Part 6

“Very bad, thank ye, sir. There, I can scarce turn i’ my bed, and when I do try for to walk my limbs do seem to go all twisty-like. I be fair scraggled wi’ it, Squire.”

“Well, men, what brought you here?” inquired their master, turning for the first time to the keepers, and addressing them with some surprise.

“Why, a rather unpleasant matter, sir, I am sorry to say,” returned Sanders respectfully, but a trifle tartly. “’Tis a bit difficult to explain, seein’ as you seem so taken up with Mr. Guppy here. I understood, sir, when I accepted your sitooation as I was to have a free hand. I didn’t look for no interference from anybody but you yourself, sir.”

“Well, haven’t you got a free hand? I’m sure I don’t interfere,” replied the Squire, with a shrug of his shoulders.

“’Tis Maister Guppy what be al’ays a-meddlin’, sir!” put in Jim, with a pull at his forelock. “He do come up-along mostly every mornin’, a-horderin’ and a-pickin’ holes here, there, and everywhere. Mr. Sanders and me do find it terr’ble ill-conwenient.”

“I was just going to say, sir,” resumed Sanders, “when Neale interrupted me”--here he paused to glare at his inferior--“as it was what I was never accustomed to--outside people comin’ and pokin’ and pryin’ and fault-findin’ and interferin’----”

“Oh, dear, how much more!” exclaimed the Squire, looking from one to the other in affected dismay, mingled with a little real vexation. “Guppy, what’s all this about?”

“Playse ye, sir, I couldn’t a-bear to see you a-treated same as ye be treated by them as ye puts your trust in. Everythin’ be in a reg’lar caddle all over the place--everythin’ be a-goin’ wrong, sir, and when I sees it, I tells ’em of it. I can’t do no different--’tis my dooty. You do pay I by the week reg’lar, and I bain’t a-goin’ to eat the bread o’ idleness--’t ’ud stick i’ my in’ards--’e-es, that it would. ‘So soon as I do get upon my legs,’ says I, ‘I’ll have a look round;’ and I did have a look round, and what did I find? Every blessed thing a-goin’ wrong--so I sarces ’em for ’t. I wasn’t a-goin’ to hold my tongue, and see you tricked and abused. I was easy wi’ ’em--a dalled sight too easy--I did ought to have reported of ’em before, but to-day I couldn’t stand it no longer; when I did speak to ’em they up and insulted me, both on ’em. ’E-es, they did. They insulted of I shameful.”

“I am sorry to hear that----” the Squire was beginning, when Mr. Sanders, losing patience, interrupted him.

“Begging your pardon, sir, ’tis more than flesh and blood can stand; ’tis got to be him or me--that’s all I can say. Nobody could put up with it. I found things in a very bad state when I came, and I’m getting them better gradual, sir, and doing my dooty in all respects as well as I can; but if Guppy is to be allowed to come pryin’ and spyin’ after me, and findin’ fault with all my arrangements----”

“He did call I a trespasser,” broke out John, who had been ruminating over his private woes, without taking heed of the keeper’s indictment. “He did call I a trespasser; he did say I was trespassin’ when I told en I’d a-been walkin’ through the Long Wood yonder where I did catch his little rascal of a son a-bird’s-nestin’ so bold as you playse. And Jim there, what did ought to know better, up and said I was poachin’ last week. _Me_ poachin’! Me what brought him back that very day a dozen o’ snares what I had picked up i’ the hedge as he went gawkin’ past without taking a bit o’ notice of.”

“’E-es, but you found a rabbit in one and popped it into your pocket!” cried Jim irefully. “Popped it into your pocket and walked off wi’ it, let I say what I would.”

“In course I did,” retorted John, with great dignity, “in course I did. ’Tweren’t very likely as I’d leave it wi’ you. As I telled ’ee at the time--says I: ‘Squire wouldn’t grudge me a rabbit now arter all the hundreds as I’ve a-had while I was keeper up yonder.’”

The Squire covered his mouth with his hand, but tell-tale wrinkles appeared about his eyes, and the points of his moustache curled significantly upwards. After a moment he recovered himself sufficiently to desire the keepers to withdraw, announcing that he would have a quiet talk with John Guppy, and that no doubt the matter could be arranged.

