The Belton Estate Part 4

"Nothing shall be done, sir, that you don't approve. I'll just manage it all as if I was acting as your own--bailiff." "Son," he was going to say, but he remembered the fate of his cousin Charles just in time to prevent the use of the painful word.

"I don't want to have anything done," said Mr. Amedroz.

"Then nothing shall be done. We'll just mend a fence or two, to keep in the cattle, and leave other things as they are. But perhaps Clara will walk out with me all the same."

Clara was quite ready to walk out, and had already tied on her hat and taken her parasol.

"Your father is a little nervous," said he, as soon as they were beyond hearing of the house.

"Can you wonder at it, when you remember all that he has suffered?"

"I don't wonder at it in the least; and I don't wonder at his disliking me either."

"I don't think he dislikes you, Mr. Belton."

"Oh, but he does. Of course he does. I'm the heir to the place instead of you. It is natural that he should dislike me. But I'll live it down. You see if I don't. I'll make him so fond of me, he'll always want to have me here. I don't mind a little dislike to begin with."

"You're a wonderful man, Mr. Belton."

"I wish you wouldn't call me Mr. Belton. But of course you must do as you please about that. If I can make him call me Will, I suppose you'll call me so too."

"Oh, yes; then I will."

"It don't much matter what a person is called; does it? Only one likes to be friendly with one's friends. I suppose you don't like my calling you Clara."

"Now you've begun you had better go on."

"I mean to. I make it a rule never to go back in the world. Your father is half sorry that he has agreed about the place; but I shan't let him off now. And I'll tell you what. In spite of what he says, I'll have it as different as possible before this time next year.

Why, there's lots of timber that ought to come out of the plantation; and there's places where the roots want stubbing up horribly. These things always pay for themselves if they are properly done. Any good done in the world always pays." Clara often remembered those words afterwards when she was thinking of her cousin's character. Any good done in the world always pays!

"But you mustn't offend my father, even though it should do good,"

she said.

"I understand," he answered. "I won't tread on his toes. Where do you get your milk and b.u.t.ter?"

"We buy them."

"From Stovey, I suppose."

"Yes; from Mr. Stovey. It goes against the rent."

"And it ought to go against the grain too,--living in the country and paying for milk! I'll tell you what I'll do. I'll give you a cow.

It shall be a little present from me to you." He said nothing of the more important present which this would entail upon him in the matter of the gra.s.s for the cow; but she understood the nature of the arrangement, and was anxious to prevent it.

"Oh, Mr. Belton, I think we'd better not attempt that," she said.

"But we will attempt it. I've pledged myself to do nothing to oppose your father; but I've made no such promise as to you. We'll have a cow before I'm many days older. What a pretty place this is! I do like these rocks so much, and it is such a comfort to be off the flat."

"It is pretty."

"Very pretty. You've no conception what an ugly place Plaistow is.

The land isn't actual fen now, but it was once. And it's quite flat.

And there is a great dike, twenty feet wide, oozing through it,--just oozing, you know; and lots of little dikes, at right angles with the big one. And the fields are all square. And there are no hedges,--and hardly a tree to be seen in the place."

"What a picture you have drawn! I should commit suicide if I lived there."

"Not if you had so much to do as I have."

"And what is the house like?"

"The house is good enough,--an old-fas.h.i.+oned manor-house, with high brick chimneys, and brick gables, tiled all over, and large square windows set in stone. The house is good enough, only it stands in the middle of a farm-yard. I said there were no trees, but there is an avenue."

"Come, that's something."

"It was an old family seat, and they used to have avenues in those days; but it doesn't lead up to the present hall door. It comes sideways up to the farm-yard; so that the whole thing must have been different once, and there must have been a great court-yard.

In Elizabeth's time Plaistow Manor was rather a swell place, and belonged to some Roman Catholics who came to grief, and then the Howards got it. There's a whole history about it, only I don't much care about those things."

"And is it yours now?"

"It's between me and my uncle, and I pay him rent for his part. He's a clergyman you know, and he has a living in Lincolns.h.i.+re,--not far off."

"And do you live alone in that big house?"

"There's my sister. You've heard of Mary;--haven't you?"

Then Clara remembered that there was a Miss Belton,--a poor sickly creature, with a twisted spine and a hump back, as to whose welfare she ought to have made inquiries.

"Oh, yes; of course," said Clara. "I hope she's better than she used to be,--when we heard of her."

"She'll never be better. But then she does not become much worse.

I think she does grow a little weaker. She's older than I am, you know,--two years older; but you would think she was quite an old woman to look at her." Then, for the next half-hour, they talked about Mary Belton as they visited every corner of the place. Belton still had an eye to business as he went on talking, and Clara remarked how many sticks he moved as he went, how many stones he kicked on one side, and how invariably he noted any defect in the fences. But still he talked of his sister, swearing that she was as good as gold, and at last wiping away the tears from his eyes as he described her maladies. "And yet I believe she is better off than any of us," he said, "because she is so good." Clara began to wish that she had called him Will from the beginning, because she liked him so much. He was just the man to have for a cousin,--a true loving cousin, stalwart, self-confident, with a grain or two of tyranny in his composition as becomes a man in relation to his intimate female relatives; and one, moreover, with whom she could trust herself to be familiar without any danger of love-making! She saw his character clearly, and told herself that she understood it perfectly. He was a jewel of a cousin, and she must begin to call him Will as speedily as possible.

At last they came round in their walk to the gate leading into Colonel Askerton's garden; and here in the garden, close to the gate, they found Mrs. Askerton. I fancy that she had been watching for them, or at any rate watching for Clara, so that she might know how her friend was carrying herself with her cousin. She came at once to the wicket, and there she was introduced by Clara to Mr. Belton. Mr.

Belton as he made his bow muttered something awkwardly, and seemed to lose his self-possession for the moment. Mrs. Askerton was very gracious to him, and she knew well how to be both gracious and ungracious. She talked about the scenery, and the charms of the old place, and the dullness of the people around them, and the inexpediency of looking for society in country places; till after awhile Mr. Belton was once more at his ease.

"How is Colonel Askerton?" asked Clara.

"He's in-doors. Will you come and see him? He's reading a French novel, as usual. It's the only thing he ever does in summer. Do you ever read French novels, Mr. Belton?"

"I read very little at all, and when I do I read English."

"Ah, you're a man who has a pursuit in life, no doubt."

"I should rather think so,--that is, if you mean, by a pursuit, earning my bread. A man has not much time for French novels with a thousand acres of land on his hands; even if he knew how to read French, which I don't."

"But you're not always at work on your farm?"

"It's pretty constant, Mrs. Askerton. Then I shoot, and hunt."