Our Little Lady Part 12

"Not at all, my son."

"Ah! you'd best go home, I reckon."

"What meanest thou?" asked Father Thomas, feeling much amused at the very unusual style of Dan's reception.

"Well!" said Dan, pa.s.sing his fingers through his hair, "I mean, if that's the way you was fetched up, you don't know the animal you've got to deal with here. There's five dragons i' that house o' mine: and each on 'em's got teeth and claws, and they knows how to use 'em, they does.

If one on 'em wern't a bit better nor t'others, and did not come and stand by me now and then, I should ne'er ha' lived to talk to you this even. Nay, I shouldn't! Best go home, Father, while you've getten a coat on your back, and some hair on your head."

"Is it so bad as that?"

"Ah, it is!" was Dan's short but emphatic reply.

"But surely, my son, thy wife would never use a man ill that meant her good?"

"Think she'll stop to ask your meanin'?" said Dan, with a contemptuous grunt. "If she's not changed sin' I come fro' dinner, she'll be a-top of you before you can say 'mercy.' And she's none a comfortable thing to have a-top of you, I give you fair warning."

"How was she at supper, then?--no better?"

"Supper! I durstn't go in for no supper. I likes hunger better nor a fray. Happen El'nor 'll steal out to me with a crust after dark. She does, sometimes."

"And how long does it take thy wife to cool down?"

Dan rubbed his forehead with his blackened hand.

"I was wed to her," said he, "th' year afore the great frost, if you know when that were--and I'd better have been fruz, a deal. I've had it mortal hot ever since. She's had that time to cool down in, and she's no cooler nor she were then. Rather, if either, t'other way on, I reckon."

Before Father Thomas could reply, the shrillest scream that had ever met his ears came out of the window of the smithy.

"Ankaret!" it said. "Ankaret! An-ka-ret!"

"Ha! That's Her!" whispered Dan, as if he were awed by the sound.

An answering scream, as shrill, but scarcely so loud, came from the neighbouring cottage.

"Whatever do you want now?" said the second shriek.

"What dost thou yonder, thou slatternly minx?" returned the first.

"I'll mash every bone of thee, if thou doesn't come in this minute!"

"Then I sha'n't!" shrieked the second voice. "Two can play at that."

"Who is Ankaret?" asked Father Thomas of the smith.

"She's th' eldest o' th' dragons--that's our Ank'ret," said Dan in the same half-frightened whisper. "If you mun face Her, you'd best do it while Ank'ret's next door: both on 'em's too much for any man. Th'

Angel Gabriel couldn't match the pair on 'em: leastwise, if he comes down to axe me, _I_ sha'n't send him forward. And don't you go and say I sent you, now. For pity's sake, don't!"

Father Thomas walked off, and knocked at the house door. He was beginning to think that if the former part of his task had been easier than he expected, the latter was going to prove more difficult. The door was opened by a young woman.

"Good day, my daughter. Is thy mother within?"

"She's here, Father. Pray you, come in."

The priest stepped inside, and sat down on a bench. For those times, the house was comfortable, and it was very clean. The young woman disappeared, and presently a pair of heavy boots came clattering down the stairs, and Father Thomas felt pretty sure that the sweet Filomena herself stood before him.

"Now then, what do _you_ want?" quoth she, in a tone which did not sound as if she were delighted to see her visitor.

"My daughter, I am a priest," said Father Thomas gently; "and I am come to see thee for thy good."

"I've got eyes!" snapped Filomena. "Can't I see you're a priest?

What's the good of such as you? Fat, lazy fellows that lives on the best o' the land, wrung out of the hard earnings o' the poor, and never does a stroke o' work theirselves, but sits a-twirling o' their thumbs all day long. That's what you are--the whole boiling of you! Get you out o' my house, or I'll help you!"

