Wenderholme Part 13

Stedman if he wishes it. Perhaps it would be well to order it at once, as there has been a great demand for the book, and it is likely to be out of print very soon, unless the new edition is out in time to keep up the supply. Four editions are exhausted already, and the book has only been out a month or two. We are writing to London to-day; shall we order the book for you, Miss Stedman?"

The lady hesitated a little, and then said, "Papa seemed to want it very much--yes, you can order it, please."

There was something very agreeable to Philip Stanburne's ear in what he had heard, and something that grated upon it harshly. The tone of the girl's voice was singularly sweet. It came to him as comes a pure unexpected perfume. It was amongst sounds what the perfume of violets is amongst odors, and he longed to hear it again. What had grated upon him was the word "Popery;" he could not endure to hear his religion called "Popery." Still, it was only the t.i.tle of some Protestant book the girl had mentioned, and she was not responsible for it--she could not give the book any other t.i.tle than its own. Philip Stanburne was examining a quant.i.ty of morocco contrivances (highly ingenious, most of them) in a gla.s.s case in the middle of the shop, and he turned round to look at the young lady, but she had her back to him. She was now choosing some note-paper on the counter. Her dress was extremely simple--white muslin, with a little sprig; and she wore a plain straw bonnet--for in those days women _did_ wear bonnets. It was evident that she was not a fashionable young lady, for her whole dress showed a timid lagging behind the fashion.

When she had completed her little purchases Miss Stedman left the shop, and Captain Stanburne was disappointed, for she had given him no opportunity of seeing her face; but just as he was leaving she came back in some haste, and they met rather suddenly in the doorway. "I beg your pardon," said the Captain, making way for her--and then he got a look at her face. The look must have been agreeable to him, for when he saw a little glove lying on the mat in the doorway, he picked it up rather eagerly and presented it to the fair owner. "Is this your glove, Miss--Miss Stedman?"

Now Miss Stedman had never in her life been spoken to by a gentleman in military uniform, with a sword by his side, and the fact added to her confusion. It was odd, too, to hear him call her Miss Stedman, but it was not disagreeable, for he said it very nicely. There is an art of p.r.o.nouncing names so as to turn the commonest of them into t.i.tles of honor; and if Philip had said "your ladyship," he could not have said it more respectfully. So she thanked him for the glove with the warmth which comes of embarra.s.sment, and she blushed, and he bowed, and they saw no more of each other--that day.

It was a poor little glove--a poor little cheap thread glove; but all the finest and softest kids that lay in their perfumed boxes in the well-stocked shops of Sootythorn,--all the pale gray kids and pale yellow kids which the young shopmen so strongly recommended as "suitable for the present season,"--were forgotten in a month, whereas Alice Stedman's glove was remembered for years and years.

CHAPTER XV.

WITH THE MILITIA.

The officers met at the orderly-room, after which they all went to the parade-ground at once; the field-officers and the Adjutant on horseback, the rest on foot.

Philip Stanburne followed the others. He knew n.o.body except the Colonel and the Adjutant, who had just said "Good morning" to him in the orderly-room; but they had trotted on in advance, so he was left to his own meditations. It was natural that in pa.s.sing the bookseller's shop he should think of Miss Stedman, and he felt an absurd desire to go into the shop again and buy another pocket-book, as if by acting the scene over again he could cause the princ.i.p.al personage to reappear. "I don't think she's pretty," said Philip to himself--"at least, not really pretty; but she's a sweet girl. There's a simplicity about her that is very charming. Who would have thought that there was any thing so nice in Sootythorn?" Just as he was thinking this, Philip Stanburne pa.s.sed close to one of the blackest mills in the place--an old mill,--that is, a mill about thirty years old, for mills, like horses, age rapidly; and through the open windows there came a mixture of bad smells on the hot foul air, and a deafening roar of machinery, and above the roar of machinery a shrill clear woman's voice singing. The voice must have been one of great power, for it predominated over all the noises in the place; and it either was really a very sweet one or its harshness was lost in the noises, whilst it rose above them purified. Philip stopped to listen, and as he stopped, two other officers came up behind him.

The footpath was narrow, and as soon as he perceived that he impeded the circulation, Philip went on.

