PIGS, ETC

It was not quite so bad as that, however. Farmer Eames turned in at the farmyard gate and led the two strangers into a good-sized kitchen, where the table was already set, in a homely fashion, for dinner. A stout, middle-aged woman, with a rather sharp face, turned from the fire, where she was superintending some cooking.

“Here we are again, wife,” said Eames. “Glad to see dinner’s ready. Take a chair, Mr. Ned. You’ll have a glass of beer to begin with?” and as he poured it out, “This here’s the new boy, missis-I’ve settled to give him a trial.”

Mrs. Eames murmured something, which Geoff supposed must have been intended as a kind of welcome. She was just then lifting a large pan of potatoes off the fire, and as she turned her face to the light, Geoff noticed that it was very red-redder than a moment before. He could almost have fancied the farmer’s wife was shy.

“Shall I help you?” he exclaimed, darting forward to take hold of the pan.

Eames burst out laughing.

“That’s a good joke,” he said. “He knows which side his bread’s buttered on, does this ’ere young fellow.”

Geoff grew scarlet, and some angry rejoinder was on his lips, when Jowett, who to his great indignation was laughing too, clapped him on the shoulder.

“Come, my boy, there’s naught to fly up about. Eames must have his joke.”

“I see naught to laugh at,” said Mrs. Eames, who had by this time shaken the potatoes into a large dish that stood ready to receive them; “the lad meant it civil enough.”

“You’re not to spoil him now, wife,” said her husband. “It’s no counter-jumpers’ ways we want hereabouts. Sit thee down, Ned; and Jim, there, you can draw the bench by the door a bit nearer the dresser, and I’ll give you some dinner by-and-by.”

Geoff, his heart swelling, did as he was bid. He sat quietly enough, glad of the rest and the warmth, till Mr. and Mrs. Eames and their guest were all helped, and had allayed the first sharp edge of their appetites. But from time to time the farmer’s wife glanced at Geoff uneasily, and once, he felt sure, he saw her nudge her husband.

“She means to be kind,” thought the boy.

And her kindness apparently had some effect. The farmer looked round, after a deep draught of beer, and pushed his tankard aside.

“Will you have a sup, Jim?” he said good-naturedly. “I can’t promise it you every day; but for once in a way.”

“No, thank you,” Geoff replied. “I never take beer; moth-” but he stopped suddenly.

“As you like,” said the farmer; “but though you’re not thirsty, I dare say you’re hungry.”

He cut off a slice of the cold meat before him, and put it on a plate with some potatoes, and a bit of dripping from a dish on the table. The slice of meat was small in proportion to the helping of potatoes; but Geoff was faint with hunger. He took the plate, with the steel-pronged fork and coarse black-handled knife, and sat down again by the dresser to eat. But, hungry though he was, he could not manage it all. Half-way through, a sort of miserable choky feeling came over him: he thought of his meals at home-the nice white tablecloth, the sparkling glass and silver, the fine china-and all seemed to grow misty before his eyes for a minute or two; he almost felt as if he were going to faint, and the voices at the table sounded as if they came from the other side of the Atlantic. He drank some water-for on his refusing beer, Mrs. Eames had handed him a little horn mug filled with water; it was as fresh and sweet as any he had ever tasted, and he tried at the same time to swallow down his feelings. And by the time that the farmer stood up to say grace, he felt pretty right again.

“And what are you going to be about, Eames?” said Jowett. “I’ll walk round the place with you, if you like. I must take the four train up again.”

“All right,” the farmer replied; “Jim can take you to the station when he goes to fetch the cans. You’ll see that he doesn’t come to grief on the way. Do ’ee know how to drive a bit?”

“Oh yes,” replied Geoff, eagerly. “I drove a good deal last summer at-in the country. And I know I was very fond of it.”

