White Lilac; or the Queen of the May Part 17

"Why, as to that, she's only a child, and makes no differ in the house, as you always say," remarked the farmer; "anyhow, I mean her to go to-morrow, and that's all about it."

Lilac went to bed that night with a heart full of grat.i.tude for her uncle's kindness, and delight at the promised visit; but her last thought before she slept was: "I'm sorry as how None-so-pretty has got to be sold."

CHAPTER NINE.

COMMON THINGS.

"...Find out men's wants and will And meet them there, all earthly joys grow less To the one joy of doing kindnesses."

_George Herbert_.

Lilac could hardly believe her own good fortune when nothing happened the next morning to prevent her visit, not even a cross word nor a complaint from her aunt, who seemed to have forgotten her objections of last night and to be quite pleased that she should go. Mrs Greenways put a small basket into her hand before she started, into which she had packed a chicken, a pot of honey, and a pat of fresh b.u.t.ter.

"There," she said, "that's a little something from Orchards Farm, tell him. The chick's our own rearing, and the honey's from Peter's bees, and the b.u.t.ter's fresh this morning."

She nodded and smiled good-naturedly; Joshua should see there was no stint at the farm. "Be back afore dusk," she called after Lilac as she watched her from the gate.

So there was nothing to spoil the holiday or to damp Lilac's enjoyment in any way, and she felt almost as merry as she used to be before she came to live in the valley, and had begun to have cares and troubles.

For one whole day she was going to be White Lilac again, with no anxieties about the b.u.t.ter; she would hear no peevish voices or wrangling disputes, she would have kindness and smiles and sunshine all round her, and the blue sky above. In this happy mood everything along the well-known road had new beauties, and when she turned up the hill and felt the keener air blow against her face, it was like the greeting of an old friend. The very flowers in the tall overgrown hedges were different to those which grew in the valley, and much sweeter; she pulled sprays of them as she went along until she had a large straggling bunch to carry as well as her basket, and so at last entered Joshua's cottage with both hands full.

"Now, Uncle Joshua," she said, when the first greetings over he had settled to his work again, "I've come to dinner with you, and I've brought it along with me, and until it's ready you're not to look once into the kitchen. You couldn't never guess what it is, so you needn't try; and you mustn't smell it more nor you can help while it's cooking."

It was a proud moment for Lilac when, the fowl being roasted to a turn, the table nicely laid, and the bunch of flowers put exactly in the middle, she led the cobbler up to the feast. Even if Joshua had smelt the fowl he concealed it very well, and his whole face expressed the utmost astonishment, while Lilac watched him in an ecstasy of delight.

"My word!" he exclaimed, "its fit for a king. I feel," looking down at his clothes, "as if I ought to have on my Sunday best."

Lilac was almost too excited to eat anything herself, and presently, when she saw Joshua pause after his first mouthful, she enquired anxiously:

"Isn't it good, Uncle?"

"Fact is," he answered, "it's _too_ good. I don't really feel as how I ought to eat such dillicate food. Not being ill, or weak, or anyway picksome in my appet.i.te."

"I made sure you'd say that," said Lilac triumphantly; "and I just made up my mind I'd cook it without telling what it was. You've got to eat it now, Uncle Joshua. You couldn't never be so ungrateful as to let it spoil."

"There's Mrs Wishing now," said Joshua, stilt hesitating, "a sickly ailing body as 'ud relish a morsel like this."

It was not until Lilac had set his mind at rest by promising to take some of the fowl to Mrs Wishing before she returned, that he was able to abandon himself to thorough enjoyment. Lilac knew then by his silence that her little feast was heartily appreciated, and she would not disturb him by a word, although there were many things she wanted to say. But at last Joshua had finished.

"A fatter fowl nor a finer, nor a better cooked one couldn't be," he said, as he laid down his knife and fork. "Not a bit o' dryness in the bird: juicy all through and as sweet as a nut."

Ready now for a little conversation, he puffed thoughtfully at his pipe while Lilac stood near washing the dishes and plates.