“So you had hundreds of rabbits while you were in my service, John,” he remarked, crossing one leg over the other, and looking at the old man with a smile. “Didn’t you get very tired of them?”

“Well, sir, my old woman be wonderful with the cookin’, and she did do ’em up in a-many different ways. ’E-es, we did use to have a rabbit for dinner four days out of seven.”

“Did you indeed?” returned his former master, much interested in these revelations. “Do you suppose, John, the other men had hundreds of rabbits every year, too?”

“Well, sir, it be a matter o’ taste. Some folks doesn’t fancy rabbit; but, of course, they can take so many as they do want.”

“Of course,” agreed the Squire.

“’E-es; keepers takes rabbits same as gardeners helps theirselves to cabbages. I knowed you’d never begrudge me that there little un.”

“No, to be sure; but we mustn’t be too hard on Jim. Jim was doing what he thought to be his duty. Now, you know, no matter how many rabbits a keeper may take for himself, he is not supposed to allow other people to take any.”

“Nay, sir, nay; I wouldn’t expect it--not other folks. But I d’ ’low it be different wi’ I, what was head over en for so many year. He didn’t ought to ha’ gone and insulted of I.”

“No, no, of course not; but then, you see, you had vexed him. He was too angry to discriminate between poaching and--just helping yourself.”

“And t’other chap, ’ee telled I I was trespassin’!” resumed John wrathfully.

“Well, my dear John, we must consider the point of view. Every man has his own, you know. As a matter of fact, I’m afraid, from Sanders’s point of view, you were trespassing.”

John’s face was a study.

“I never thought to live to hear you say that, Squire.”

“I only said from his point of view,” cried the Squire, hastily. “He’s naturally, perhaps, a little jealous; you were here so many years, you know, and of course, like all young men--young men will have foolish notions, John--he thinks his way is the best way. We old fogies must just give in for the sake of peace and comfort.”

“Noo ways,” agreed the old man, sorrowfully; “noo folks and noo ways.”

“As you heard me say just now,” resumed his master, “_I_ don’t interfere with him, and, upon my life, I think it’s better you shouldn’t interfere, John. I fancy it would be wiser if you could just keep away for a little bit--then no one could say you were trespassing, you know.”

“I’ll keep away, Squire,” said John. “No fear; I’ll keep away. Ye’ll not have to tell I that twice.”

“You and I are free to have our own opinions, of course,” urged the Squire, smiling, “but we’ll keep them to ourselves--these young folks you know----”

But John did not smile in return; his head, always bent, drooped almost to his breast, his lips moved, but uttered no sound. After a moment or two, he pulled his forelock, scraped his leg, and turned to depart.

“You’re not going, John?”

“’E-es, sir, I be goin’, I bain’t wanted here no more. As you do say, noo times----”

“Now, now, I can’t have you going away offended. Don’t you see how it is, John?”

“Nay, sir, I don’t see nothin’ but what you’ve a-gone and thrown over a old servant for a noo un. That be all as I can see. You didn’t check en for insultin’ of I, and you did uphold him and made little of I. I be goin’, and you’ll never be troubled wi’ I again. I’m fit for nothin’. I be a-eatin’ of your bread and a-takin’ of your money and doin’ nothin’ for ’t. Eatin’ the bread o’ idleness! I d’ ’low it ’ull fair choke I.”

The Squire, vexed and perplexed, in vain sought to soothe him, but he waved aside all attempts at consolation, and made his way slowly out of the room and out of the house.

The Squire watched him as he went tottering down the avenue. “What’s to be done?” he said to himself. “The poor old chap is past his work; it would be cruelty to allow him to attempt it. Sanders is an excellent fellow, on the other hand--more go-ahead than dear old John, and, it must be owned, a better keeper. He would certainly have given notice if I had allowed John to continue his visitations here. It is the only thing to be done, but I can’t bear to see the poor old fellow so cut up.”

