 CHAPTER XV While Loveday and his neighbours were thus rambling forth full of expectancy, some of them, including Anne in the rear, heard the crackling of light wheels along the curved lane to which the path was the cord. At once Anne thought, perhaps it's he and we are missing him. But recent events were not of a kind to induce her to say anything, and the others of the company did not reflect on the sound. Had they gone across to the hedge which hid the lane and looked through it, they would have seen a light cart driven by a boy beside whom was seated a seafaring man, apparently of good standing in the merchant's service, with his feet outside on the shaft. The vehicle went over the main bridge, turned in upon the other bridge at the tail of the mill, and halted by the door. The sailor alighted, showing himself to be a well-shaped, active and fine young man, with a bright eye and anonymous nose, and of such a rich complexion by exposure to ripening suns, that he might have been some connection of the foreigner who calls his likeness the portrait of a gentleman in galleries of the old masters. It in spite of this, and though Bob Love Day had been all over the world from Cape Horn to Peek Inn, and from India's Coral Strand to the White Sea, the most conspicuous of all the marks that he had brought back with him was an increased resemblance to his mother, who had lain all the time beneath the overcome church wall. Captain Love Day tried the house door. Finding this locked, he went to the mill door. This was locked also, the mill being stopped for the night. "'They're not at home,' he said to the boy, but never mind that, just help to unload the things, and then I'll pay you, and you can drive off home.' The cart was unloaded, and the boy was dismissed, thanking the sailor profusely for the payment rendered. Then Bob Love Day, finding that he is still some leisure in his hands, looked musingly east, west, north, south, and nadia, after which he bestowed himself by carrying his goods article by article round to the back door, out of the way of casual passes. This done, he walked round the mill in a more regardful attitude, and surveyed its familiar features one by one. The panes of the grinding-room, now, as here too far, clouded with flour as with stale whorefrost. The mill lodged in the corners of the window-sills, forming a soil in which lichens grew without ever getting any bigger, as they had done since his smallest infancy. The mosses, on the plinth towards the river, reaching as high as the capillary power of the walls, would fetch up moisture for their nourishment. And the penned mill-pond, now, as ever, on the point of overflowing into the garden. Everything was the same. When he had had enough of this, it occurred to Love Day that he might get into the house in spite of the locked doors, and by entering the garden, placing a pole from the fork of an apple-tree to the window-sill of a bedroom on that side, and climbing across like a barberry-ape, he entered the window and stepped down inside. There was something anomalous in being close to the familiar furniture without having first seen his father, and its silent, impassive shine was not cheering. It was as if his relations were all dead, and in their tables and chests of drawers left to greet him. He went downstairs and seated himself in the dark parlour. Finding this place too rather solidarily, on the stick of the invisible clock, pretty naturally loud, he unearthed the tinder-box, obtained a light, and set about making the house comfortable for his father's return, divining that the miller had gone out to meet him by the wrong road. Robert's interest in this work increased as he proceeded, and he bustled round and round the kitchen as lightly as a girl. David, the indoor factotum, having lost himself among the caught pots of budmouth, there had been no pity left here to prepare supper, and Bob had it all to himself. In a short time a fire blazed up the chimney, a tablecloth was found, the plates were clapped down, and a search made for what provisions the house afforded, which, in addition to various meats, including some fresh eggs of the elongated shape that produces cockerels when hatched, and had been set aside on that account for putting under the next broody hen. A more reckless cracking of eggs than that which now went on had never been known in Overcum since the last large christening, and as Love Day gashed one on the side, another at the end, another long ways, and another diagonally, he acquired a dryness by practice, and at last made every son of a hen with them fall into two hemispheres as neatly as if he were opened by a hinge. From eggs he proceeded to ham, and from ham to kidneys. The result being a brilliant fry. Not to be tempted to fall too before his father came back, the returned navigator emptied the hole into a dish, laid a plate over the top, his coat over the plate, and his hat over his coat. Thus completely stopping in the appetizing smell, he sat down to await events. He was relieved from the tediousness of doing this by hearing voices outside, and in a minute his father entered. Glad to welcome your home, father, said Bob, and supper is just ready. Lord, Lord, why Captain Bob's here, said Mrs. Garland. And we've been out waiting to meet thee, said the miller, as he entered the room, followed by representatives of the houses of Cripplestraw, Comfort, Mitchell, Beach, and Snooks, together with some small beginnings of fensible tremlitz posterity. In the rear came David, and quite in the vanishing point of the composition, Anne the Fair. I drove over, and was so forced to come by the road, said Bob. And we went across the fields, thinking you'd walk, said his father. I should have been here this morning, but not so much as a wheel-barrier could I get for my traps. Everything was gone to the review. So I went to, thinking I might meet you there. I was then obliged to return to the harbour for the luggage. Then there was a welcoming of Captain Bob by pulling out his arms like drawers, and shutting them again, smacking him on the back as if he were choking, holding him at arm's length so that he were of too large type to read close. All which persecution Bob bore with a wide, genial smile, that was shaken into fragments and scattered promiscuously among the spectators. Get a chevron, said the miller to David, whom they had met in the fields, and found to have got nothing worse by his absence than a slight slant in his walk. Never mind. I'm not tired. I've been here ever so long, said Bob. And I— But the chair having been placed behind him and a smart touch in the hollow of a person's knee by the edge of that piece of furniture having a tendency to make the person sit without further argument, Bob sank down dumb, and the others drew up other chairs at a convenient nearness for easy analytic vision and the subtler forms of good fellowship. The miller went about saying, David, the nine best glasses from the corner cupboard. David, the corkscrew. David, whisk the tail of thy smock-frock round the inside of these cork pots before you draw a drink on them. They'd be an inch thick in dust. David, lower that chimney crock a couple of notches, that the flame may touch the bottom of the kettle, and light three more of the largest candles. If you can't get the cork out of the jar, David, bore a hole in the tub of hollands that's buried under the scruff of the fuel-house. Do you hear? Dan Brown left them there yesterday as a return for the little porker I get him, when they'd all had a thimbleful round, and the superfluous neighbours had reluctantly departed one by one. The inmates gave their minds to the supper, which David had begun to serve up. What be you rolling back the tablecloth for, David? said the miller. Mr. Barber's put down one of the undersheets by mistake, and I thought you might not like it, sir, as those ladies present. It was the first thing that came to hand, said Robert. It seemed a tablecloth to me. Never mind. Don't pull off the things. Now he's laid them down. Let it by, said the miller. But where's Biddo Garland and Madey Ann? They'd be here a bit a minute ago, said David. Depend upon it. They've slinked off, because they'd be shy. The miller at once went round to ask them to come back and sup with him. While he was gone, David told Bob, in confidence, what an excellent place he had for an old man. Here, Captain Bob, as I suppose I must call you, I've worked for your father these eight and thirty years, and we've always got on very well together. Trust me, with all the keys, lends me his sleeve waistcoat, and leaves the house entirely to me. Biddo Garland next door, too, is just the same with me, and treats me as if I was her own child. She must have married young to make you that, David. Yes, yes, I'm years older than she. It is only my common way of speaking. Mrs. Garland would not come into supper, and the meal proceeded without her. Bob, recommending to his father the dish she had cooked, in the manner of a householder to a stranger just to come. The miller was anxious to know more about his son's plans for the future, but would not for the present interrupt his eating, looking up from his own plate to appreciate Bob's travelled way of putting English vitals out of sight, as if we'd looked at a mill on improved principles. David had only just got the table clear, and set the plates in a row under the bakehouse table for the cat's to lick. When the door was hastily opened, a Mrs. Garland came in, looking concerned. I've been waiting to hear the plates removed to tell you how frightened we are at something we heard at the back door. It seems like robbers muttering. But when I look out, there's nobody there. Or this must be seen to, said the miller, rising promptly. David, light the middle-sized lanterner, I'll go and search the garden. And I'll go too, said his son, taking up a cudgel. Lucky I've come home just in time. They went out stealthily, followed