"It's thirty years ago," he said, speaking in a jerky voice so as not to interfere with the comfort of his pipe, "since I had a fowl for dinner-- and I mind very well when it was. It was my wedding-day. Away up in the north it was, and parson gave the feast."

"Was that when you used to play the clar'net in church, Uncle?" asked Lilac.

Joshua nodded.

"We was a clar'net and a fiddle and a ba.s.s viol," he said reflectively.

"Never kept time--the ba.s.s viol didn't. Couldn't never get it into his head. He wasn't never any shakes of a player--and he was a good feller too."

"Did they play at your wedding?" asked Lilac.

"They did that," he answered; "in church and likewise after the ceremony. Lor'! to hear how the ba.s.s viol did tag behind in _Rockingham_. I can hear him now. 'Twas like two solos being played, as one might say. No unity at all. I never hear that tune now but what it carries me back to my wedding-day and the ba.s.s viol; and the taste of that fowl's done the same thing. It's a most pecooliar thing, is the memory."

Lilac liked to hear Joshua talk about old days, but she was eager too to tell her own news. There was so much that he did not know: all about hay-harvest, and her b.u.t.ter-making, about Lenham fete, and her cousins, and, finally, all about None-so-pretty and Peter. "I do think," she added, "as how I like him best of any of 'em, for all they say he's so common."

"Common or uncommon, they'd do badly without him," muttered Joshua.

"He's the very prop and pillar of the place, is Peter; if a wall's strong enough to hold the roof up, you don't ask if it's made of marble or stone."

"Are common things bad things?" asked Lilac suddenly.

Joshua took his pipe out of his mouth and looked at her in some surprise.

"Common things--eh?" he repeated.

"Yes, Uncle," said Lilac hesitatingly, and trying to think of how to make it clear. But she could only add:

"They call the pigs common too."

"Well, as to pigs," said Joshua, "I wish they was commoner still. I don't despise a bit of bacon myself. I call that a good thing anyhow.

When one comes to look at it," he continued after a few puffs at his pipe, "the best things of all is common. The things as is under our feet and nigh to our hand and easy to be got. There's the flowers now-- the common ones which grow so low as any child can pick 'em in the fields, daisies and such. There's the blue sky as we can all see, poor as well as rich. There's rain and sunshine and air and a heap else as belongs to all alike, and which we couldn't do without. The common things is the best things, don't you make any mistake about that.

There's your own name now--Lilac. It's a common bush lilac is; it grows every bit as well in a little bit of garden nigh the road as in a grand park, and it hasn't no rare colours to take the eye. And yet on a sunshiny day after rain the folks pa.s.sing'll say, 'Whatever is it as smells so beautiful?' Why it's just the common lilac bush. You ought to be like that in a manner of speaking--not to try and act clever and smart so as to make folks stare, but to be good-tempered and peaceful and loving, so as they say when you leave 'em, 'What made the place so pleasant? Why, it was Lilac White. She ain't anything out of the common, but we miss her now she's gone--'"

The frequent mention of her name reminded Lilac of something she wanted to say, and she broke in suddenly:

"Why, I've never thought to thank you, Uncle, for all that bloom you got me on May Day. What a long way back it do seem!"

Joshua looked perplexed.

"What's the child talking on?" he said. "I didn't get no flowers."

"Whoever in all the world could it a been then?" said Lilac slowly.

"You're sure you haven't forgotten, Uncle Joshua?"

"Sartain sure!"

"You didn't ask no one to get it?"

"Never mentioned a word to a livin' bein'." Lilac stared thoughtfully at the cobbler, who had now gone back to his little shed and was hard at work.

"P'r'aps, then," she said, "'twarn't you neither who sent Mother's cactus down to the farm?"

"Similarly," replied he, "it certainly was _not_; so you've got more friends than you reckoned for, you see."

Lilac stood in the doorway, her bonnet dangling in one hand, her eyes fixed absently on Joshua's brown fingers.

"I made sure," she said, "as how it was you. I couldn't think as there was anybody else to mind."