‘Then there is plenty of time to give such words of command in the heat of battle?’ said Anne innocently.
‘No!’ said the yeoman, his face again in flames. ‘Why, of course I am only telling you what would be the word of command if—there now! you la—’
‘I didn’t; ’pon my word I didn’t!’
‘No, I don’t think you did; it was my mistake. Well, then I come smartly to Present, looking well along the barrel—along the barrel—and fire. Of course I know well enough how to engage the enemy! But I expect my old uncle has been setting you against me.’
‘He has not said a word,’ replied Anne; ‘though I have heard of you, of course.’
‘What have you heard? Nothing good, I dare say. It makes my blood boil within me!’
‘O, nothing bad,’ said she assuringly. ‘Just a word now and then.’
‘Now, come, tell me, there’s a dear. I don’t like to be crossed. It shall be a sacred secret between us. Come, now!’
Anne was embarrassed, and her smile was uncomfortable. ‘I shall not tell you,’ she said at last.
‘There it is again!’ said the yeoman, throwing himself into a despair. ‘I shall soon begin to believe that my name is not worth sixpence about here!’
‘I tell you ’twas nothing against you,’ repeated Anne.
‘That means it might have been for me,’ said Festus, in a mollified tone. ‘Well, though, to speak the truth, I have a good many faults, some people will praise me, I suppose. ’Twas praise?’
‘It was.’
‘Well, I am not much at farming, and I am not much in company, and I am not much at figures, but perhaps I must own, since it is forced upon me, that I can show as fine a soldier’s figure on the Esplanade as any man of the cavalry.’
‘You can,’ said Anne; for though her flesh crept in mortal terror of his irascibility, she could not resist the fearful pleasure of leading him on. ‘You look very well; and some say, you are—’
‘What? Well, they say I am good-looking. I don’t make myself, so ’tis no praise. Hullo! what are you looking across there for?’
‘Only at a bird that I saw fly out of that tree,’ said Anne.
‘What? Only at a bird, do you say?’ he heaved out in a voice of thunder. ‘I see your shoulders a-shaking, young madam. Now don’t you provoke me with that laughing! By God, it won’t do!’
‘Then go away!’ said Anne, changed from mirthfulness to irritation by his rough manner. ‘I don’t want your company, you great bragging thing! You are so touchy there’s no bearing with you. Go away!’
‘No, no, Anne; I am wrong to speak to you so. I give you free liberty to say what you will to me. Say I am not a bit of a soldier, or anything! Abuse me—do now, there’s a dear. I’m scum, I’m froth, I’m dirt before the besom—yes!’
‘I have nothing to say, sir. Stay where you are till I am out of this field.’
‘Well, there’s such command in your looks that I ha’n’t heart to go against you. You will come this way to-morrow at the same time? Now, don’t be uncivil.’
She was too generous not to forgive him, but the short little lip murmured that she did not think it at all likely she should come that way to-morrow.
‘Then Sunday?’ he said.
‘Not Sunday,’ said she.
‘Then Monday—Tuesday—Wednesday, surely?’ he went on experimentally.
She answered that she should probably not see him on either day, and, cutting short the argument, went through the wicket into the other field. Festus paused, looking after her; and when he could no longer see her slight figure he swept away his deliberations, began singing, and turned off in the other direction.
VIII. ANNE MAKES A CIRCUIT OF THE CAMP
When Anne was crossing the last field, she saw approaching her an old woman with wrinkled cheeks, who surveyed the earth and its inhabitants through the medium of brass-rimmed spectacles. Shaking her head at Anne till the glasses shone like two moons, she said, ‘Ah, ah; I zeed ye! If I had only kept on my short ones that I use for reading the Collect and Gospel I shouldn’t have zeed ye; but thinks I, I be going out o’ doors, and I’ll put on my long ones, little thinking what they’d show me. Ay, I can tell folk at any distance with these—’tis a beautiful pair for out o’ doors; though my short ones be best for close work, such as darning, and catching fleas, that’s true.’
‘What have you seen, Granny Seamore?’ said Anne.
‘Fie, fie, Miss Nancy! you know,’ said Granny Seamore, shaking her head still. ‘But he’s a fine young feller, and will have all his uncle’s money when ‘a’s gone.’ Anne said nothing to this, and looking ahead with a smile passed Granny Seamore by.
Festus, the subject of the remark, was at this time about three-and-twenty, a fine fellow as to feet and inches, and of a remarkably warm tone in skin and hair. Symptoms of beard and whiskers had appeared upon him at a very early age, owing to his persistent use of the razor before there was any necessity for its operation. The brave boy had scraped unseen in the out-house, in the cellar, in the wood-shed, in the stable, in the unused parlour, in the cow-stalls, in the barn, and wherever he could set up his triangular bit of looking-glass without observation, or extemporize a mirror by sticking up his hat on the outside of a window-pane. The result now was that, did he neglect to use the instrument he once had trifled with, a fine rust broke out upon his countenance on the first day, a golden lichen on the second, and a fiery stubble on the third to a degree which admitted of no further postponement.
His disposition divided naturally into two, the boastful and the cantankerous. When Festus put on the big pot, as it is classically called, he was quite blinded ipso facto to the diverting effect of that mood and manner upon others; but when disposed to be envious or quarrelsome he was rather shrewd than otherwise, and could do some pretty strokes of satire. He was both liked and abused by the girls who knew him, and though they were pleased by his attentions, they never failed to ridicule him behind his back. In his cups (he knew those vessels, though only twenty-three) he first became noisy, then excessively friendly, and then invariably nagging. During childhood he had made himself renowned for his pleasant habit of pouncing down upon boys smaller and poorer than himself, and knocking their birds’ nests out of their hands, or overturning their little carts of apples, or pouring water down their backs; but his conduct became singularly the reverse of aggressive the moment the little boys’ mothers ran out to him, brandishing brooms, frying-pans, skimmers, and whatever else they could lay hands on by way of weapons. He then fled and hid behind bushes, under faggots, or in pits till they had gone away; and on one such occasion was known to creep into a badger’s hole quite out of sight, maintaining that post with great firmness and resolution for two or three hours. He had brought more vulgar exclamations upon the tongues of respectable parents in his native parish than any other boy of his time. When other youngsters snowballed him he ran into a place of shelter, where he kneaded snowballs of his own, with a stone inside, and used these formidable missiles in returning their pleasantry. Sometimes he got fearfully beaten by boys his own age, when he would roar most lustily, but fight on in the midst of his tears, blood, and cries.
He was early in love,