As Guppy passed the keeper’s lodge the dogs ran forward, leaping upon him and whining. He patted them absently, and then pushed them off. “Down, Rover, down! There, Bessie, off wi’ you; you should learn a lesson fro’ your betters. Stick to the noo folks, and get rid of the wold. Poor beasts! they be fain to see I, I d’ ’low. Dogs bain’t like Christians. They don’t seem to know when a man be down. They be faithful, all the same; they haven’t a-got no sense, poor things.”

He was spent and trembling when he arrived at his own home, and sank down in his chair by the hearth.

“There, missis, put away my gun; I’ll not want it no more; I be done wi’ it--I be done wi’ everythin’. I could wish that there stroke had a-carried I off. I bain’t no use i’ this world as I can see. It do seem a strange thing as the Lard ’ll leave ye to live on and on when folks be tired o’ ye, and be a-wishin’ of ye under the sod. I wish I were i’ my long home--aye, that I do.”

Mrs. Guppy was at first alarmed, then affected, and finally burst into tears.

“I’m sure I never did hear a man go on the same as you do, Jan; there, I be all of a tremble. What’s amiss? What’s come to ye? What’s it all about?”

“Gi’ I my pipe,” said John; “there’s things a woman can’t understand.”

Not another word could she extract from him till dinner-time, when she summoned him to table.

He gazed at the food sourly. “All charity!” he murmured. “Charity, woman. I be eatin’ what I haven’t earned. I may jist so well go to the Union.”

A few days later the Squire’s dogcart drew up at the little gate, and the Squire himself descended therefrom, carrying a couple of rabbits which he extracted from under the seat.

“Good-day, John; good-day, Mrs. Guppy. Well, John, how are you? Cheering up a bit, I hope.”

John shook his head slowly.

“I’ve brought you a couple of rabbits,” continued the Squire. “It never struck me till the other day how you must miss them. I’ll send you some every week. There are enough, Heaven knows.”

“I don’t want no rabbits,” growled Guppy; “I bain’t a-goin’ to eat of ’em.”

“John!” gasped his wife, hardly believing her ears.

“Put ’em back i’ the cart, woman,” he continued; “I bain’t a-goin’ to eat no rabbits what they chaps up yonder have a-ketched.”

“Why, John,” said the Squire, sitting down beside him, “can’t you get over it? I thought you would be all right by this time.”

“I bain’t all right, Squire, and I can’t get over it. Nay, look at it which way I will, I can’t. Here be I, John Guppy, a bit scram and a bit wambly; but so sound i’ the head as ever I was, whatever my legs mid be. Here be I, anxious for to do my dooty, and able for to do my dooty, and you won’t let I do it. You do give me money what I haven’t earned; you do want I to sit here idle when I’m as ready for a day’s work as any o’ they new-fangled chaps what you’ve a-set up yonder i’ my place.”

The Squire sighed and looked hopelessly at Mrs. Guppy, who stood with her hands folded limply at her waist, and a most dolorous expression on her countenance, shaking her head emphatically at every pause in her husband’s speech. After a few further attempts at consolation, the Squire rose and went to the door, followed by his hostess.

“What is to be done, Mrs. Guppy?” he inquired, when they were out of earshot. “I positively can’t have him back up there--he isn’t fit for it; and he has been setting all the other men by the ears.”

“He’s fair breakin’ ’is ’eart,” murmured Mrs. Guppy dolefully. “He thinks he bain’t o’ no use--and he bain’t--and it’s killin’ ’im. If he could even fancy he was doing summat and ockipy hisself in any way he’d be a different man. ’Tis the thought as nobody wants en what do cut en so.”

The Squire cogitated, and then a sudden light broke over his face.

“I have it,” he cried. “I have thought of a job for the old fellow! We’ll put him to rights yet, Mrs. Guppy--see if we don’t!”

He re-entered the cottage, and approached the inglenook where John still sat, leaning forward, and slowly rubbing the knees of his corduroys.

“John,” he said, “I was almost forgetting a most important thing I wanted to say to you. Sanders and Jim have got their hands pretty full up there, as you know.”

“I d’ ’low they have,” agreed Guppy; “they’re like to have ’em too full, seein’ as they don’t know how to set about their work nohow.”

“Yes, yes. Well, Sanders is very busy all day and Jim has a wide beat. Neither of them ever find time to go near the river. It’s my private belief, John, that that river is dreadfully poached. We’ve next to no wild duck, you know.”

