Rewards and Fairies Part 11

'"And I meant to kill Hal," says Benedetto. "Master, I meant to kill him because the English King had made him a knight."

'"Ah!" says the Master, shaking his finger. "Benedetto, if you had killed my Hal, I should have killed you--in the cloister. But you are a craftsman too, so I should have killed you like a craftsman, very, very slowly--in an hour, if I could spare the time!" That was Torrigiano--the Master!'

Mr. Springett sat quite still for some time after Hal had finished. Then he turned dark red; then he rocked to and fro; then he coughed and wheezed till the tears ran down his face. Dan knew by this that he was laughing, but it surprised Hal at first.

'Excuse me, sir,' said Mr. Springett, 'but I was thinkin' of some stables I built for a gentleman in Eighteen hundred Seventy-four. They was stables in blue brick--very particular work. Dunno as they weren't the best job which ever I'd done. But the gentleman's lady--she'd come from Lunnon, new married--she was all for buildin' what she called a haw-haw--what you an' me 'ud call a dik--right acrost his park. A middlin' big job which I'd have had the contract of, for she spoke to me in the library about it. But I told her there was a line o' springs just where she wanted to dig her ditch, an' she'd flood the park if she went on.'

'Were there any springs at all?' said Hal.

'Bound to be springs everywhere if you dig deep enough, ain't there? But what I said about the springs put her out o' conceit o' diggin'

haw-haws, an' she took an' built a white tile dairy instead. But when I sent in my last bill for the stables, the gentleman he paid it 'thout even lookin' at it, and I hadn't forgotten nothin', I do a.s.sure you.

More than that, he slips two five-pound notes into my hand in the library, an' "Ralph," he says--he allers called me by name--"Ralph," he says, "you've saved me a heap of expense an' trouble this autumn." I didn't say nothin', o' course. I knowed he didn't want any haw-haws digged acrost his park no more'n _I_ did, but I never said nothing. No more he didn't say nothing about my blue-brick stables, which was really the best an' honestest piece o' work I'd done in quite a while. He give me ten pounds for savin' him a hem of a deal o' trouble at home. I reckon things are pretty much alike, all times, in all places.'

Hal and he laughed together. Dan couldn't quite understand what they thought so funny, and went on with his work for some time without speaking.

When he looked up, Mr. Springett, alone, was wiping his eyes with his green and yellow pocket-handkerchief.

'Bless me, Mus' Dan, I've been asleep,' he said. 'An' I've dreamed a dream which has made me laugh--laugh as I ain't laughed in a long day.

I can't remember what 'twas all about, but they do say that when old men take to laughin' in their sleep, they're middlin' ripe for the next world. Have you been workin' honest, Mus' Dan?'

'Ra-ather,' said Dan, unclamping the schooner from the vice. 'And look how I've cut myself with the small gouge.'

'Ye-es. You want a lump o' cobwebs to that,' said Mr. Springett. 'Oh, I see you've put it on already. That's right, Mus' Dan.'

KING HENRY VII. AND THE s.h.i.+PWRIGHTS

Harry our King in England, from London town is gone, And comen to Hamull on the Hoke in the countie of Suthampton.

For there lay _The Mary of the Tower_, his s.h.i.+p of war so strong, And he would discover, certaynely, if his s.h.i.+pwrights did him wrong.

He told not none of his setting forth, nor yet where he would go, (But only my Lord of Arundel,) and meanly did he show, In an old jerkin and patched hose that no man might him mark; With his frieze hood and cloak about, he looked like any clerk.

He was at Hamull on the Hoke about the hour of the tide, And saw the _Mary_ haled into dock, the winter to abide, With all her tackle and habiliments which are the King his own; But then ran on his false s.h.i.+pwrights and stripped her to the bone.

They heaved the main-mast overboard, that was of a trusty tree, And they wrote down it was spent and lost by force of weather at sea.

But they sawen it into planks and strakes as far as it might go, To maken beds for their own wives and little children also.

There was a knave called Slingawai, he crope beneath the deck, Crying: 'Good felawes, come and see! The s.h.i.+p is nigh a wreck!

For the storm that took our tall main-mast, it blew so fierce and fell, Alack! it hath taken the kettles and pans, and this bra.s.s pott as well!'

With that he set the pott on his head and hied him up the hatch, While all the s.h.i.+pwrights ran below to find what they might s.n.a.t.c.h; All except Bob Brygandyne and he was a yeoman good, He caught Slingawai round the waist and threw him on to the mud.

'I have taken plank and rope and nail, without the King his leave, After the custom of Portesmouth, but I will not suffer a thief.

Nay, never lift up thy hand at me! There's no clean hands in the trade-- Steal in measure,' quo' Brygandyne. 'There's measure in all things made!'

'Gramercy, yeoman!' said our King. 'Thy council liketh me.'

And he pulled a whistle out of his neck and whistled whistles three.

Then came my Lord of Arundel p.r.i.c.king across the down, And behind him the Mayor and Burgesses of merry Suthampton town.

They drew the naughty s.h.i.+pwrights up, with the kettles in their hands, And bound them round the forecastle to wait the King's commands.

But 'Since ye have made your beds,' said the King, 'ye needs must lie thereon.

For the sake of your wives and little ones--felawes, get you gone!'

When they had beaten Slingawai, out of his own lips, Our King appointed Brygandyne to be Clerk of all his s.h.i.+ps.

'Nay, never lift up thy hands to me--there's no clean hands in the trade.

But steal in measure,' said Harry our King. 'There's measure in all things made!'

_G.o.d speed the 'Mary of the Tower,' the 'Sovereign' and 'Grace Dieu,'

The 'Sweepstakes' and the 'Mary Fortune,' and the 'Henry of Bristol' too!

All tall s.h.i.+ps that sail on the sea, or in our harbours stand, That they may keep measure with Harry our King and peace in Engeland!_

Marklake Witches

THE WAY THROUGH THE WOODS

They shut the road through the woods Seventy years ago.

Weather and rain have undone it again, And now you would never know There was once a road through the woods Before they planted the trees.

It is underneath the coppice and heath, And the thin anemones.

Only the keeper sees That, where the ring-dove broods, And the badgers roll at ease, There was once a road through the woods.

Yet, if you enter the woods Of a summer evening late, When the night-air cools on the trout-ringed pools Where the otter whistles his mate.

(They fear not men in the woods Because they see so few) You will hear the beat of a horse's feet And the swish of a skirt in the dew, Steadily cantering through The misty solitudes, As though they perfectly knew The old lost road through the woods....

But there is no road through the woods.

Marklake Witches

When Dan took up boat-building, Una coaxed Mrs. Vincey, the farmer's wife at Little Lindens, to teach her to milk. Mrs. Vincey milks in the pasture in summer, which is different from milking in the shed, because the cows are not tied up, and until they know you they will not stand still. After three weeks Una could milk _Red Cow_ or _Kitty Shorthorn_ quite dry, without her wrists aching, and then she allowed Dan to look.

But milking did not amuse him, and it was pleasanter for Una to be alone in the quiet pastures with quiet-spoken Mrs. Vincey. So, evening after evening, she slipped across to Little Lindens, took her stool from the fern-clump beside the fallen oak, and went to work, her pail between her knees, and her head pressed hard into the cow's flank. As often as not, Mrs. Vincey would be milking cross _Pansy_ at the other end of the pasture, and would not come near till it was time to strain and pour off.

Once, in the middle of a milking, _Kitty Shorthorn_ boxed Una's ear with her tail.

'You old pig!' said Una, nearly crying, for a cow's tail can hurt.

'Why didn't you tie it down, child?' said a voice behind her.