“Well,” said the farmer, drily, “you’ll have enough of it here. But the pony’s old; you mustn’t drive him too fast. Now, I’ll tell one of the men to show you the yard, and the pig-sties, and the missis’ll show you where she keeps the swill-tub. It’ll want emptying-eh, wife?”

“It do that,” she replied. “But he must change his clothes afore he gets to that dirty work. Those are your best ones, ain’t they?”

Geoff looked down at his suit. It was not his best, for he had left his Eton jackets and trousers behind him. The clothes he had on were a rough tweed suit he had had for the country; he had thought them very far from best. But now it struck him that they did look a great deal too good for feeding the pigs in.

“I’ve got an older pair of trousers in my bag,” he said; “but this is my oldest jacket.”

“He should have a rougher one,” said Mrs. Eames. “I’ll look out; maybe there’s an old coat of George’s as’d make down.”

“All right,” said Eames. “But you’ve no need of a coat at all to feed the pigs in. Whoever heard o’ such a thing?”

Just then a voice was heard at the door.

“I’m here, master,” it said, “fur the new boy.”

“All right,” said Eames; and, followed by Geoff, in his shirt-sleeves by this time, he led the way to the farmyard.

It was interesting, if only it had not been so cold. Matthew, the man, was not very communicative certainly, and it seemed to the new boy that he eyed him with some disfavour. Eames himself just gave a few short directions, and then went off with Jowett.

“Them’s the stables,” said Matthew, jerking his thumb towards a row of old buildings, “and them’s the cow-houses,” with a jerk the other way. “Old pony’s with master’s mare, as he drives hisself. I’ve nought to say to pony; it’s your business. And I’ll want a hand with cart-horses and plough-horses. Young folks has no call to be idle.”

“I don’t mean to be idle,” said Geoff; “but if Mr. Eames doesn’t find fault with me, you’ve no call to do so either.”

He spoke more valiantly than he felt, perhaps, for Matthew’s stolid face and small, twinkling eyes were not pleasant. He muttered something, and then went grumbling across the yard towards a wall, from behind which emanated an odour which required no explanation.

“Them’s pigs,” said he. Matthew had a curious trick of curtailing his phrases as his temper waxed sourer. Articles, prepositions, and auxiliary verbs disappeared, till at last his language became a sort of spoken hieroglyphics.

Geoff looked over the pig-sty wall. Grunt, grumph, snort-out they all tumbled, one on the top of the other, making for the trough. Poor things! it was still empty. Geoff could hardly help laughing, and yet he felt rather sorry for them.

“I’ll go and fetch their dinner,” he said. “I don’t mind pigs; but they are awfully dirty.”

“Ax the missus for soap to wash ’em,” said Matthew, with a grin. He hadn’t yet made up his mind if the new boy was sharp or not.

“No,” said Geoff, “I’ll not do that till the first of April; but I’ll tell you what, Matthew, I’ll not keep them as dirty as they are. And I should say that the chap that’s been looking after them is a very idle fellow.” Matthew scowled. “Pigs don’t need to be so dirty,” Geoff went on. “I know at Cole-” But he stopped abruptly. He was certainly not going to take Matthew into his confidence. He asked to be shown the pony-poor old pony! it didn’t look as if it would be over “sperrity”-and then he went back to the house to fetch the pigs’ dinner.

Very hot, instead of cold, he was by the time he had carried across pail after pail of Mrs. Eames’s “swill,” and emptied it into the barrel which stood by the sty. It wasn’t savoury work, either, and the farmer’s wife made a kind of excuse for there being so much of it. “Matthew were that idle,” and they’d been a hand short the last week or two. But Geoff wasn’t going to give in; there was a sort of enjoyment in it when it came to the actual feeding of the pigs, and for their digestion’s sake, it was well that the farmer’s wife warned him that there might be such a thing as over-feeding, even of pigs. He would have spent the best part of the afternoon in filling the trough and watching them squabble over it.

He was tired and hot, and decidedly dirtier-looking than could have been expected, when Eames and Jowett came back from the fields.

