Now this shows how women have their wits about them, even at moments most critical. The housekeeper had fled with no small alacrity, when the flood came roaring; and now with equal promptitude she had returned, and discovered how best to reward me.
“I think you might give me a hand,” said the young lady, still mounted on the high stone with our parish-mark, upon which by some instinct I had placed her.
“I cannot; I am trembling like an aspen-leaf,” Mrs. Marker replied, though she looked firm enough; “but our gallant preserver is as strong as he is brave. Don’t be afraid of his touching you, because he is a little damp, Miss Kitty.”
This was truly clever of her, and it stopped all reasoning. With a glance of reproach, the maiden gathered her loosened cloak more tightly, and then gave me both her hands and sprang; and I managed it so that she slid down into my arms. This was not what she intended, but there was no help for it, the ground being very slippery after such a flood. She seemed lighter than a feather, and more buoyant than a cork; though some of that conclusion perhaps was due to my impressions. Be that either way, I could never have believed that anything so lovely would be ever in my hold; and the power of it drove away my presence of mind so badly, that I was very near forgetting the proper time for letting go.
And this was no wonder, when I come to think about it; the only wonder was that I could show such self-command. For the breath of her lips was almost on mine, and her blushes so near that I seemed to feel their glow, and the deep rich blue of her eyes so close that they were like an opening into heaven. My entire gift of words was gone, and I knew not what I did or thought.
But suddenly a shout—or a speech if one could take it so—of vulgar insolence and jealousy most contemptible, broke on my lofty condition. Sam Henderson had been left in black dudgeon on the other side of the water, and the bridge being swept away, he could not get at us. We had forgotten all about him; however, he had managed to run away, when the great billow came from the bursting of the sluice; and now he showed his manners and his thankfulness to God, by coming to the bank and shouting, while he grinned, and clapped his hands in mockery—
“Kit and Kitty! Kit and Kitty! That’s what I call coming it strong; and upon a Sunday evening! Mother Marker, do you mean to put up with that? See if I don’t tell your Missus. Kit and Kitty! O Lord, oh Lord! ’Tis as good as a play, and we don’t get much of that sort of fun in Sunbury. Holloa! What the deuce—”
His speech was ended, for I had caught up a big dollop of clod from the relics of the flood, and delivered it into his throat so truly that his red satin fall and mock-diamond pin—which were tenfold more sacred to him than the Sabbath—were mashed up into one big lump of mud, together with the beard he cherished. Labouring to utter some foul words, he shook his fist at me and departed.
CHAPTER IV.
PEACHES, AND PEACHING
There seem to be many ways of taking the very simplest fact we meet and if any man was sure to take things by his own light, it was my good Uncle. When a friend, or even a useful neighbour, offered a free opinion, my Uncle Cornelius would look at him, say never a word, but be almost certain to go downright against that particular view. One of his favourite sayings was, “Every man has a right to his own opinion,” although he was a strict Conservative—and of that right he was so jealous, that he hated to have his opinions shared. And this was a very lucky thing for me, as I cannot help seeing and saying.
For the very next morning, a neighbour came in (when I was gone prowling, I need not say where), and having some business, he told Tabby Tapscott to show him where her master was most likely to be found. This gentleman was Mr. Rasp, the baker, who kept two women, a man, and a boy, and did the finest trade in Sunbury. And what he wanted now was to accept my Uncle’s offer, at which he had hum’d and hawed a week ago, of ten sacks of chat potatoes at fifteen pence a bushel, for the purpose of mixing with his best white bread. By the post of that morning Mr. Rasp had heard from the great flour-mills at Uxbridge, that good grindings were gone up six shillings a quarter, and sure to be quoted still higher next week, by reason of the cold, wet harvest. But he did not intend to tell Uncle Corny this.
That excellent gardener was under his big wall, which had formed part of the monastic enclosure, and was therefore the best piece of brickwork in the parish, as well as a warm home and sure fortress to the peach and nectarine. This wall had its aspect about S.S.E., the best that can be for fruit-trees, and was flanked with return walls at either end; and the sunshine, whenever there seemed to be any, was dwelling and blushing in this kind embrace. The summers might be bitter—as they generally are—but if ever a peach donned crimson velvet in the South of England out of doors, it was sure to be sitting upon this old red wall and looking out for Uncle Corny.
Mr. Cornelius Orchardson, as most people called him when they tried to get his money, glanced over his shoulder when he heard the baker coming, and then began to drive a nail with more than usual care. Not that he ever drove any nail rashly, such an act was forbidden by his constitution; but that he now was in his deepest calm, as every man ought to be in the neighbourhood of a bargain. His manner was always collected and dry, and his words quite as few as were needful; and he never showed any desire to get the better of any one, only a sense of contentment, whenever he was not robbed. This is often the case with broad-shouldered people, if they only move quietly and are not flurried; and my good Uncle Corny possessed in his way every one of these elements of honesty.
“Good morning, Mr. Orchardson!” said Rasp the baker. “What a pleasure it is to see a glimpse of sun at last! And what a fine colour these red bricks do give you!”
“As good as the bakehouse,” said my Uncle shortly. “But look out where you are treading, Rasp. I want every one of them strawberry-runners. What brings you here? I am rather busy now.”
“Well, I happened to see as your door was open, so I thought I’d just jog your memory, to have them potatoes put up in the dry, while I’ve got my copper lighted.”
“Potatoes! Why, you would not have them, Rasp. You said fifteen pence a bushel was a deal too much, and potatoes were all water such a year as this. And now I’ve got a better customer.”
“Well, it don’t matter much either way,” said the baker; “but I always took you, Mr. Orchardson, to be a man of your word, sir—a man of your word.”
“So I am. But I know what my words are; and we came to no agreement. Your very last words were—‘A shilling, and no more.’ Can you deny that, Rasp?”
“Well, I didn’t put it down, sir, and my memory plays tricks. But I told my wife that it was all settled; and she said, ‘Oh, I do like to deal with Mr. Orchardson, he gives such good measure.’ So I brought round the money in this little bag, thirty-seven shillings and sixpence. Never mind for a receipt, sir; everybody knows what you are.”
“Yes, so they do,” answered Uncle Corny; “they’d rather believe me than you, Master baker. Now how much is flour gone up this morning, and floury potatoes to follow it? Never a chat goes out of my gate, under one and sixpence a bushel.”
“This sort of thing is too much for me. There is something altogether wrong with the times. There is no living to be made out of them.” Mr. Rasp shook his head at the peaches on the wall, as if they were dainties he must not dare to look at.
“Rasp, you shall have a peach,” declared my Uncle Corny, for he was a man who had come to a good deal of wisdom; “you shall have the best peach on the whole of this wall, and that means about the best in England. I will not be put out with you, Rasp, for making a fine effort to cheat me. You are a baker; and you cannot help it.”
If any other man in Sunbury was proud of his honesty, so was Rasp; and taking this speech as a compliment to it, he smiled and pulled a paper-bag from his pocket, to receive the best peach on the