And Filomena took up a formidable-looking mop which stood in the corner, as if to let the priest clearly understand the sort of help which she proposed to give him. She had tried this style of reception when the Vicar took the liberty of calling on her some months before, with the result that the appalled gentleman in question never ventured to renew his visit, and told the anecdote with many shakes of the head over "that she-bear up at the smithy." She understood how to deal with a man of the Vicar's stamp, and she mistakenly fancied that all priests were of his sort. Sadly too many of them were such lazy, careless, self-indulgent men, who, having just done as much work as served to prevent the Bishop or their consciences (when they kept any) from becoming troublesome, let all the rest go, and thought their duty done.

But Father Thomas, as the Vicar had said, was cut from another kind of stuff. Very sensitive to rudeness or unkindness, his feelings were not permitted to override his duty of perseverance: and while he dearly loved peace, he was not ready to buy it at the cost of something more valuable than itself. While he might be slow to see his duty, yet once seen, it would not escape him again.

The personal taunts which Filomena had launched at him he simply put aside as not worth an answer. They did not apply to him. He was neither fat nor lazy: and if Filomena were so ignorant as to fancy that the clergy were paid out of the earnings of the poor, what did it matter, when he knew they were not? He went straight to the root of the thing. His words were gentle enough, but his tone was one of authority.

"Daughter, what an unhappy woman thou art!"

Filomena's fingers slowly unclosed from the mop, which fell back into the corner. Father Thomas said no more: he merely kept his eyes upon her. His calm dignity took effect at last. Her angry eyes fell before his unchanged look. She was not accustomed to hear her abuse answered in this manner.

"I just am!" she muttered with intense bitterness.

"Dost thou wish to be happy?"

"That's none for the like of us. It's only for rich folks, isn't that,--folks as has all they wants, and a bit over."

"No man has that," said Father Thomas, "except the little children who sit at the feet of Jesus Christ. Become thou as a little child, and happiness shall come to seek thee."

"Me a little child!" There was no merriment in the laugh which accompanied the words.

"Ay, even thou. For 'if there be a new creature in Christ, old things pa.s.s away; behold, all things are made new.' [Note. 3 Corinthians five 17, Vulgate version.] That is the very childhood, my daughter--to be made new. Will thou have it? It may be had for the asking, if it be asked of G.o.d by a true heart--that childhood of grace, which is meek, patient, gentle, loving, obedient, humble. For it is not thou that canst conquer Satan, but Christ in thee, that shall first conquer thee.

Thou in Christ--this is safety: Christ in thee--here is strength. Seek, and thou shalt find. Farewell."

And without giving Filomena time to answer, Father Thomas turned away, and was lost in a moment behind the bushes which separated the cottage from the smithy. She stood for a minute where he left her, as if she had been struck to stone. The whole style of his address was to her something completely new, and so unlike anything she had expected that for once in her life she was at a loss.

Filomena took up the corner of her ap.r.o.n and wiped her forehead, as if she were settling her brains into their places.

"Well, that's a queer set-out!" said she at last, to n.o.body, for she was left alone. "Me a baby! Whatever would the fellow be at? I reckon I was one once. Eh, but it would be some queer to get back again! What did he say? 'Meek, patient, gentle, loving, obedient, humble.'

_That's_ not me! Old Dan wouldn't think he'd picked up his own wife, if I were made new o' that fas.h.i.+on. It didn't sound so bad, though.

Wonder how it 'd be if I tried it! That chap said it would make me happy. I'm none that, neither, nor haven't been these many years. Eh deary me! to think of me a baby!"

While these extremely new ideas were seething in Filomena's mind, Father Thomas reached the smithy.

"Glad to see you!" said Dan, laying down his hammer. "You did not 'bide so long!" with a grim smile.

"Long enough," said the priest shortly.

"I believe you! If you wasn't glad to get your back turned, you liked a tussle wi' a dragon better nor most folks. Was she white-hot, or no-but [Only] red? El'nor, she came down to me while you was in there, wi' a hunch o' bread and cheese, and she said it were gettin' smoother a bit nor it had been most part o' th' day. What said she to you?"