The Squirrel Inn Part 22

Mrs. Cristie's arrangement for the return pleased everybody except Lanigan Beam. The nurse-maid was perfectly willing to go in the village cart, and was not at all afraid of horses, and Walter Lodloe had no objection to sit on the back seat of the wagon with his lady-love, and help take care of the baby. Lanigan made few remarks about the situation; he saw that he had made a mistake, and was being punished for it, and without remonstrance he took the front seat and the reins of the grays.

XXIV

TRANSLATIONS

Lanigan Beam had no more fear of Mr. Tippengray as a rival than he would have had of Mr. Petter, but the apportionment of companions for the return trip nettled him a good deal, and, as a consequence of this, the pair of grays traveled homeward at a smarter pace, and Hammerstein and the village cart were soon left far behind.

The road was not the one by which Mr. Tippengray had arrived on the scene, but led through the woods to the main road, which it joined at a point not far from the sign of the Squirrel Inn. Hammerstein traveled very quietly and steadily of his own accord, slackening his gait at the rough places, thus giving Mr. Tippengray every opportunity for an uninterrupted converse with his fellow scholar; and he lost no time in submitting to her his Greek version of the lines from "Pickwick."

"I am very glad you have it with you," said Ida, "for I put my Greek dictionary in my pocket this morning, when I first came down, hoping to have a chance to do some translating, and what better chance could I have than this?"

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE TRANSLATION.]

Drawing out her dictionary and a little blank-book she immediately began her labors. Mr. Tippengray did not altogether like this. He felt an intense and somewhat novel desire to converse with the young woman on no matter what subject, and he would have preferred that she should postpone the translation. But he would not interrupt the engrossing occupation into which she now plunged with ardor. Rapidly turning backward and forward the leaves of the little dictionary, and tapping her front teeth with her pencil as she puzzled over the correlation of Greek and English words and expressions, she silently pursued her work.

Although he did not talk to her, it was very pleasant for Mr. Tippengray to sit and look upon this fair young scholar. At her request he made the tall steed walk, in order that her pencil might not be too much joggled, slyly thinking, the while, that thus the interview would be prolonged. The air was warm and balmy. Everything was still about them.

They met no one, and every minute Mr. Tippengray became more and more convinced that, next to talking to her, there could be no greater joy in life than basking in the immediate atmosphere of this girl.

At last she shut up her dictionary.

"Now, then!" she exclaimed, "I have translated it, and I a.s.sure you that it is a fair and square version, for I do not in the least remember the original paragraph."

"I have the original here," said Mr. Tippengray, pulling the second volume of "Pickwick" from his pocket, "and we will compare it with your translation, if you will be so good as to read it. You do not know with what anxious enthusiasm I await the result."

"And I, too," said Ida, earnestly. "I do not think there could be a better test of the power of the Greek language to embalm and preserve for future generations the spirit of d.i.c.kens. Now I will read, and you can compare my work with the original as I go on."

The translation ran thus:

"For the reason that he who drives a vehicle of the post-road holds high office above the ma.s.ses," to him answered the Sire Weller with eyes affiliated; "for the reason that he who drives a vehicle of the post-road acteth at will, undoubted, humanity otherwise prohibited. For the reason that he who drives a vehicle of the post-road is able to look with affection on a woman of eighty far distant, though it is not publicly believed that in the midst of any it is his desire to wed. Among males which one discourseth similarly, Sammy?"

"I wrote Sammy," she explained, "because I remembered that is the way the name is used in English."

Mr. Tippengray raised his eyebrows very high, and his chin slowly began to approach the sailor knot of his cravat.

"Oh, dear," he said, "I am afraid that this would not express to future ages the spirit and style of d.i.c.kens. The original pa.s.sage runs thus,"

and he read:

"'Cos a coachman's a privileged individual," replied Mr.

Weller, looking fixedly at his son. "'Cos a coachman may do without suspicion wot other men may not; 'cos a coachman may be on the very amicablest terms with eighty mile o' females and yet n.o.body thinks that he ever means to marry any vun among 'em. And wot other man can say the same, Sammy?"

"They are not much alike, are they?" said Miss Mayberry. "I think if d.i.c.kens could read my translation he would not in the least recognize it. The fact is, Mr. Tippengray, I do not believe that your method of Greek pickling will answer to preserve our fiction for the future. It may do for histories and scientific work, but when you come to dialect and vernacular, if you once get it into Greek you can never get it back again as it used to be."