“We never did have none, sir,” interrupted Guppy.

“Just what I say,” agreed his master; “we never had the chance. You had _your_ hands pretty full when you were head-keeper, hadn’t you?”

“I weren’t one what ’ud ever ha’ let ’em get empty,” growled Guppy.

“Well, I was thinking, now that you haven’t very much to do, you might undertake the control of those meadows down there by the river, if you feel up to it, and it’s not asking too much of you.”

“Oh! I could do it,” returned John, in a mollified tone; “I could do it right enough if I was let.”

“I should be very much obliged to you,” resumed the Squire, “very much obliged indeed. All that part of the property has got shamefully neglected. I imagine the people think they’ve got a right-of-way.”

“Very like they do,” agreed John, whose countenance was gradually clearing; “but I can soon show ’em whether they have or not.”

“Just so. Well, will you undertake to look after that part of the estate for me? It will be a great relief to my mind. Don’t overtire yourself, you know; but any day that you are feeling pretty fit you might stroll round, and just keep a sharp look-out.”

“’E-es, I could do that,” said John, after considering for a moment; “I could do it all right, Squire. I will look into the matter.”

“That’s right. Thank you very much, John. I shall feel quite satisfied about it now.”

He nodded, and went away, John looking after him with a satisfied expression.

“I never did mind obligin’ the Squire,” he remarked to his wife, “and I’m glad to do en a bit of a good turn i’ my ancient years. ’Tis true what he do say, that there bit down by the river have a-been fearful neglected. I myself could never make time to go down there, and ’t ain’t very likely as these here chaps ’ull go out of their way to look round. I’ll put it to rights, though.”

“I’m sure it’s very good o’ you, John,” said Mrs. Guppy, who had listened to the foregoing colloquy with a somewhat mystified air. “I shouldn’t ha’ thought that there was anything worth lookin’ arter down there. Why, the town boys do bathe there reg’lar i’ the summer.”

“They’ll not bathe there any more,” returned her lord resolutely. “I’ll teach Mr. Sanders a lesson--I’ll larn ’em how to see arter a place as it did ought to be looked arter! Reach me down that gun, woman!”

He sallied forth that very hour, drawing up his little, bent form to as close an approach to straightness as he could manage.

His first care on reaching his destination was to examine the gates that gave access to this stretch of meadow-land. He pursed his nether lip and shook his head disapprovingly at their shaky condition, making a mental resolution to repair them at the earliest opportunity, and moreover to see that they were provided with padlocks. After diligently hunting in the neighbouring wood, he discovered a half-defaced board, which had at one time borne the legend, “Trespassers will be prosecuted,” and, with a sigh of satisfaction, placed it in a more prominent position.

His joy was extreme when, late in the afternoon, he discovered an honest labouring man in the act of climbing a gate, which, owing to the rickety condition of its hinges, could not be opened without risk of falling flat upon the ground.

“Where be goin’ to?” inquired John, sternly.

“Why, jist home-along,” returned the other, with a good-humoured smile; “’tis a bit of a short cut this way.”

“There’s to be no more short cuts here,” cried John, with a certain almost malignant triumph. “These here meadows belongs to Squire. They’m his private property.”

The man’s jaw dropped. “That’ll be summat noo,” he said doubtfully, but still good-humouredly.

“’Tis noo times all round,” replied Guppy, with an odd contraction of the face, “but these ’ere reg’lations ’ull be carried out strict. You jist turn about, my bwoy.”

“I be three parts there now,” protested the other.

“Then you’ll have to step back three parts, that’s all,” responded Guppy unmoved.

The man scratched his head, stared, and finally recrossed the gate, and walked away, grumbling to himself, Guppy looking after him with a sense of well-nigh forgotten dignity. He had vindicated the majesty of the law.