by the widow and Anne, who had been afraid to stay alone in the house under the circumstances. No sooner were they beyond the door, when sure enough there was the muttering almost close at hand, and low upon the ground, as from persons lying down in hiding. Bless my heart, said Bob, striking his head as though it were some enemies. Why, it is my luggage. I quite forgot it. What? asked his father. My luggage! Really, if it hadn't been for Mrs. Garland, it would have stayed there all night. They poor things would have been starved. I've got all sorts of articles for you. You go inside, and I'll bring them in. It is parrots that you hear a muttering, Mrs. Garland. You'd even be afraid any more. Parrots? said the miller. I'm glad it is no worse. But how could's forget so, Bob? The packages were taken in by David and Bob, and the first unfastened were three unwrapped in cloths, which being stripped off revealed three cages with a gorgeous parrot in each. This one is for you, father, to hang up outside the door and amuse us, said Bob. He'll talk very well, but he's sleepy tonight. This other one I bought along for any neighbour that would like to have him. His colours are not so bright, but there's a good bird. If you would like to have him, you're welcome to him, he said, turning to Anne, who'd been tempted forward by the birds. You've hardly spoken yet, Miss Anne, but I recollect you very well. How much taller you have got, to be sure. Anne said she was much obliged, but did not know what she could do with such a present. Mrs. Garland accepted it for her, and the sailor went on, Now this other bird I hardly know what to do with, but I dare say he'll come in for something or other. He's by far the prettiest, said the widow. I would rather have it than the other, if you don't mind. Yes, said Bob with embarrassment. But the fact is, that bird will hardly do for ye man. He's a hard swearer, to tell the truth, and I'm afraid he's too old to be broken of it. How dreadful, said Mrs. Garland. We could keep him in the mill, suggested the miller. It won't matter about the grinder hearing him, for he can't learn to cuss worse than he do already. The grinder shall have him then, said Bob. The one I have given you, ma'am, has no harm in him at all. He might take him to church as soon as as far as that goes. The sailor now untied a small wooden box about a foot square perforated with holes. Here are two marmosets, he continued. You can't see them to-night, but they are beauties of the tufted sword. What's a marmoset, said the miller? Oh, a little kind of monkey. They bite strangers rather hard, but you'll soon get used to them. They're rubbed up in something, I declare, said Mrs. Garland, peeping in through a chink. Yes, that's my fennel shirt, said Bob apologetically. They suffer terribly from cold in this climate, poor things, and I had nothing better to give them. Well, now, in this next box I've got things of different sorts. The latter was a regular seamen's chest, and out of it he produced shells of many sizes and colours, carved ivories, queer little caskets, gorgeous feathers, and several silk handkerchiefs, which articles were spread out upon all the available tables and chairs till the house began to look like a bazaar. What a lovely shawl, exclaimed Widow Garland, in her interest for stalling the regular exhibition by looking into the box of what was coming. Oh, yes, said the mate, putting out a couple of the most bewitching shawls that eyes ever saw. One of these I'm going to give to that young lady I'm shortly to be married to, you know, Mrs. Garland. As Father told you about it. Matilda Johnson of Southampton, that's her name. Yes, we know all about it, said the Widow. Well, I shall give one of these shawls to her, because, of course, I ought to. Of course, said she. But the other one I've got no use for at all, and he continued looking round. Will you have it, Miss Anne? You refuse the parrot, and you ought not to refuse this. Thank you, said Anne calmly, but much distressed. But really, I don't want it, and couldn't take it. But do have it. Said Bob in hurt tones. Mrs. Garland being all the while on tenterhooks, lest Anne shall persist in her absurd refusal. Why, there's another reason why you ought to, said he, his face lighting up with recollections. It never came into my head till this moment, that I used to be your bow in a humble sort of way. Faith, so I did, and we used to meet at places sometimes, didn't we? That is, when you were not too proud. And once I gave you, or somebody else, a bit of my hair in fun. It was somebody else, said Anne quickly. Ah, perhaps it was, said Bob innocently, but as you I used to meet, or try to, I'm sure. Well, I've never thought of that boyish time for years till this minute. I'm sure you ought to accept some one gift, dear, out of compliment with those old times. Anne drew back, and shook her head, for she would not trust her voice. Well, Mrs. Garland, then you shall have it, said Bob, tossing the shawl to that ready receiver. If you don't, upon my life, I will throw you out to the first beggar I see. Now, here's a parcel of capravens of the splendidest sort I could get. Have these, do Anne. Yes, do, said Mrs. Garland. I promise them to Matilda, continued Bob, but I'm sure she won't want them, as she's got some of her own, and I would have soon seen them upon your head, my dear, as upon hers. I think you'd better keep them for your bride, if you promise them to her, said Mrs. Garland, mildly. It wasn't exactly a promise, I just said, till there's some capraims in my box, if you'd like to have them. But she's got enough things already for any bride in creation, and now you shall have them, upon my soul you shall, or I'll fling them down the mill-tail. Anne had meant to be perfectly firm in refusing everything, for reasons obvious, even to that poor wave, the meanest capacity. But when it came to this point she was absolutely compelled to give in, and reluctantly received the capraims in her arms, blushing fitfully, and with her lip trembling in a motion which she tried to exhibit as a smile. What would Tillie say if she knew? said the miller, slyly. Yes, indeed, and it is wrong of him. Anne instantly cried, tears running down her face as she threw the parcel robins on the floor. You better bestow your gifts where you bestow your love, Mr. Loveday, that's what I say. And Anne turned her back and went away. I'll take them for her, said Mrs. Garland, quickly picking up the parcel. Now that's a pity, said Bob, looking regretfully after Anne. I didn't remember that she was a quick-tempered sort of girl at all. Telling Mrs. Garland that I ask her pardon. But, of course, I didn't know she was too proud to accept the little present. How should I? Upon my life, if it wasn't for Matilda, right? Well, that can't be, of course. What's this? said Mrs. Garland, touching with her foot a large package that had been laid down by Bob unseen. That's a bit of backie for myself, said Robert Meekly. The examination of presents had last ended, and the two families parted for the night. When they were alone, Mrs. Garland said to Anne, What a close girl you are! I'm sure I never knew that Bob Loveday and you had walked together. You must have been mere children. Oh, yes, we were, said Anne, now quite recovered. It was when we first came here, about a year after Father died. We did not walk together in any regular way. You know, I've never thought that Loveday is high enough for me. It was only just nothing at all, and I had almost forgotten it. It is to be hoped that somebody's sins were forgiven her that night before she went to bed. When Bob and his father were left alone, the miller said, Well, Robert, what about this young woman of thine, Matilda, what's her name? Yes, Father, Matilda Johnson. I was just going to tell you about her. The miller nodded and sipped his mug. Well, she's an excellent body, continued Bob. That can truly be said. A real charmer, you know. A nice, good, comely young woman. A miracle of gentile breeding, you know, and all that. She can throw her hair into the nicest curls, and she's got splendid gowns and head-clothes. In short, you might call her a land mermaid. She'll make such a first-rate wife as there never was. No doubt she will, said the miller, for I've never known thee wanting in sense in a general way. He turned his cup round on his axis till the handle had travelled a complete circle. How long did you say in your letter that you'd known her? A fortnight. Not very long. It don't sound long to be true, and it was really longer. It was fifteen days and a quarter. But, hang it, Father, I could see in the twinkling of an eye that the girl would do. I know a woman well enough when I see her. I ought to indeed have been so much about the world. Now, for instance, there's Widow Garland and her daughter. The girl is a nice little thing, but the old woman. Oh, no! Bob shook his head. What o'er, said his father, slightly shifting in his chair? Well, she's—she's—I mean, I should never have chosen her, you know. She's of a nice disposition and young for a widow with a grown-up daughter. But if all the men had been like me, she would never have had her husband. I like her in some respects, but she's a style of beauty I don't care for. Or, if it is only looks you're thinking of, said the millermut relieved, there's nothing to be said, of course. Well, there's many a duchess worse looking if it comes to argument, as you would find my son, he added, with a sense of having been mollified too soon. The mate's thoughts were elsewhere by this time. As to my marrying Matilda thinks I, here's one of the jerry gentilists sort, and I may as well do the job at once. So I chose her. She's a dear girl. There's nobody like her. Search where you will. How many did you choose her out from? And quite his father. Well, she was the only young woman I happened to know in Southampton. That's true. But what of that? It would have been to the soul the same if I'd known a hundred. Her father is in business near the docks, I suppose. Well, no, in short, I didn't see her father. Her mother? Her mother—no, I didn't. I think her mother is dead, but she's got a very rich aunt living at Milchester. I didn't see her aunt, because there wasn't time to go. But of course we shall know her when we are married. Yes, yes, of course, said the miller, trying to feel quite satisfied. And she will soon be here? Aye, she's coming soon, said Bob. She's gone to this aunt's at Milchester to get her things packed and such like, or she would have come with me. I am going to meet the coach of the King's Arms, Castor Bridge, on Sunday at one o'clock. To show what a capital sort of wife she'll be, I may tell you that she wants to come by the mercury, because tis a little cheaper than the other. But I said, for once in your life do it well, and come by the royal mail, and I'll pay. I can have the pony-entrapped fetcher, I suppose, as tis too far for her to walk. Of course you can't, Bob, or anything else, and I'll do all I can to give you a good wedding feast. End of Chapter 15. Recording by Simon Evers. Chapter 16 of The Trumpet Major. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Alana Jordan. The Trumpet Major by Thomas Hardy. Chapter 16. They make ready for the illustrious stranger. Preparations for Matilda's welcome, and for the event which was to follow, at once occupied the attention of the mill. The miller and his man had but dim notions of housewifery on any large scale, so the great wedding-cleaning was kindly supervised by Mrs. Gardland. Bob, being mostly away during the day with his brother, the Trumpet Major, on various errands, one of which was to buy paint and varnish for the gig that Matilda was to be fetched in, which he had determined to decorate with his own hands. By the widow's direction, the old familiar incrustation of shining dirt, imprinted along the back of the settle by the heads of countless jolly sitters, was scrubbed and scraped away. The brown circle round the nail whereon the miller hung his hat, stained by the brim in wet weather, was whitened over. Tawny smudges of bygone shoulders in the passage were removed without regard to a certain genial and historical value which they had acquired. The face of the clock, coated with vertigris, as thick as a diacolon playster, was rubbed till the figures emerged in today, while, inside the case of the same chronometer, the cobwebs that formed triangular hammocks, which the pendulum could hardly wade through, were cleared away at one swoop. Mrs. Gardland also assisted at the invasion of warm-eaten cupboards, where layers of ancient smells lingered on in the stagnant air, and recalled to the reflective nose the many good things that had been kept there. The upper floors were scrubbed with such abundance of water that the old established death-watches, wood-lice, and flower-worms were all drowned, the suds trickling down into the room below, and so lively a novel manner as to convey the romantic notion that the miller lived in a cave with dripping stalactites. They moved, what had never been moved before, the oak coffer, containing the miller's wardrobe, a tremendous weight, what with its locks, hinges, nails, dirt, framework, and the hard stratification of old jackets, waistcoats, and knee-breaches at the bottom, never disturbed since the miller's wife died, and health pulverized by the moths whose flattened skeletons lay amid the mass and thousands. It fairly makes my back open and shut, said Love Day, as, an obedience to Mrs. Garland's direction, he lifted one corner, the grinder and David assisting at the others. All together, speak when you be going to heave, now! The pot-covers and skimmers were brought to such a state that, on examining them, the beholder was not conscious of utensils, but of his own face in a condition of hideous elasticity. The broken clock-line was mended, the kettles rocked, the creeper nailed up, and a new handle put to the warming pan. The large household lantern was cleaned out after three years of uninterrupted accumulation. The operation yielding a conglomerate of candle snuffs, candle ends, remains of matches, lamp-black, and eleven ounces and a half of good grease, invaluable as dubbing for skitty boots and ointment for cartwheels. Everybody said that the mill residents had not been so thoroughly scoured for twenty years. The miller and David looked on, with a sort of awe, tempered by gratitude, tacitly admitting by their gaze that this was beyond what they had ever thought of. Mrs. Garland supervised all with disinterested benevolence. It would never have done, she said, for his future daughter-in-law to see the house in its original state. She would have taken a dislike to him, and perhaps to Bob likewise. Why don't ye come and live here with me, and then you would be able to see to it at all times? said the miller, as she bustled about again, to which she answered that she was considering the matter, and might in good time. He had previously informed her that his plan was to put Bob and his wife in the part of the house that she, Mrs. Garland, occupied as soon as she chose to enter his, which relieved her of any fear of being incommodated by Matilda. The cooking for the wedding festivities was on a proportionate scale of thoroughness. They killed the four supernumerary chickens that had just begun to crow, and the little curly-tailed borrow-pig, in preference to the sow, not having been put up fattening for more than five weeks. It was excellent small meat, and therefore more delicate and likely to suit a town-bread lady's taste than a large one, which, having reached the weight of fourteen score, might have been a little gross to a cultured palette. There were also provided a cold chine, stuffed veal, and two pigeon-pies, also thirty rings of black pot, a dozen of white pot, and ten knots of tender and well-washed chitterlings, cooked plain in case she should like a change. As additional reserves, there were sweet-breads, and five mills, sewed up at one side in the form of a chrysalis, and stuffed with thyme, sage, parsley, mint, groats, rice, milk, chopped egg, and other ingredients. They were afterwards roasted before a slow fire and eaten hot. The business of chopping so many herbs for the various stuffings was found to be aching work for women. And David the Miller, the grinder, and the grinder's boy, being fully occupied in their proper branches, and Bob being very busy painting the gig and touching up the harness, Love Day called in a friendly dragoon of John's regiment, who was passing by, and he, being a muscular man, willingly chopped all the afternoon for a quart of strong judiciously administered, and all the victuals found, taking off his jacket and gloves, rolling up his shirt sleeves, and unfastening his collar in an honourable and energetic way. All windfalls and maggot-cord codlands were excluded from the apple-pies, and as there was no known dish large enough for the purpose, the puddings were stirred up in the milking pail and boiled in the three-legged bell-metal crock of great weight and antiquity, which every travelling tinker for the previous thirty years had tapped with a stick coveted, made a bid for, and often attempted to steal. In the liquor-line Love Day laid in an ample barrel of Castor Bridge strong beer. This renowned drink now almost as much a thing of the past as Falstaff's favourite beverage, was not only well calculated to win the hearts of soldiers blown dry and dusty by residents intense on a hill-top, but of any way fair whatever in that land. It was of the most beautiful colour that the eye of an artist in beer could desire, full in body, yet brisk as a volcano, pequant, yet without a twang, luminous as an autumn sunset, free from streakiness of taste, but finally rather heady. The masses worshipped it. The minor gentry loved it more than wine, and by the most illustrious county families it was not despised. Anybody brought up for being drunk and disorderly in the streets of its natal burrow had only to prove that he was a stranger to the place and its liquor to be honourably dismissed by the magistrates as one overtaken in a fault that no man could guard against who entered the town unawares. In addition, Mr. Love Day also tapped a hog's head of fine cider that he had mellowing in the house for several months, having bought it of an honest down-country man who did not colour for any special occasion like the present. It had been pressed from fruit judiciously chosen by an old hand, horner and cleave's apple for the body, a few tom-putts for colour, and just a dash of old five corners for sparkle, a selection originally made to please the palette of a well-known temperate earl who was a regular cider-drinker and lived to be eighty-eight. On the morning of the Sunday appointed for her coming Captain Bob Love Day set out to meet his bride. He had been all the week engaged in painting the gig assisted by his brother at odd times, and now it appeared of a gorgeous yellow with blue streaks and tassels at the corners, and red wheels outlined with a darker shade. He put in the pony at half-past eleven and looking down at him from the door as he packed himself into the vehicle and drove off. There may be young women who look out at young men driving to meet the brides as Anne looked at Captain Bob, and yet we are quite indifferent to the circumstances, but they are not often met with. So much dust had been raised on the highway by traffic resulting from the presence of the court at the town further on that brambles hanging from the fence and giving a friendly scratch to the wanderer's face were dingy as church cobwebs, and the grass on the margin had assumed a paper-shaving hue. Bob's father had wished him to take David, lest, from want of recent experience at the whip, he should meet with any mishap, but picturing to himself the awkwardness of three in such