"That will be a great pity," said Mr. Tippengray, "for fiction makes up such a large part of our literature. And it does seem that good English might be properly translated into good Greek."

"Oh, it isn't the translation," said Ida; "that is all easy enough: it's the resurrection back into the original condition. Look at the prophet Enoch. He was translated, but if it were possible now to bring him back again, he would not be the same Enoch, you know."

"One might infer from that simile," said the Greek scholar, smiling, "that when a bit of English gets into Greek it goes to heaven, and would better stay there. Perhaps you are right in what you say about fiction.

Anyway it is very pleasant to talk with one who can appreciate this subject, and reason sensibly about it."

Mr. Tippengray shut up his book and put it back into his pocket, while his companion tore her translation from her note-book and scattered it in little bits along the road.

"I would not like it," she said, "if any one but you were to read that and know I did it."

Mr. Tippengray's eyes and Mr. Tippengray's heart turned towards her.

Those words, "any one but you," touched him deeply. He had a feeling as if he were being translated into something better than his original self, and that this young woman was doing it. He wished to express this in some way, and to say a good many other things which came crowding upon his mind, but he expressed nothing and said none of these things.

An exclamation from Ida caused him to look in front of him, and there was the spring wagon with the horses standing still.

Mrs. Cristie turned round and called to them:

"Mr. Beam says that there are some by-roads just ahead of us, and as he was afraid you might turn into one and get lost, he thought it better to wait for you."

"Nonsense!" cried Miss Mayberry; "there was no danger that we would turn into any by-ways. The road is plain enough."

"I'm not so sure of that," said Mr. Tippengray to himself. "I think that just now I was on the point of turning into a by-way."

The wagon now moved slowly on, and the village cart followed. Mr.

Tippengray would gladly have dropped a good deal behind, but he found this not practicable, because whenever he made Hammerstein walk Stolzenfels and Falkenberg also walked. It was plain enough that Lanigan Beam did not wish any longer to cut himself off from the society of the lady to whom he had made a proposal of marriage, and whenever he could find a pretext, which was not difficult for Lanigan, he called back to her to direct her attention to something, or to ask her opinion about something. Miss Mayberry did not respond with any readiness, but the persistence of the young man succeeded in making the conversation a general one, and the Greek scholar made no attempt to explain to the nurse-maid that he was in course of translation.

Dinner was very late at the Squirrel Inn that day, and Mrs. Petter gave her guests a scolding. But this did not in the least disturb the mind of Mr. Tippengray, who was well used to being scolded for coming late to his meals. But something else disturbed him, and for nearly an hour after dinner he wandered about the lawn and around the house. He wanted very much to see Miss Mayberry again, and to tell her the things he did not have a chance to tell her on the road, and he also very much wished to prevent that rascally Lanigan Beam from getting ahead of him, and continuing his broken-off interview with the lady.

XXV

MR. TIPPENGRAY MOUNTS HIGH

It seemed as if every one must be taking an afternoon nap, for the Greek scholar had the grounds to himself. When he began to be tired of walking, he seated himself where he had a good view of the house, and presently saw Ida Mayberry at her window, with the young Douglas in her arms. Almost at the same moment he saw Lanigan Beam approaching from the direction of the barns.

"If he turns his steps towards that window," thought the scholar, "I shall see to it that I am there before him."

But the young man did not walk towards the front of the house, but went in the direction of his room, where the ladder stood leaning against the open window. Mounting this, he disappeared within.

The eyes of Mr. Tippengray flashed, and his face was lighted by a bright thought. In an instant he was on his feet and running lightly towards Lanigan's room. Cautiously and silently he approached the ladder; deftly, and without making the least noise, he moved the upper end of it from the side of the building, and then, putting it on his shoulder, gently walked away with it.

Around to the front of the house Mr. Tippengray carried the ladder, and boldly placed it nearly upright, under Miss Mayberry's window. In astonishment that young lady looked out, and asked him what in the world he was doing.

"I want to speak to you," said Mr. Tippengray, "on a subject of great importance, and I cannot afford to lose this opportunity. May I come up?"

"Certainly," said Ida.

In a moment the Greek scholar was standing on one of the upper rounds of the ladder, with his head and shoulders well above the window-sill.

Little Douglas was delighted to see him, and, taking hold of his outstretched forefinger, gave it a good wag.