Aunt Rachel Part 2

"Joseph Beaker," said the Earl of Barfield, shaking his hand at the lop-sided man, "you are late again. I have been waiting ten minutes."

"What did I say yesterday?" asked Joseph Beaker. His face was lop-sided, like his figure, and his speech came in a hollow mumble which was difficult to follow. Joseph was content to pa.s.s as the harmless lunatic of the parish, but there was a shrewdly humorous twinkle in his eye which damaged his pretensions with the more discerning sort of people.

"I do not want to know what you said yesterday," his lords.h.i.+p answered, tartly. "Take up the billhook and the saw. Now bring the ladder."

"What I said yesterday," mumbled Joseph, shambling by the n.o.bleman's side, a little in the rear.

"Joseph Beaker," said the earl, "hold your tongue."

"Niver could do it," replied Joseph; "it slips from betwixt the thumb and finger like a eel. What I said yesterday was, 'Why doesn't thee set thy watch by the parish church?' Thee'st got Barfield time, I reckon, and Barfield's allays a wick and ten minutes afore other placen."

The aged n.o.bleman twinkled and took snuff.

"Joseph," said his lords.h.i.+p, "I am going to make a new arrangement with you."

"Time you did," returned Joseph, pausing, ostensibly to s.h.i.+ft the ladder from one shoulder to the other, but really to feign indifference.

"I find ninepence a day too much."

"I've allays said so," Joseph answered, shambling a little nearer. "A sinful sight too much. And half on it wasted o' them white garmints."

"I find myself a little in want of exercise," said his lords.h.i.+p. "I shall carry the ladder from the first tree to the second, and you will carry it from the second to the third; then I shall carry it again, and then _you_ will carry it again. We shall go on in that way the whole afternoon, and shall continue in that way so long as I stay here."

Joseph laughed. It was in his laugh that he chiefly betrayed the shortcomings of character. His smile was dry and full of cunning, but his laugh was fatuous.

"Naturally," pursued the earl, "I shall not pay you full wages for a half-day's work." Joseph's face fell into a look of ludicrous consternation. "I shall be generous, however--I shall be generous. I shall give you sixpence. Sixpence a day, Joseph, and I shall do half the work myself."

"It ar'n't to be done, gaffer," said Joseph, resolutely stopping short, and setting up the ladder in the roadway.

The old n.o.bleman turned to face him with pretended anger.

"You are impertinent, Joseph."

"It caw't be done, my lord," his a.s.sistant mumbled, thrusting his head through a s.p.a.ce in the ladder.

"Times are hard, Joseph," returned his lords.h.i.+p.

There had been a discernible touch of banter in his voice and manner when he had rebuked Joseph a second or two before, but he was very serious now indeed.

"Times are hard; expenses must be cut down. I can't afford more.

Sixpence a day is three s.h.i.+llings a week, and three s.h.i.+llings a week is one hundred and fifty-six s.h.i.+llings a year--seven pounds sixteen. That is interest at three per cent, on a sum of two hundred and fifty-nine pounds ten s.h.i.+llings. That is a great amount to lie waste. While I pay you sixpence a day I am practically two hundred and fifty-nine pounds ten s.h.i.+llings poorer than I should be if I kept the sixpence a day to myself. I might just as well not have the money--it is of no use to me."

"Gi'e it to me, then," suggested Joseph, with a feeble gleam.

"Sixpence a day," said his lords.h.i.+p, "is really a great waste of money."

"It's cruel hard o' me," returned Joseph, betraying a sudden inclination to whimper. "If I was a lord I'd be a lord, I would."

"Joseph! Joseph! Joseph!" cried his lords.h.i.+p, sharply.

"It's cruel hard," said Joseph, whimpering outright. "I'd be a man _or_ a mouse, if I was thee."

"I shall be generous," said the aged n.o.bleman, relenting. "I shall give you a suit of clothes. I shall give you a pair of trousers and a waistcoat--a laced waistcoat--and a coat."

Joseph laughed again, but clouded a moment later.

"Theer's them as pets the back to humble the belly, and theer's them as pets the belly to humble the back," he said, rubbing his bristly chin on a rung of the ladder as he spoke. "What soort o' comfort is theer in a laced wescut, if a man's got nothing to stretch it out with?"

"Well, well, Joseph," returned the earl, "sixpence a day is a great deal of money. In these hard times I can't afford more."

"What I look at," said Joseph, "is, it robs me of my bit o' bacon. If I was t'ask annybody in Heydon Hay, 'Is Lord Barfield the man to rob a poor chap of his bit o' bacon?' they'd say, 'No.' That's what they'd say. 'No,' they'd say; 'niver dream of a such-like thing as happening Joseph.'"

