“When I can bear no more
The sound of tears,
And all the muffled roar
Of hopes and fears,
I let my tired mind a vigil keep,
To watch in silence where the others sleep.
A moment – and I go
Where green grass waves,
Where still-eyed daisies grow
On quiet graves,
While every afternoon the setting sun
Falls on the names there, like a benison.”
Andy read it over. He thought it was very beautiful indeed, and began to compose an epitaph for himself when he should lie, like Gulielmus, beneath the shadow of the ancient church.
“A great poet and a great priest. Fifty years of untiring service – ”
Oh, he was so young and so happy that he enjoyed it very much indeed. And he was so hungry afterwards that he was able to eat Mrs. Jebb’s pastry.
The next day about two o’clock he went across the lawn to speak to his gardener about the radishes when it suddenly occurred to him that he had seen nothing of that worthy since half-past ten, though he had been about the place all the morning. Evidently young Sam Petch was beginning his games. This should be put a stop to at once. Andy walked over the short grass with a determined step, and was about to start the inquisition when Sam, with a pleasant smile, remarked —
“Nice morning I had of it. Searching high and low, I was, for bits of cloth to nail up the creepers on the stable wall. And in the end my poor missus gave me the clippings she’d saved for pegging a hearthrug.”
Andy looked hard at his gardener, but it was his own eyes which fell before the radiant honesty shining in Sam Petch’s face.
“Very good of Mrs. Petch – I must see if I haven’t an old pair – ”
He broke off, for he had come closer to Sam in speaking, and there was somewhere in the air an unmistakable odour of the public-house.
“Your oldest would be too good for that job,” said Sam hastily. “My wife would sponge ’em with beer with a drop o’ gin in it and they’d look like new. She does that, time and again, to my old clothes. These I have on she did last night. On’y drawback is, you can’t get the smell of the liquor out all at once. You’ll maybe not have noticed, but I smell a smell of drink about this here jacket yet, though I’ve been out in it since morning.”
Andy looked hard again. Again he was met by the clear, blue gaze of honesty and simple candour. He walked away, making no remark.
But half-way across the grass he paused, shook his head, and went back.
“I would have you know,” he said, copying as closely as possible the air and manner of the senior curate, “that I am perfectly able to appreciate the difference between the odour of beer applied externally and internally. Pray remember that for the future.”
Then, head in air, he marched towards the house, feeling greatly annoyed that a dandelion root should trip him up half-way and spoil the exit.
Sam watched him go into the house, and then bent over the mowing machine in a paroxysm of helpless laughter.
“Golly – he’s a rum ’un – but not so soft as he looks.”
For young Sam Petch had many failings, but also the great virtue of being able to enjoy a joke against himself.
Meanwhile, Andy made his way to Mrs. Simpson’s sale, and as he entered the house the auctioneer’s raucous voice could be heard selling the spare-bedroom furniture. Every one was upstairs save a few who waited in the dining-room so as to have a good place when the auctioneer came in there.
Mrs. Thorpe and Mrs. Will Werrit, for instance, had planted themselves firmly by the table on which Mrs. Simpson’s cut glass and china were displayed. They were not surprised to see the new Vicar, as they supposed he would be wanting things for his house, and Mrs. Thorpe tore herself away from a fascinating and confidential conversation with her neighbour to say pleasantly glancing at him over her ample chest —
“I hope you’re comfortable at Gaythorpe, Mr. Deane?”
That was what Mrs. Thorpe wanted every one to be in this world – comfortable – and it was certainly what she hoped for in the world to come.
“I’m more than comfortable,” said Andy. “I love the place already. And after London it seems so peaceful – like one big family.”
Mrs. Will Werrit’s thin lips curled at the corners.
“Are big families peaceful in London?” she said.
“Well, well!” said Mrs. Thorpe, soothingly. “Human nature is human nature. And how does your housekeeper cook, Mr. Deane?”
“Oh, not very grandly,” said Andy, with a laugh.
“Can she make decent pastry?” asked Mrs. Will Werrit.
“No. But I’m not much of a pastry lover – ”
“Oh!” said Mrs. Thorpe and Mrs. Will Werrit. Then they coughed behind their gloves to tone down the ejaculation, and carefully avoided each other’s glance.
But Andy wondered what on earth there was to be so surprised at in the fact that he did not like pastry. He walked to the window and stood there with his hands in his pockets while the two women resumed their interrupted conversation.
“Did you hear?” said Mrs. Will Werrit. “He said he didn’t like pastry. After eating six tarts and eight cheesecakes at a sitting.”
“Well, well. I’m sure I don’t know how that got about. I never told a soul, that I can swear.”
“Nobody,” said Mrs. Will Werrit, snapping her lips together, “can blame a lad for liking tarts and cheesecakes. But what I hate is his lying about it.”
“Come, come! You can’t call it lying,” said Mrs. Thorpe. “Poor lad, he’s ashamed of his appetite, I expect.” She touched a set of glass dishes on the table before her. “I’m bidding for those.”
“Don’t touch ’em!” said Mrs. Will sharply. “There’s a woman looking at you. You don’t want anybody to notice them before they’re auctioned if you can help it. They’ll be running you up.”
“I shan’t go beyond two shillings apiece,” said Mrs. Thorpe.
“You don’t know. Sales are such queer things. You’d think” – Mrs. Will lowered her voice still further and glanced at Andy’s back – “you’d think sometimes when you get home with a lot of rubbish you’ve no use for, that you’d been possessed.” She paused. “I shall bid for the jelly glasses. I remember thinking I should like them the last time we had supper here before Mr. Simpson’s illness.”
“Did you, now?” said Mrs. Thorpe. “Well, I thought the same about the glass dishes on that very night. Last party they gave before he was taken ill.”
And yet they were good women, and would do the widow and her children a thousand kindnesses. It is such things that make the dullest-seeming person so tremendously interesting.
“Finger-bowls!” said Mrs. Will Werrit, touching one with a scornful finger. “No wonder he died in debt!”
“Maybe they were a wedding – ” began Mrs. Thorpe, but a great trampling of feet announced that the