circumstances Bob would not hear of this, and nothing more serious happened to his driving than that the wheel-marks formed two serpentine lines along the road during the first mile or two before he got his hand in, and that the horse shied at a milestone, a piece of paper, a sleeping tramp, and a wheel-barrow, just to make use of the opportunity of being in bad hands. He entered Caster Bridge between 12 and 1, and putting up at the old Greyhound walked on to the bow. Here, rather dusty on the ledges of his clothes, he stood and waited while the people in their best summer dresses poured out of the three churches round him. When they had all gone, and a smell of cinders and gravy had spread down the ancient high street, and the pie-dishes from adjacent bake-houses had all traveled past, he saw the male coach rise above the arch of Grey's Bridge, a quarter of a mile distant, surmounted by swaying knobs, which proved to be the heads of the outside travelers. That's the way for a man's bride to come to him, said Robert, to himself with a feeling of poetry. And as the horn sounded, and the horses clattered up the street, he walked down to the inn. The knot of hostlers and in-servants had gathered. The horses were dragged from the vehicle, and the passengers for Caster Bridge began to descend. Captain Bob eyed them over, looking inside, looking outside again, to his disappointment Matilda was not there, nor her boxes, nor anything that was hers, neither coachman nor guard had seen or heard of such a person at Melchester, and Bob walked slowly away. Depressed by forebodings to an extent which took nearly a third of his appetite, he sat down in the parlor of the old Greyhound to a slice from the family joint of the landlord. This gentleman, who dined in his shirt sleeves, partly because it was August, and partly from a sense that they would not be so fit for public view further on in the week, suggested that Bob should wait till three or four that afternoon, when the road wagon would arrive, as the lost lady might have preferred that mode of conveyance. And when Bob appeared rather hurt at the suggestion, the landlord's wife assured him, as a woman who knew good life, that many genteel persons traveled in that way during the present high price of provisions. Love-day, who knew little of traveling by land, readily accepted her assurance and resolved to wait. Wandering up and down the pavement, or leaning against some hot wall between the wagon-office and the corner of the street above, he passed the time away. It was a still, sunny, drowsy afternoon, and scarcely a soul was visible in the length and breadth of the street. The office was not far from All Saints Church, and the church windows being open, he could hear the afternoon service from where he lingered, as distinctly as if he had been one of the congregation. Thus he was mentally conducted through the Psalms, through the first and second lessons, through the burst of fiddles and clarionettes which announced the evening hymn, and well into the sermon, before any signs of the wagon could be seen upon the London road. The afternoon sermons at this church being of a dry and metaphysical nature at that date, it was by a special providence that the wagon-office was placed near the ancient fabric, so that whenever the Sunday wagon was late, which it always was in hot weather, in cold weather, in wet weather, and in weather of almost every other sort, the rattle, dismounting, and swearing outside completely drowned the parson's voice within, and sustained the flagging interest of the congregation at precisely the right moment. No sooner did the charity children begin to writhe on their benches, and adult snores grow audible than the wagon arrived. Captain Love Day felt a kind of sinking in his poetry at the possibility of her for whom they had made such preparations being in the slow, unwieldy vehicle which crunched its way towards him. But he would not give in to the weakness. Neither would he walk down the street to meet the wagon, lest she should not be there. At last the broad wheels drew up against the curb, the wagon-ear with his white smock frock, and whip as long as a fishing-line, descended from the pony on which he rode alongside, and the six broad-chested horses backed from their collars and shook themselves. In another moment something showed forth, and he knew that Matilda was there. Bob felt three cheers rise within him as she stepped down. But at being Sunday he did not utter them. In dress Miss Johnson passed his expectations. A green and white gown with long, tight sleeves, a green silk handkerchief round her neck, and crossed in front. A green parasol and green gloves. It was strange enough to see this verdant caterpillar turn out of a road wagon, and gracefully shake herself free from the bits of straw and fluff which would usually gather on the rain-ment of the grandest travelers by that vehicle. But my dear Matilda, said Bob, when he had kissed her three times which much publicity. The practical step he had determined, on seeming to demand, that these things should no longer be done in a corner. My dear Matilda, why didn't you come by the coach, having the money fort and all? That's my scrimping, said Matilda, in a delightful gush. I know you won't be offended when you know I did it to save against a rainy day. Bob, of course, was not offended, though the glory of meeting her had been less, and even if vexation were possible, it would have been out of place to say so. Still he would have experienced no little surprise had he learned the real reason of his Matilda's change of plan. That angel had, in short, so wildly spent Bob's and her own money in the adornment of her person before setting out, that she found herself without a sufficient margin for her fare by coach and had scrimped from sheer necessity. Well, I have got the trap out at the Greyhound, said Bob. I don't know whether it will hold your luggage and us too, but it looked more respectable than the wagon on a Sunday, and if there's not room for the boxes I can walk alongside. I think there will be room, said Miss Johnson mildly, and it was soon very evident that she spoke the truth, for when her property was deposited on the pavement it consisted of a trunk about eighteen inches long and nothing more. Oh, that's all, said Captain Love Day, surprised. That's all, said the young woman assuringly. I didn't want to give trouble, you know, and what I have besides I have left at my aunt's. Yes, of course, he answered readily, and as it's no bigger I can carry it in my hand to the inn, and so it will be no trouble at all. He caught up the little box, and they went side by side to the Greyhound, and in ten minutes they were trotting up the southern road. Bob did not hurry the whores, there being many things to say and hear, for which the present situation was admirably suited. The sun shone occasionally into Matilda's face as they drove on, its rays picking out all her features to a great nicety. Her eyes would have been called brown, but they were really eel-color, like many other nice brown eyes, they were well-shaped and rather bright, though they had more of a broad shine than a sparkle. She had a firm, sufficient nose, which seemed to save itself that it was good as noses go. She had rather a picturesque way of wrapping her upper in her lower lip, so that the red of the latter showed strongly. Whenever she gazed against the sun, toward the distant hills, she brought into her forehead, without knowing it, three short vertical lines, not there at other times, giving her, for the moment, rather a hard look. And in turning her head round to a far angle, to stare at something or other that he pointed out, the drawn flesh of her neck became a mass of lines. But Bob did not look at these things, which of course were of no significance, for had she not told him, when they compared ages, that she was a little over two and twenty? As nature was hardly invented at this early point of the century, Bob's Matilda could not say much about the glamour of the hills or the shimmering of the foliage or the wealth of glory in the distant sea, as she would doubtless have done had she lived later on. But she did her best to be interesting, asking Bob about matters of social interest in the neighborhood, to which she seemed quite a stranger. Is your watering-place a large city, she inquired, when they mounted the hill where the overcome folk had waited for the king? Bless you, my dear, no. T'would be nothing if it wasn't for the royal family and the lords and ladies and the regiments of soldiers and the frigates and the king's messengers and the actors and actresses and the games that go on. At the words actors and actresses, the innocent young thing pricked up her ears. Does Eliston pay as good salaries this summer as in— Oh, you know about it, then? I thought— Oh, no, no. I have heard of Budmouth, read in the papers, you know, dear Robert, about the doings there, and the actors and actresses, you know. Yes, yes, I see. Well, I have been away from England a long time and don't know much about the theatre in the town, but I'll take you there some day. Would it be a treat to you? Oh, an amazing treat, said Miss Johnson, with an ecstasy in which a close observer might have discovered a tinge of gasliness. You've never been into one, perhaps, dear. Never, said Matilda Flatley. Whatever do I see yonder? A row of white things on the down? Yes, that's a part of the encampment, above the overcome. Lots of soldiers are encamped about here. Those are the white tops of their tents. He pointed to a wing of the camp that had become visible. Matilda was much interested. It will make it very lively for us, he added, especially as John is there. She thought so too, and thus they chatted on. End of CHAPTER XVI Meanwhile Miller Love Day was expecting the pair with interest. And about five o'clock, after repeated outlooks, he saw two specks the size of caraway seeds on the