"That's one o' th' oudest mills i' Sootythorn," said one of the officers behind Captain Stanburne; "it's thirty year oud, if it's a day."

The broad Lancashire accent surprised Captain Stanburne, and attracted his attention. Could it be possible that there were officers in the regiment who spoke no better than that? Evidently this way of speaking was not confined to an individual officer, for the speaker's companion answered in the same tone,--

"Why, that's John Stedman's mill, isn't it?"

"John Stedman? John Stedman? it cannot be t' same as was foreman to my father toward thirty year sin'?"

When Philip Stanburne heard the name of Stedman, he listened attentively. The first speaker answered, "Yes, but it is--it's t' same man."

"Well, an' how is he? he must be well off. Has he any chilther?"

"Just one dorter, a nice quiet la.s.s, 'appen eighteen year old."

"So she's the daughter of a cotton-spinner," thought Philip, "and a Protestant cotton-spinner, most likely a bigot. Indeed, who ever heard of a Catholic cotton-spinner? I never did. I believe there aren't any.

But what queer fellows these are to be in the militia; they talk just like factory lads." Then, from a curiosity to see more of these extraordinary officers, and partly, no doubt, from a desire to cultivate the acquaintance of a man who evidently knew something about Miss Stedman, Philip left the causeway, and allowed the officers to come up with him.

"I beg your pardon," he said; "no doubt you are going to the parade-ground. Will you show me the way? I was following some officers who were in sight a minute or two since, but they turned a corner whilst I was not looking at them, and I have lost my guides."

To Captain Stanburne's surprise he was answered in very good English, with no more indication of the Lancashire accent than a clearly vibrated _r_, and a certain hardness in the other consonants, which gave a masculine vigor to the language, not by any means disagreeable. The aspirate, however, was too frequently omitted or misplaced.

"We are going straight to the parade-ground ourselves, so if you come with us you cannot go wrong." There was a short silence, and the same speaker continued, "The Colonel said we were to consider ourselves introduced. I know who you are--you're Captain Stanburne of Stanithburn Peel; and now I'll tell you who we are, both of us: I'm the Doctor--my name's Bardly. I don't look like a doctor, do I? Perhaps you are thinking that I don't look very like an officer either, though I'm dressed up as one. Well, perhaps I don't. This man here is called Isaac Ogden, and he lives at Twistle Farm, on a hill-top near Shayton, when he's at home."

This queer introduction, which was accompanied by the oddest changes of expression in the Doctor's face, and by a perpetual twinkle of humor in his gray eye, amused Philip Stanburne, and put him into a more genial frame of mind than his experience of the swell clique at breakfast-time.

Isaac Ogden asked Stanburne what company he had got, and on being told that it was number six, informed him that he himself was only a lieutenant.

"He's lieutenant in the grenadier company," said the Doctor, "and on Sunday morning we shall see him like a b.u.t.terfly with a pair of silver wings.[16] He's only a chrysalis to-day; his wings haven't budded yet.

He's very likely put 'em on in private--most of them put on their full uniform in private, as soon as ever it comes from the tailor's. It's necessary to try it on, you know--it _might_ not fit. The epaulettes would fit, though; but they generally take their epaulettes out of the tin box and put them on, to see how they look in the gla.s.s."

"Well, Doctor," said Stanburne, "I suppose you are describing from personal experience. When your own epaulettes came, you looked at yourself in the gla.s.s, I suppose."

Here an indescribably comic look irradiated Dr. Bardly's face. "You don't imagine that _I_ have laid out any money on epaulettes and such gear? The tailor tried to make me buy a full uniform, of course, but it didn't answer with me. What do I want with a red coat, and dangling silver fringes over my shoulders? I've committed one piece of tomfoolery, and that's enough--I've bought this sword; but a sword might just possibly be of use for a thief. There was a man in Shayton who had an old volunteer sword always by his bedside, and one night he put six inches of it into a burglar; so you see a sword _may_ be of use, but what can you do with a bit of silver fringe?"

"But I don't see how you are to do without a full uniform. How will you manage on field days, and how will you go to church on Sundays?"

