towards the north porch.

The Dean, with old-fashioned and chivalrous courtesy, held the little door, which was cut out of the big one for ordinary use, to let her pa.s.s, and then he said:

"Miss Falconer, I think. I hope your good father is well. Is he in Wells to-day?"

"Yes, sir," Joyce replied, bright smiles rippling over her face. "Yes, sir; on magistrates' business."

"Ah, ah! I heard there was some bad case brought in from Mendip. The good lady at Barley Wood will have to learn that much prating about religion ain't what we want. It's like the crackling of thorns under the pot. Let us see you at the Deanery before long; make my compliments to your good father and Mrs. Falconer." And then the Dean ambled away, his thin, black-stockinged legs beneath the deca.n.a.l coat and ap.r.o.n giving him the appearance of a black stork.