John Halifax, Gentleman Part 26

"Don't 'ee make more noise than 'ee can help, my lad," the good woman said to our post-boy, "because, sir, the sick gentleman bean't so well again to-day."

"I am sorry for it. We would not have driven up to the door had we known. Which is his room?"

Mrs. Tod pointed to a window--not on our side of the house, but the other. A hand was just closing the cas.e.m.e.nt and pulling down the blind--a hand which, in the momentary glimpse we had of it, seemed less like a man's than a woman's.

When we were settled in the parlour John noticed this fact.

"It was the wife, most likely. Poor thing! how hard to be shut up in-doors on such a summer evening as this!"

It did seem a sad sight--that closed window, outside which was the fresh, balmy air, the sunset, and the roses.

"And how do you like Enderley?" asked John, when, tea being over, I lay and rested, while he sat leaning his elbow on the window-sill, and his cheek against a bunch of those ever-intruding, inquisitive roses.

"It is very, very pretty, and so comfortable--almost like home."

"I feel as if it were home," John said, half to himself. "Do you know, I can hardly believe that I have only seen this place once before; it is so familiar. I seem to know quite well that slope of common before the door, with its black dots of furze-bushes. And that wood below; what a clear line its top makes against the yellow sky! There, that high ground to the right; it's all dusky now, but it is such a view by daylight. And between it and Enderley is the prettiest valley, where the road slopes down just under those chestnut-trees."

"How well you seem to know the place already."

"As I tell you, I like it. I hardly ever felt so content before. We will have a happy time, Phineas."

"Oh, yes!" How--even if I had felt differently--could I say anything but "yes" to him then?

I lay until it grew quite dark, and I could only see a dim shape sitting at the window, instead of John's known face; then I bade him good-night, and retired. Directly afterwards, I heard him, as I knew he would, dash out of the house, and away up the Flat. In the deep quiet of this lonely spot I could distinguish, for several minutes, the diminis.h.i.+ng sound of his footsteps along the loose, stony road; and the notes, clear and shrill, of his whistling. I think it was "Sally in our Alley," or some such pleasant old tune. At last it faded far off, and I fell into sleep and dreams.

CHAPTER X

"That Mrs. Tod is an extraordinary woman. I repeat it--a most extraordinary woman."

And leaning his elbows on the table, from which the said extraordinary woman had just removed breakfast, John looked over to me with his own merry brown eyes.

"Wherefore, David?"

"She has a house full of children, yet manages to keep it quiet and her own temper likewise. Astonis.h.i.+ng patience! However people attain it who have to do with brats, _I_ can't imagine."

"John! that's mean hypocrisy. I saw you myself half-an-hour ago holding the eldest Tod boy on a refractory donkey, and laughing till you could hardly stand."

"Did I?" said he, half-ashamed. "Well, it was only to keep the little scamp from making a noise under the windows. And that reminds me of another remarkable virtue in Mrs. Tod--she can hold her tongue."

"How so?"

"In two whole days she has not communicated to us a single fact concerning our neighbours on the other half of Rose Cottage."

"Did you want to know?"

John laughingly denied; then allowed that he always had a certain pleasure in eliciting information on men and things.

"The wife being indicated, I suppose, by that very complimentary word 'thing.' But what possible interest can you have in either the old gentleman or the old lady?"

"Stop, Phineas: you have a bad habit of jumping at conclusions. And in our great dearth of occupation here, I think it might be all the better for you to take a little interest in your neighbours. So I've a great mind to indulge you with an important idea, suggestion, discovery. Harkee, friend!"--and he put on an air of sentimental mystery, not a bad copy of our old acquaintance, Mr. Charles--"what if the--the individual should not be an old lady at all?"

"What! The old gentleman's wife?"

"Wife? Ahem! more jumping at conclusions. No; let us keep on the safe side, and call her the--individual. In short; the owner of that grey silk gown I saw hanging up in the kitchen. I've seen it again."

"The grey gown! when and where?"

"This morning, early. I walked after it across the Flat, a good way behind, though; for I thought that it--well, let me say SHE--might not like to be watched or followed. She was trotting along very fast, and she carried a little basket--I fancy a basket of eggs."

"Capital housekeeper! excellent wife!"

"Once more--I have my doubts on that latter fact. She walked a great deal quicker and merrier than any wife ought to walk when her husband is ill!"

I could not help laughing at John's original notions of conjugal duty.

"Besides, Mrs. Tod always calls her invalid 'the old gentleman!' and I don't believe this was an elderly lady."

"Nay, old men do sometimes marry young women."

"Yes, but it is always a pity; and sometimes not quite right.

No,"--and I was amused to see how gravely and doggedly John kept to his point--"though this lady did not look like a sylph or a wood-nymph--being neither very small nor very slight, and having a comfortable woollen cloak and hood over the grey silk gown--still, I don't believe she's an old woman, or married either."

"How can you possibly tell? Did you see her face?"

"Of course not," he answered, rather indignantly. "I should not think it manly to chase a lady as a schoolboy does a b.u.t.terfly, for the mere gratification of staring at her. I stayed on the top of the Flat till she had gone indoors."

"Into Rose Cottage?"

"Why--yes."

"She had, doubtless, gone to fetch new-laid eggs for her--I mean for the sick gentleman's breakfast. Kind soul!"

"You may jest, Phineas, but I think she is a kind soul. On her way home I saw her stop twice; once to speak to an old woman who was gathering sticks; and again, to scold a lad for thras.h.i.+ng a donkey."

"Did you hear her?"

"No; but I judge from the lad's penitent face as I pa.s.sed him. I am sure she had been scolding him."

"Then she's not young, depend upon it. Your beautiful young creatures never scold."

"I'm not so sure of that," said John, meditatively. "For my part, I should rather not cheat myself, or be cheated after that manner.

Perfection is impossible. Better see the young woman as she really is, bad and good together."

"The young woman! The fair divinity, you mean!"

"No;" shutting his mouth over the negative in his firm way--"I strongly object to divinities. How unpleasant it would be to woo an angel of perfection, and find her out at last to be only--only Mrs.--"