His lords.h.i.+p fidgeted and took snuff.

"What his lords.h.i.+p 'ud be a deal likelier to do," pursued Joseph, declaiming, in imitation of his supposed interlocutor, with his head through the ladder, and waving the billhook and the saw gently in either hand, "'ud be to say as a poor chap as wanted it might goo up to the Hall kitchen and have a bite--that's what annybody 'ud say in Hey don Hay as happened to be inquired of."

Joseph's glance dwelt lingeringly and wistfully on his lords.h.i.+p's face as he watched for the effect of his speech. The old earl took snuff with extreme deliberateness.

"Very well, Joseph," he said, after a pause, "we will arrange it in that way. Sixpence a day. And now and then--now and then, Joseph, you may go and ask Dewson for a little cold meat. There is a great deal of waste in the kitchen. It will make little difference--little difference."

Things being thus happily arranged, his lords.h.i.+p drew a slip of paper from his pocket and began to study it with much interest as he walked.

He began to chuckle, and the fire of strategic triumph lit his aged eyes. The day's itinerary was planned upon that slip of paper, and Lord Barfield had so arranged it that Joseph should carry the ladder all the long distances, while he himself should carry it all the short ones.

Joseph on his side was equally satisfied with the arrangement, so far as he knew it, and gave himself up to the sweet influences of fancy. He saw a glorified edition of himself, attired in my lord's cast-off garments, and engaged in the act of stretching out the laced waistcoat in the kitchen at the Hall. The prospect grew so glorious that he could not hold his own joy and gratulation. It welled over in a series of hollow chuckles, and his lords.h.i.+p twinkled dryly as he walked in front, and took snuff with a double gusto.

"We shall begin," said his lords.h.i.+p, "at Mother Duke's. That laburnum has been an eyesore this many a day. We must be resolute, Joseph. I shall expect you to guard the ladder, and not to let it go, even if she should venture to strike you."

"Her took me very sharp over the knuckles with the rollin'-pin last time, governor," said Joseph. "But her'll be no more trouble to thee now; her's gone away."

"Gone away! Mother Duke gone away?"

"Yes," mumbled Joseph, "her's gone away. There's a little old maid as lives theer now--has been theer a wick to-day."

"That's a pity--that's a pity," said his lords.h.i.+p. "I should have liked another skirmish with Mother Duke. At least, Joseph," he added, with the air of a man who finds consolation in disappointment, "we'll trim the laburnum this time. At all events, we'll make a fight for it, Joseph--we'll make a fight for it." Here he took the billhook and the saw from his a.s.sistant, and strode on, swinging one of the tools in each hand.

"Theer'll be no need for a fight," returned Joseph. "Her's no higher than sixpenn'orth o' soap after a hard day's was.h.i.+ng."

"That's wrong reckoning, Joseph," said the earl; "wrong reckoning. The smaller they are the more terrible they may be."

"I niver fled afore a little un," said Joseph. "I could allays face a little un." He spoke with a retrospective tone. His lords.h.i.+p eyed him askance with a twinkle of rich enjoyment, and took snuff with infinite relish, as if he took Joseph's mental flavor with it and found it delightful. "Mother Duke could strike a sort of a fear into a man,"

pursued Joseph.

"What did you say was the new tenant's name, Joseph?" his lords.h.i.+p demanded, presently.

"Dunno," said Joseph. "Her's a little un--very straight up. Goes about on her heels like, to mek the most of herself."

A minute's further walk brought them to a bend in the lane, and, pa.s.sing this, they paused before a cottage. The front of this cottage was overgrown with climbing roses, just then in full bloom, and a disorderly patch of overgrown blossom and shrub lay on each side the thread of gravel-walk which led from the gate to the door. A little personage, attired in a tight-fitting bodice and a girlish-looking skirt, was busily reducing the redundant growth to order with a pair of quick-snapping shears. It gave his lords.h.i.+p an odd kind of shock when this little personage arose and turned. The face was old. There was youth in the eyes and the delicate dark-brown arch of the eyebrows, but the old-fas.h.i.+oned ringlet which hung at either cheek beneath the cottage bonnet she wore was almost white. The cheeks were sunken from what had once been a charming contour, the delicate aquiline nose was pinched ever so little, the lips were dry, and there were fine wrinkles everywhere. There was something almost eerie in the youthfulness of the eyes, which shone in the midst of all her faded souvenirs of beauty.

Had the eyes been old the face would have been beautiful still, but the contrast they presented to their setting was too striking for beauty.

They gave the old face a curiously exalted look, an expression hardly indicative of complete sanity, though every feature was expressive in itself of keen good-sense, quick apprehension, and strong self-reliance.