“Time to get the pony to!” shouted the farmer. Geoff turned off to the stable. He wanted to manage the harnessing alone; but, simple as it was, he found it harder than it looked, and he would have been forced to apply to Matthew, had not Jowett strolled into the stable. He felt sorry for the boy, sorrier than he thought it well to show, when he saw his flushed face and trembling hands, and in a trice he had disentangled the mysteries of buckles and straps, and got all ready.

“Been working hard?” he said good-naturedly. “Seems a bit strange at first.”

“I don’t mind the work; but-it does all seem very rough,” said Geoff.

There was a slight quiver in his voice, but Jowett said no more till they were jogging along on their way to the station. Geoff’s spirits had got up a little again by this time. He liked to feel the reins between his fingers, even though the vehicle was only a milk-cart, and the steed a sadly broken-winded old gray pony; and he was rather proud at having managed to steer safely through the yard gate, as to which, to tell the truth, he had felt a little nervous.

“Is there anything I can do for you on my way through town?” asked Jowett. “I’ll be in your part of the world to-night.”

“Are you going to sleep at the livery stables?” asked Geoff.

Jowett nodded.

“I wish-” began the boy. “If I’d thought of it, I’d have written a letter for you to post in London. But there’s no time now.”

Jowett looked at his watch-a very good silver watch it was-“I don’t know that,” he said. “I can get you a piece of paper and an envelope at the station, and I’ll see that your letter gets to-wherever it is, at once.”

“Thank you,” said Geoff. “And Jowett”-he hesitated. “You’ve been very good to me-would you mind one thing more? There’s some one I would like to hear from sometimes, but I don’t want to give my address. Could I tell them-her-it’s my sister-to write to your place, and you to send it to me?”

“To be sure,” said Jowett. “But I won’t give my address in the country. You just say to send on the letter to the care of

’MR. ABEL SMITH,
LIVERY STABLES,
MOWBRAY PLACE MEWS,’

and I’ll see it comes straight to you. You won’t want to give your name maybe? Just put ‘Mr. James, care of Abel Smith.’”

“Thank you,” said Geoff, with a sigh of relief. “You see,” he went on, half apologetically, “there’s some one ill at home, and I’d like to know how-how they are.”

“To be sure,” said Jowett again; “it’s only natural. And however bad one’s been treated by one’s people-and it’s easy to see they must have treated you oncommon badly to make a young gent like you have to leave his home and come down to work for his living like a poor boy, though I respects you for it all the more-still own folks is own folks.”

He cast a shrewd glance at Geoff, as he spoke. The boy could not help colouring. Had he been treated so “oncommon badly”? Was his determination to run away and be independent of Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot’s assistance a real manly resolution, or not rather a fit of ill-tempered boyish spite? Would he not have been acting with far more true independence by accepting gratefully the education which would have fitted him for an honourable career in his own rank? for Mr. Byrne, as he knew well by his mother’s trust in the old gentleman, was not one to have thrown him aside had he been worthy of assistance.

“But anyway, it’s done now,” thought the boy, choking down the feelings which began to assert themselves.

At the station, Jowett was as good as his word. He got the paper and a pencil, and Geoff wrote a short note to Vicky, just to tell her he was “all right,” and enclosing the address to which she was to write. And Jowett undertook that she should have it that same evening. Had the boy been less preoccupied he could not but have been struck by the curious inconsistencies in the young countryman, who, when he had first met him that morning, had seemed scarcely able to find his way to the station, and yet, when occasion arose, had shown himself as sharp and capable as any Londoner.

But as it was, when the train had whizzed off again, he only felt as if his last friend had deserted him. And it was a very subdued and home-sick Geoffrey who, in the chilly, misty autumn evening, drove the old pony through the muddy lanes to the farm, the empty milk-cans rattling in the cart behind him, and the tears slowly coursing down his cheeks now there was no one to see them.