far line of ridge where the sunlit white of the road met the blue of the sky. Then the remainder parts of Bob and his lady became visible, and then the whole vehicle, and on, and he heard the dry rattle of the wheels on the dusty road. Miller Love Day's plan, as far as he had formed any, was that Robert and his wife should live with him in the millhouse until Mrs. Garland made up her mind to join him there, in which event her present house would be made over to the young couple. Upon all grounds he wished to welcome, becomingly, the woman of his son's choice, and came forward promptly as they drew up at the door. What a lovely place you've got here, said Mrs. Johnson, when the Miller had received her from the captain, a real stream of water, a real mill-wheel, and real fowls, and everything. Yes, tis real enough, said Love Day, looking at the river with balanced sentiments, and so you will say when you've lived here a bit as Mrs., and had the trouble of cleaning the furniture. At this, Mrs. Johnson looked modest and continued to do so till Anne, not knowing they were there, came round the corner of the house with her prayer-book in her hand, having just arrived from church. Bob turned and smiled to her, at which Mrs. Johnson looked glum. How long she would have remained in that phase is unknown, for just then her ears were assailed by a loud bass note from the other side, causing her to jump round. Oh, la, what dreadful thing is that, she exclaimed, and beheld a cow of Love Days, of the name of Crumpler, standing close to her shoulder. It being about milking time, she had come to look up David and hasten on the operation. Oh, what a horrid bull! It did frighten me so. I hope a chant faint, said Matilda. The miller immediately used the formula which has been uttered by the proprietors of livestock ever since Noah's time. She won't hurt you. Hush, Crumpler! She's as timid as a mouse, ma'am. But as Crumpler persisted in making another terrific inquiry for David, Matilda could not help closing her eyes and saying, Oh, I shall be gored to death. Her head falling back upon Bob's shoulder, which, seeing the urgent circumstances, and knowing her delicate nature, he had providentially placed in a position to catch her. Anne Garland, who had been standing at the corner of the house, not knowing whether to go back or come on, at this felt her womanly sympathies aroused. She ran and dipped her handkerchief into the splashing mill-tail, and with it damped Matilda's face. But as her eyes still remained closed, Bob, to increase the effect, took the handkerchief from Anne and wrung it out on the bridge of Matilda's nose, once it ran over the rest of her face in a stream. Oh, Captain Loveday, said Anne, the water is running over her green silk handkerchief, and into her pretty reticule. There, I didn't think so, exclaimed Matilda, opening her eyes, starting up, and promptly pulling out her own handkerchief, with which she wiped away the drops, and an unimportant trifle of her complexion, assisted by Anne, who, in spite of her background of antagonistic emotions, could not help being interested. That's right, said the miller, his spirits reviving with the revival of Matilda. The lady is not used to country life, are you, ma'am? I am not, replied the sufferer. All is so strange about here. Suddenly they're spread into the firmament from the direction of the down. Ratata, tatata, tatata, ratata! Oh, dear, dear, more hideous country sounds, I suppose, she inquired with another start. Oh, no, said the miller cheerfully, tis only my son John's trumpeter chaps at the camp of dragoons just above us, a blowing mess, or feed, or picket, or some other of their vagaries. John will be much pleased to tell you the meaning on it when he comes down. He's trumpet major, as you may know, ma'am. Oh, yes, you mean Captain Loveday's brother. Dear Bob has mentioned him. If you come round to widow Garland's side of the house, you can see the camp, said the miller. Don't force her, she's tired with her long journey, said Mrs. Garland humanely, the widow having come out in the general wish to see Captain Bob's choice. Indeed, they all behaved towards her as if she were a tender exotic, which their crude country manners might seriously injure. She went into the house, accompanied by Mrs. Garland and her daughter, though before leaving Bob she managed to whisper in his ear, Don't tell them I came by wagon, will you, dear? A request which was quite needless, for Bob had long ago determined to keep that a dead secret, not because it was an uncommon mode of travel, but simply that it was hardly the usual conveyance for a gorgeous lady to her bridle. As the men had a feeling that they would be superfluous indoors just at present, the miller assisted David in taking the horse round to the stables, Bob following, and leaving Matilda to the women. In doors Miss Johnson admired everything, the new parrots and marmosets, the black beams of the ceiling, the double corner covered with the glass doors, through which gleaned the remainders of sundry china sets acquired by Bob's mother and her housekeeping, two handled sugar basins, no handled tea cups, a teapot like a pagoda, and a cream jug in the form of a spotted cow. This sociability in their visitor was returned by Mrs. Garland and Anne, and Miss Johnson's pleasing habit of partly dying whenever she heard any unusual bark or bellow added to her pecancy in their eyes. But conversation as such was naturally at first of a nervous tentative kind, in which, as in the works of some minor poets, the sense was considerably led by the sound. You get the sea breezes here, no doubt? Oh yes, dear, when the wind is that way. Do you like windy weather? Yes, though not now, for it blows down the young apples. Apples are plentiful, it seems. You country folk call St. Swithon's their christening day if it rains? Yes, dear. Ah, me, I have not been to a christening for these many years. The baby's name was George, I remember, after the King. I hear the King George is still staying at the town here. I hope he'll stay till I have seen him. He'll wait till the corn turns yellow, he always does. How very fashionable yellow is getting for gloves just now. Yes, some persons wear them to the elbow I hear. Do they? I was not aware of that. I struck my elbow last week so hard against the door of my aunt's mansion that I feel the ache now. Before they were quite overwhelmed by the interest of this discourse, the Miller and Bob came in. In truth Mrs. Garland found the office in which he had placed that of introducing a strange woman to a house which was not the widow's own, a rather awkward one, and yet almost a necessity. There was no woman belonging to the house except that wondrous compendium of usefulness, the intermittent maid-servant whom Love Day had, for appearances, borrowed from Mrs. Garland, and Mrs. Garland was in the habit of borrowing from the girl's mother. And as for the demi-woman David, he had been informed as peremptorily as Pharaoh's baker that the office of housemaid and bedmaker was taken from him, and would be given to this girl till the wedding was over, and Bob's wife took the management into her own hands. They all sat down to high tea, Anne and her mother included, and the captain sitting next to Miss Johnson. Anne had put a brave face upon the matter, outwardly at least, and seemed in a fair way of subduing any lingering sentiment which Bob's return had revived. During the evening and while they still sat over the meal, John came down on a hurried visit, as he had promised, ostensibly on purpose to be introduced to his intended sister-in-law, but much more to get a word and a smile from his beloved Anne. Before they saw him, they heard the trumpet-major's smart step coming around the corner of the house, and in a moment his forum darkened the door. As it was Sunday, he appeared in his full-dress laced coat, white waistcoat and britches, and towering plume, the latter of which he instantly lowered, as much from necessity as good manners, the beam in the millhouse ceiling having a tendency to smash and ruin all such headgear without warning. John, we've been hoping you would come down, said the miller, and so we have kept the tay about on purpose. Draw up and speak to Mrs. Matilda Johnson. Ma'am, this is Robert's brother. Your humble servant, ma'am, said the trumpet-major gallantly. As it was getting dusk in the low, small-pained room, he instinctively moved towards Ms. Johnson, as he spoke, who sat with her back to the window. He had no sooner noticed her features than his helmet nearly fell from his head, his face became suddenly fixed, and his natural complexion took itself off, leaving her greenish-yellow in its stead. The young person, on her part, had no sooner looked closely at him than she said weekly, Robert's brother, and changed color yet more rapidly than the soldier had done. The faintness, previously half-counterfeit, seized on her now in real earnest. I don't feel well, she said, suddenly rising by an effort. This warm day has quite upset me. There was a regular collapse of the tea-party, like that of the Hamlet play scene. Bob seized his sweetheart and carried her upstairs, the miller exclaiming, ah, she's terribly worn by the journey. I thought she was when I saw her nearly go off at the blaire of the cow. No woman would have been frightened at that, if she'd been up to her natural strength. That, and being so very shy of men, too, must have made John's handsome regimentals quite overpowering to her, poor thing, added Mrs. Garland, following the catastrophic young lady upstairs, whose indisposition was by this time beyond question. And yet, by some perversity of the heart, she was as eager now to make light of her faintness as she had been to make much of it two or three hours ago. The miller and John stood like straight sticks in the room the others had quitted, John's face being hastily turned towards a caricature of Bonaparte on the wall