All hitherto unconscious trespassers had thenceforth a bad time of it under the reign of the new river-keeper. Would-be bathers, small boys on bird’s-nesting intent, tired women with market-baskets, labourers on their way to and from their daily work, were ruthlessly turned back by old Guppy, whose magisterial air carried conviction with it. The other keepers, laughing perhaps in their sleeves, let him pursue his tactics unmolested, and the Squire was careful to congratulate him from time to time on the success of his labours. John Guppy’s greatest triumph was, perhaps, when he actually did discover a wild duck’s nest amid the sedges of the now tranquil river. How tenderly he watched over it; how proudly he noted the little brood of downy ducklings when they first paddled from one group of reeds to another in the wake of their mother; with what delight he imparted his discovery to the Squire, and with what supreme joy did he invite him to set about the destruction of these precious charges when they were sufficiently grown! Almost equal rapture was his when, having struggled along the avenue with a brace of ducks dangling from each hand, he encountered the head-keeper in the shrubbery.

“Those are fine ones,” remarked Sanders, good-naturedly; he was a good-hearted fellow in the main, and did not grudge the old man his small successes.

“I should think they was,” returned Guppy, swelling with pride. “They be uncommon fine uns, Maister Sanders; they be the only wild duck what was ever seen on this here property. I be glad to hear,” he added, condescendingly, “as you’ve done pretty well wi’ the pheasants, too. Squire was a-tellin’ me about the good season ye did have.”

“Yes,” rejoined the keeper, with a twinkle in his eye; “they didn’t turn out so bad, you see, Mr. Guppy.”

“I be very glad on’t, I’m sure,” said John, still condescendingly; “of course it be easy to rear a good few pheasants if you do go in for buyin’ eggs; it bain’t so very easy to get wild duck to take to a place where they never did come afore.”

“No, to be sure,” agreed Sanders affably. “It was a wonderful piece of luck, that was.”

“It wasn’t luck, Maister Sanders,” said John impressively, “it was knowledge.”

And he walked on, with conscious pride in every line of face and figure, leaving his successor chuckling.

THE WORM THAT TURNED.

“Where be goin’, William?”

“Oh, I be jest steppin’ up to the Pure Drop.”

And William Faithfull brought back his abstracted gaze from the horizon, where it habitually rested when it was not required for practical purposes in the exercise of his profession, and fixed itself somewhat shamefacedly on his interlocutor.

He was a tall, loose-limbed man, of about forty, with an expression of countenance chronically dismal, except at such times when he was employed in some particularly genial task, such as making a coffin, or repairing the church trestles, when his neighbours averred that he became quite lively, and even whistled as he worked.

His crony now returned his glance with a jocular one, and slapped his thigh ecstatically.

“Well, I never seed such a chap! Faithfull by name and faithful by natur’--ah, sure you are. Why, ’tis nigh upon twelve year, bain’t it, since ye started coortin’ Martha Jesty?”

“Somewhere about that,” replied William; and his countenance, already ruddy in the sunset glow, assumed a still deeper tint.

“Well, I never!” returned the other with a shout of laughter. “She be gettin’ on pretty well, now--I d’ ’low she’ll be a staid woman by the time you wed her.”

William shifted uneasily from one foot to the other.

“Well,” he said, after a pause, “I d’ ’low she be worth waitin’ for. She be wonderful clever, Martha be--an’ that sprack! No, I don’t regret it--not at all I don’t.”

“Bain’t the wold man anyways comin’ round?” inquired his friend with his head on one side.

“No,” returned Faithfull gloomily. “Not at all. But he be so terr’ble punished, poor wold chap, one can’t expect rayson off he.”

“’Tis the rheumatics, bain’t it?” was the next query in a commiserating tone.

“’Tis the sky-attics,” replied the carpenter, not without a certain pride in his pseudo-father-in-law’s distinguished ailment. “There, he be so scraggled as anything--all doubled up by times. Martha do say he goes twisty-like same as a eel, when it do take en real bad.”

“Lard, now!” ejaculated the other.

“’E-es,” said William, shaking his head--“that’s how it do take en. So, as Martha do say, ye can’t expect the onpossible. ‘If my father,’ says she, ‘be so scram-like in his out’ard man, how can ye look for en to act straight-forrard? He’ve a-set his mind again’ the notion of us gettin’ wed, so we must just wait till he be underground. And then,’ says she, ‘I’ll not keep ’ee waitin’ a minute longer.’”