"Get leave of absence on all such occasions," said the Doctor; "so long as I haven't a full uniform I have a good excuse." The fact was, that the Doctor's aversion to full dress came quite as much from a dislike to public ceremonies as from an objection to scarlet and silver in themselves. He had a youthful a.s.sistant in the regiment who was perfectly willing to represent the medical profession in all imaginable splendor, and who had already pa.s.sed three evenings in full uniform, surrounded by his brothers and sisters, and a group of admiring friends.

The day was a tiresome idle day for everybody except the Adjutant, who shouted till his throat was sore, and the sergeants, on whom fell the real work of the companies. After lunch, the important matter of billets had to be gone into, and it was discovered that it was impossible to lodge all the men in Sootythorn. One company, at least, must seek accommodation elsewhere. The junior captain must therefore submit, for this training, to be banished from the mess, and sent to eat his solitary beefsteak in some outlandish village, or, still worse, in some filthy and uncouth little manufacturing town. His appet.i.te, it is true, might so far benefit by the long marches to and from the parade-ground that the beefsteak might be eaten with the best of sauces; but the ordinary exercises of the regiment would have been sufficient to procure that, and the great efforts of Mr. Garley at the Thorn might have been relied upon for satisfying it. So the junior captain was ordered to take his men to Whittlecup, a dirty little town, of about six thousand inhabitants, four miles distant from Sootythorn; and the junior captain was Philip Stanburne.

Behold him, therefore, marching at the head of his rabble, for the men as yet had neither uniforms nor military bearing, on the dusty turnpike road! The afternoon had been uncommonly hot for the season of the year; and a military uniform, closely b.u.t.toned across the breast, and padded with cotton wool, is by no means the costume most suitable for the summer heats. There were so few lieutenants in the regiment (there was not one ensign) that a junior captain could not hope for a subaltern, and all the work of the company fell upon Philip Stanburne and his old sergeant. It was not easy to keep any thing like order amongst the men.

They quarrelled and fought during the march; and it became necessary to arrange them so as to keep enemies at a distance from each other. Still, by the time they reached the precincts of Whittlecup several of the men were adorned with black eyes; and as a few had been knocked down and tumbled in the dust by their comrades, the company presented rather the appearance of a rabble after a riot than of soldiers in her Majesty's service. Philip Stanburne's uniform was white with dust; but as the dust that alighted on his face was wetted by perspiration, it did not there remain a light-colored powder, but became a thick coat of dark paste.

Indeed, to tell the truth, the owner of Stanithburn had never been so dirty in his life.

Now there was a river at the entrance to Whittlecup, and over the river a bridge; and on the bridge, or in advance of it (for the factories had just loosed), there stood a crowd of about three thousand operatives awaiting the arrival of the militia-men.

The Lancashire operative is not accustomed to restrain the expression of his opinions from motives of delicacy, and any consideration for your feelings which he may have when isolated diminishes with the number of his companions. Three factory lads may content themselves with exchanging sarcastic remarks on your personal appearance when you are out of hearing, thirty will make them in your presence, three hundred will jeer you loudly; and from three thousand, if once you are unlucky enough to attract their attention, there will come such volleys of derision as n.o.body but a philosopher could bear with equanimity.

Not only was the road lined on both sides with work-people, but they blocked it up in front, and made way for the militia-men so slowly, that there was ample time for Philip Stanburne to hear every observation that was directed against him. Amidst the roars of laughter which the appearance of the men gave rise to, a thousand special commentaries might be distinguished.

"Them chaps sowdiers! Why, there's n.o.bbut one sowdier i' th' lot as I can see on."

"Where is he? I can see noan at o'."

"Cannot ta see th' felly wi' th' red jacket?"

"Eh, what a mucky lot!"

"They'll be right uns for fightin', for there's four on 'em 'as gotten black een to start wi'."

"Where's their guns?"

"They willn't trust 'em wi' guns. They'd be shootin' one another."

"There's one chap wi' a soourd."

"Why, that's th' officer."

"Eh, captain!" screamed a factory girl in Philip's ear, "I could like to gi' thee a kiss, but thou's getten sich a mucky face!"

"I wouldn't kiss him for foive shillin'," observed another.

"Eh, but I would!" said a third; "he's a nice young felly. I'll kiss him to-neet when he's washed hissel!"