that he had not seen more than a hundred and fifty times before. "'Come sit down and have a dish of tea anyhow,' said his father at last. She'll soon be right again, no doubt.' "'Thanks, I don't want any tea,' said John quickly. And, indeed, he did not, for he was in one gigantic ache from head to foot. The light had been too dim for anybody to notice his amazement, and, not knowing where to vent it, the trumpet-major said he was going out for a minute. He hastened to the bake-house. But David being there, he went to the pantry. But the maid being there, he went to the cart shed. But a couple of tramps being there, he went behind a row of French beans in the garden, where he led off in ejaculation the most pious that he had uttered that Sabbath day. "'Heaven, what's to be done?' And then he walked wildly about the paths of the dusky garden, where the trickling of the brooks seemed loud by comparison with the stillness around, treading recklessly on the cracking snails it had come forth to feed, and entangling his spurs in the long grass till the rowels were choked with its blades. Presently he heard another person approaching, and his brother's shape appeared between the stubborn tree and the hedge. "'Oh, is it you?' said the maid. "'Yes, I am taking a little air. She's getting round nicely again, and as I am not wanted indoors just now, I am going into the village to call upon a friend or two I have not been able to speak to as yet.' John took his brother Bob's hand. Bob, rather, wondered why. "'All right, old boy,' he said. "'Going into the village? You'll be back again, I suppose, before it gets very late?' "'Oh, yes,' said Captain Bob cheerfully, and passed out of the garden. John allowed his eyes to follow his brother till his shape could not be seen, and then he turned and again walked up and down. End of Chapter 17. Recording by Roger Maline Chapter 18 of The Trumpet Major This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Roger Maline The Trumpet Major by Thomas Hardy Chapter 18 The Night After the Arrival John continued his sad and heavy pace till walking seemed too old and worn out a way of showing sorrow so new, and he leaned himself against the fork of an apple tree like a log. There the Trumpet Major remained for a considerable time, his face turned towards the house whose ancient many chimneyed outline rose against the darkened sky and just shut out from his view the camp above. But faint noises coming thence from horses restless at the pickets and from visitors taking their leave recalled its existence and reminded him that in consequence of Matilda's arrival he had obtained leave for the night, a fact which, owing to the startling emotions that followed his entry, he had not yet mentioned to his friends. While abstractly considering how he could best use that privilege under the new circumstances which had arisen, he heard Farmer Derriman drive up to the front door and hold a conversation with his father. The old man had at last apparently brought the tin box of private papers that he wished the miller to take charge of during Derriman's absent, and at being a calm night John could hear, though he little heeded, Uncle Benji's reiterated supplications to Love Day to keep it safe from fire and thieves. Then Uncle Benji left and John's father went upstairs to deposit the box in a place of security, the whole proceeding reaching John's preoccupied comprehension merely as voices during sleep. The next thing was the appearance of a light in the bedroom which had been assigned to Matilda Johnson. This effectually aroused the trumpet major, and with the stealthiness unusual in him he went indoors. No light was in the lower rooms, his father, Mrs. Garland, and Anne having gone out on the bridge to look at the new moon. John went upstairs on tiptoe and along the uneven passage till he came to her door. It was standing a jar, a band of candlelight shining across the passage and up the opposite wall. As soon as he entered the radiance he saw her. She was standing before the looking-glass, apparently lost in thought, her fingers being clasped behind her head in abstraction, and the light falling full upon her face. I must speak to you, said the trumpet major. She started, turned and grew paler than before, and then as if moved by a sudden impulse she swung the door wide open and, coming out, said quite collectively and with apparent pleasantness, oh yes, you are my Bob's brother. I didn't for a moment recognize you. But you do now? As Bob's brother, you have not seen me before? I have not, she answered, with a face as impassable as Tallyran's. Good God! I have not, she repeated. Nor any of the the dagoons? Captain Jolly, for instance? No. You mistake. I'll remind you of particulars, he said dryly, and he did remind her at some length. Never, she said desperately. But she had miscalculated her staying powers and her adversary's character. Five minutes after that she was in tears, and the conversation had resolved itself into words which, on the soldier's part, were of the nature of commands, tempered by pity, and were a mere series of entreaties on hers. The whole scene did not last ten minutes. When it was over, the trumpet major walked from the doorway where they had been standing and brushed moisture from his eyes. Reaching a dark lumber room, he stood still there to calm himself, and then descended by a Flemish ladder to the bakehouse instead of by the front stairs. He found that the others, including Bob, had gathered in the parlor during his absence and lighted the candles. Miss Johnson, having sent down some time before John re-entered the house to say that she would prefer to keep her room that evening, was not expected to join them, and on this account Bob showed less than his customary liveliness. The miller, wishing to keep up his son's spirits, expressed his regret that, it being Sunday night, they could have no songs to make the evening cheerful. When Mrs. Garland proposed that they should sing psalms, which, by choosing lively tunes and not thinking of the words, would be almost as good as ballads. This they did, the trumpet major appearing to join in with the rest, but as a matter of fact no sound came from his moving lips. His mind was in such a state that he derived no pleasure, even from Anne Garland's presence, though he held a corner of the same book with her, and was treated in a winsome way, which it was not her usual practice to indulge in. She saw that his mind was clouded, and, far from guessing the reason why, was doing her best to clear it. At length the Garlands found that it was the hour for them to leave, and John loved day at the same time, wished his father and Bob good night, and went as far as Mrs. Garland's door with her. He had said not a word to show that he was free to remain out of camp, for the reason that there was painful work to be done. Which it would be best to do in secret and alone. He lingered near the house till its reflected window-lights seized to glimmer upon the mill-pond, and all within the dwelling was dark and still. Then he entered the garden, and waited there till the back door open, and a woman's figure temerously came forward. John loved day at once went up to her, and they began to talk in low, yet dissentient tones. They had conversed about ten minutes, and were parting as if they had come to some painful arrangement, Miss Johnson sobbing bitterly, when a head stealthily arose from the dense hedgerow, and in a moment a shout burst from its owner. Thieves! Thieves! My tin box! Thieves! Thieves! Matilda vanished into the house, and John loved a hasten to the hedge. For heaven's sake, hold your tongue, Mr. Derryman, he exclaimed. My tin box! said Uncle Benchy. Oh, only the trumpet major! Your box is safe enough, I assure you. It was only here the trumpet major gave vent to an artificial lap. Only a sly bit of courting, you know. Ha-ha! I see! said the relieved old squireen. Courting Miss Anne, then you've ousted my nephew, trumpet major. Well, so much the better. As for myself, the truth on it is that I haven't been able to go to bed easy, for thinking that possibly your father might not take care of what I put under his charge, and at last I thought I would just step over and see if all was safe here before I turned in. And when I saw your two shapes, my poor nerves magnified yeet of housebreakers and bonies, and I don't know what all. You have alarmed the house, said the trumpet major, hearing the clicking of Flint and Steele in his father's bedroom, followed in a moment by the rise of a light in the window of the same apartment. You have got me into difficulty, he added gloomily, as his father opened the casement. I am sorry for that, said Uncle Benjy, but step back. I'll put it all right again. What for heaven's sake is the matter, said the miller, his tassled nightcap appearing in the opening? Nothing, nothing, said the farmer. I was uneasy about my few bonds and documents, and I walked this way, miller, before going to bed, as I start from home to-morrow morning. When I came down by your garden hedge, I thought I saw thieves, but it turned out to be here a lump of earth from the trumpet major's hand struck Uncle Benjy in the back as a reminder, to be the bow of a cherry tree waving in the wind. Good night. No thieves are like to try my house, said miller Love Day. Now don't you come alarming us like this again, farmer, or you shall keep your box yourself, begging your pardon for saying so. Good night to you. Miller, will you just look, since I am here. Just look and see if the box is all right. There's a good man. I am old, you know, and my poor remains are not what my original self was. Look and see if it is where you put it. There's a good, kind man. Very well, said the miller, good-humoredly. Neighbor Love Day, on second thoughts I will take my box home again after all, if you don't mind. You won't deem it ill of me. I have no suspicions, of course, but now I think on it there's rivalry between my nephew and your son, and if Festus should take it into his head to set your house on fire in his enmity, it would be bad for my deeds and documents. No offence, miller, but I'll take the box, if you don't mind. Faith, I don't mind, said Love Day. But your nephew had better think twice before he lets his enmity take that color. Receeding from the window he took the candle to a back part of the room and soon appeared with the tin box. I won't trouble ye to dress, said Derriman considerably. Let him down by anything you have at hand. The box was lowered by a cord, and the old man clasped it in his arms. Thank ye, he said with heartfelt gratitude. Good night! The miller replied and closed the window, and the light went out. There, now I hope you are satisfied, sir, said the trumpet major. Quite, quite, said Derriman, and, leaning on his walking stick, he pursued his lonely way. That night Anne lay awake in her bed, musing on the traits of the few friends who had come to her neighbor's house. She would not be critical, it was ungenerous and wrong, but she could not help thinking of what interested her. And were there, she silently asked, in Miss Johnson's mind and person such rare qualities as placed that lady altogether beyond comparison with herself? Oh yes, there must be. For had not Captain Bob singled out Matilda from among all other women, herself included? Of course, with his world-wide experience, he knew best. When the moon had set, and only the summer stars threw their light into their great damp garden, she fancied that she heard voices in that direction. Perhaps they were the voices of Bob and Matilda taking a lover's walk before retiring. If so, how sleepy they would be next day, and how absurd it was of Matilda to pretend she was tired. Ruminating in this way, and saying to herself that she hoped they would be happy, Anne fell asleep. End of Chapter 18, Recording by Roger Maline Chapter 19 of The Trumpet Major This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. The Trumpet Major by Thomas Hardy Chapter 19 Miss Johnson's behavior causes no little surprise. Partly from the excitement of having his Matilda under the paternal roof, Bob rose next morning as early as his father and the grinder, and when the big wheel began to pedder and the little winds to mumble in response, went to sun himself outside the mill front, among the fowls of brown and speckle kinds which haunted that spot, and the ducks that came up from the mill tail. Standing on the worn-out millstone inlaid in the gravel, he talked with his father on various improvements of the premises and on the proposed arrangements for his permanent residence there, with an enjoyment that was half-based upon this prospect of the future, and half on the penetrating warmth of the sun to his back and shoulders. Then the different troops of horses began their morning scramble down to the mill pond, and, after making it very muddy round the edge, ascended to slope again. The bustle of the camp grew more and more audible, and presently David came to say that breakfast was ready. Is Miss Johnson downstairs? said the miller, and Bob listened for the answer, looking at a blue sentinel aloft on the down. Now yet Masters had the excellent David. We'll wait till she's down, said Loveday. When she is, let us know. David went indoors again, and Loveday and Bob continued their morning survey by ascending into the mysterious, quivering recesses of the mill, and holding a discussion over a second pair of burst-stones, which had to be redressed before they could be used again. This and similar things occupied nearly twenty minutes, and looking from the window, the elder of the two was reminded of the time of day by seeing Mrs. Garland's tablecloth bluttering from her back door over the heads of a flock of pigeons that had alighted for their crumbs. I suppose David can't find us, he said, with a sense of hunger that was not altogether strange to Bob. He put out his head and shouted. The lady is not down yet, said his man in reply. No hurry, no hurry, said the miller, with cheerful emptiness. Bob, to pass the time, will look into the garden. She'll get up sooner than this, you know, when she signed articles and got a birth here. Bob observed apologetically. Yes, yes, said Loveday, and they descended into the garden. Here they turned over sundry flat stones and killed the slugs sheltered beneath them from the coming heat of the day, talking of slugs in all of their branches, of the brown and the black, of the tough and the tender, of the reason why there were so many in the garden that year, of the coming time when the grass walks harboring them were to be taken up and gravel laid, and of the relatively exterminatory merits of a pair of scissors and the heel of the shoe. At last the miller said, Well, really, Bob, I'm hungry, we must begin without her. They were about to go in when David appeared with haste in his motions, and his eyes wider vertically than crosswise, and his cheeks nearly all gone. Master, I've been to collar, and as I didn't speak, I wrapped, and as I didn't answer, kicked, and not being latched the door opened, and she's gone. Bob went off like a swallow towards the house, and the miller fallowed, like the rather heavy man that he was. That Miss Matilda was not in a room, or a scrap of anything belonging to her was soon apparent. They searched every place in which she could possibly hide or squeeze herself, every place in which she could not, but found nothing at all. Captain Bob was quite wild with astonishment and grief. When he was quite sure that she was nowhere in his father's house, he ran into Mrs. Garland's and telling them the story so hastily, that they hardly understood the particulars. He went on towards Comfort's house, intending to raise the alarm there, and also at Mitchell's, Beaches, Cripple Straws, the Parsons, the Clerks, the Camp of Dragroons, the Hazars, and on through the Hall County. But he paused and thought it would be hardly expedient to publish his discomputure in such a way. If Matilda had left the house for any freakish reason he would not care to look for her, and if her deed had a tragic intent she would keep aloof from camp and village. In his trouble he thought of Anne. She was a nice girl and could be trusted. To her he went and found her in a state of excitement and anxiety which equaled his own. Tis so lonely to cruise here all by myself, said Bob, disconsolently, his forehead all in wrinkles. And I thought you would come with me and cheer the way. Where shall we search? said Anne. Oh, in the holes of rivers you know, and down wells and inquiries and over cliffs and like that. Your eyes might catch the loom of any bit of shawl or bonnet that I should overlook. And it would do me a real service. Please do come. So Anne took pity upon him and put on her hat and went, the Miller and David having gone off in another direction. They examined the ditches of fields, Bob going round by one fence and Anne by the other, till they met at the opposite side. Then they peeped under culverts into outhouses, down old wells and inquiries, until the theory of a tragical end had nearly spent its force in Bob's mind, and he began to think that Matilda had simply run away. However, they still walked on, though by this time the sun was hot and Anne would gladly have sat down. Now don't you think highly of her, Ms. Garland he inquired as the search began to languish? Oh yes, said Anne, very highly. She was really beautiful, no nonsense about her looks was there. None. Her beauty was thoroughly ripe, not too young. We should all have got to love her. What can have possessed her to go away? I don't know, and upon my life I shall soon be drove to say I don't care, replied the mate despairing jingly. Let me pilot ye down over those stones, he added as Anne began to descend a rugged quarry. He stepped forward, leapt down, and turned to her. She gave him her hand and sprang down. Before he relinquished his hold, Captain Bob raised her fingers to his lips and kissed them. Oh, Captain, love day, cried Anne, snatching away her hand in genuine dismay, while a tear rose unexpectedly in each eye. I never heard of such a thing. I won't go an inch farther with you, sir. It is too bare-faced, and she turned and ran off. Upon my life I didn't mean it, said the repentant Captain, hastening after. I do love her best, indeed I do, and I don't love you at all. I am not so fickle as that. I merely just, for the moment, admired you as a sweet little craft, and that's how I came to do it. You know, Miss Garland, he continued earnestly, and still running after her. Tis like this. When you came ashore after having been shut up in a ship for eighteen months, woman-folk seemed so new and nice that you can't help liking them. One and all in a body, and so your heart is apt to get scattered. And to yob it. But of course I think of poor Matilda most, and shall always stick to her. He heaved a sigh of tremendous magnitude, to show beyond the possibility of doubt that his heart was still in the place of that honor required. I am glad to hear that, of course. I am very glad, she said, with a quick pencholence keeping her face turned away from him. And I hope we shall find her, and that the wedding will not be put off, and that you'll both be happy. But I won't look for her any more. No, I don't care to look for her. And my headaches, I'm going home. And so am I, said Robert promptly. No, no. Go on looking for her, of course, all the afternoon and all night. I'm sure you will, if you love her. Oh, yes, I mean to. Still, I ought to convey you home first. No, you ought not, and I shall not accept your company. Good morning, sir. And she went off over one of the stone styles which the spot abounded, leaving the friendly sailor standing in the field. He sighed again, and, observing the camp not far off, thought he would go to his brother John and ask him his opinion on the sorrowful case. On reaching the tents, he found that John was not at liberty just at that time, being engaged in practicing the trumpet tears, and leaving word that he wished the trumpet major to come down to the mill as soon as possible. Bob went back again. "'Tis no good looking for her,' he said gloomily. She liked me well enough, but when she came here and saw the house, and the place, and the old horse, and the plain furniture, she was disappointed to find us all so homely, and felt she didn't care to marry into such a family. His father and David had returned with no news. "'Yes, tis as I've been thinking, father,' Bob said. We weren't good enough for her, and she went away in scorn. "'Well, that can't be helped,' said the miller. What we be, we be, and have been for generations. To my mom, she seemed glad enough to get a hold of us. "'Yes, yes, for the moment, because of the flowers and the birds, and what's pretty in the place,' said Bob tragically. "'But you don't know, father, how should you know who have hardly been out of overcome in your life? You don't know what delicate feelings are in a real refined woman's mind. Any little vulgar action unreeves their nerves like a marlin spike. And now I wonder, did you do anything to disgust her?' "'Faith, not that I know of,' said Loveday, reflecting. I didn't say a single thing that I should naturally have said on purpose to give her no offense. "'You was always very homely, you know, father.' "'Yes, so I was,' said the miller meekly. "'I wonder what it could have been,' Bob continued. Wandering about restlessly, you didn't go drinking out of the big mug with your mouth fuller, wipe your lips with your sleeve. "'That I'll swear I didn't,' said the miller firmly. "'Thinks I. There's no knowing what I may do to shock her. So I'll take my solid vitals in the bakehouse and only crumb and a drop in her company for manners. "'You could do no more than that,' certainly,' said Bob gently. "'If my manners be good enough for well-bred up people like the garlands, they'd be good enough for her,' continued the miller with a sense of injustice. "'That's true. Then it must have been David. David, come here. How did you behave before that lady? Now, mind you, speak the truth.' "'Yes, Mr. Captain Roberts,' said David earnestly. "'I assure ye, she was served like a royal queen, the best silver spoons we's put down, and your poor grand-fur silver tanket as you see, and the feather cushion for her to sit on. "'Now I've got it,' said Bob decisively, bringing down his hand upon the windowsill. Her bed was hard, and there's nothing shocks a true lady like that. The bed in that room always was as hard as the rock of Gibraltar. "'Oh, Captain Bob, the beds were changed, wasn't they, Master?' We put the goose bed in her room and the flock one that used to be in there in yours.' "'Yes, we did,' collaborated the miller. David and I changed them with our own hands, because they were too heavy for the women to move. "'Sure, I didn't know I had the flock bed, murmured Bob.' I slept on, little thinking what I was going to wake to. Well, well, she's gone, and, search as I will, as she'll never find another like her. She was too good for me. She must have carried her box with her own hands, poor girl. As far as that goes, I could overtake her even now, I dare say, but I won't entreat her against her will, not I.' Miller loved A. and David, feeling themselves to be rather a desecration in the presence of Bob's sacred emotions, managed to edge off by degrees, the former burying himself in the most flowery recesses of the mill, his invariable resource when perturbed, the rumbling having a soothing effect upon the nerves of those properly trained to its music. Bob was so impatient that, after going up to her room to ensure himself once more that she had not undressed, but had only lain down on the outside of the bed, he went outside of the house to meet John, and waited on the sunny slope of the down till his brother appeared. John looked so brave and shapely and more like that, even in Bob's present distress, he could not but feel an honest and affectionate pride at owning such a relative. Yet, he fancied that John did not come along with the same swinging step he had shown yesterday, and when the trumpet major got nearer, he looked anxiously at the mate and waited for him to speak first. You know our great trouble, John, said Robert Gazing stoically into his brother's eyes. Come and sit down and tell me all about it, answered the trumpet major, showing no surprise. They went towards a slight ravine, where it was easier to sit down than on the flat ground, and here John reclined among the grasshoppers, pointing to his brother to do the same. But do you know what it is, said Robert? Has anybody told you? I do know, said John. She's gone, and I'm thankful. What, said Bob, rising to his knees in amazement. I'm at the bottom of it, said the trumpet major slowly. You, John, yes, and if you will listen, I'll tell you all. Do you remember what happened when I came into the room last night? Why, she turned color and nearly fainted away. That was because she knew me. Bob started his brother with a face of pain and distrust. For once, Bob, I must say something that will hurt thee a good deal, continued John. She was not a woman who could possibly be your wife, and so she's gone. You sent her off? Well, I did. John, tell me right through, tell me. Perhaps I had better, said the trumpet major, his blue eyes resting on the far distant sea, that seemed to rise like a wall as high as the hill they sat upon. And then he told a tale of Miss Johnson, and the dragoons which rung his heart as much in the telling as it did Bob's to hear, and which showed that John had been temporarily cruel to be ultimately kind. Even Bob, as excited as he was, could discern from John's manner of speaking what a terrible undertaking that night's business had been for him. To justify the course he had adopted, the dictates of duty must have been imperative. But the trumpet major, with a becoming reticence, which his brother at the time was naturally unable to appreciate, scarcely dwelt distinctly enough upon the compelling cause of his conduct. It would indeed have been hard for any man, much less so modest a one as John, to do himself justice in that remarkable relation when the listener was a lady's lover, and it is no wonder that Robert rose to his feet and put a greater distance between himself and John. And what time was it, he asked in a hard suppressed voice? It was just before one o'clock. How could you help her go away? I had a pass. I carried her box to the coach office. She was to follow at dawn. But she had no money. Yes, she had. I took particular care of that. John did not add, as he might have done, that he had given her in his pity all the money he had possessed, and at present had only 18 pence in the world. Well, it is over, Bob, so sit ye down and talk with me of old times, he added. Ah, Jack, it is well enough for you to speak like that, said the disquieted sailor, but I can't help feeling that it is a cruel thing you have done. After all, she would have been snug enough for me. Would I have never found this out about her? John, why did you interfere? You had no right to overhaul my affairs like this. Why didn't you tell me fairly all you knew, and let me do as I chose? You have turned her out of the house, and it's a shame. If she had only come to me, why didn't she? Because she knew it was best to do otherwise. Well, I shall go after her, said Bob firmly. You can do as you like, said John, but I would advise you strongly to leave matters where they are. I won't leave matters where they are, said Bob impetuously. You have made me miserable and all for nothing. I tell you, she was good enough for me, and as long as I knew nothing about what you say of her history, what difference would it have made to me? Never was there a young woman who was better company, and she loved a merry song as I do myself. Yes, I'll follow her. Oh, Bob, said John, I hardly expected this. That's because you didn't know your man. Can I ask you to do me one kindness? I don't suppose I can. Can I ask you not to say a word against her to any of them at the house? Certainly. The very reason why I got her off, silently, as she has done, was because nothing should be said against her here, and no scandal should be heard of. That may be, but I'm off after her. Marry that girl I will. You'll be sorry that we shall see, replied Robert with determination, and he went away rapidly towards the mill. The trumpet major had no heart to follow. No good could possibly come a further opposition. And there on the down he remained like a graven image till Bob had vanished from his sight into the mill. Bob entered his father's only sleeved word that he was going on a renewed search for Matilda and to pack up a few necessaries for his journey. Ten minutes later he came out again with a bundle in his hand, and John saw him go diagonally across the lower fields towards the high road. And this is all the good I have done, said John musingly, readjusting his stock, we're at cut his neck, and descending towards the mill. End of Chapter 19 Chapter 20 of The Trumpet Major This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org The trumpet major by Thomas Hardy Chapter 20 How Delicent the Effect of the Calamity Meanwhile, Annie Gowlin had gone home, and being wary with her ramble in search of Matilda, sat silent in a corner of the room. Her mother was passing the time in giving utterance to every conceivable surmise on the cause of Miss Johnson's disappearance that the human mind could frame, to which Annie returned monosyllabic answers. The result not of indifference, but of intense preoccupation. Presently, Love Day, the father, came to the door. Her mother vanished with him, and they remained closeted together a long time. Annie went into the garden and seated herself beneath the branching tree, whose boughs had sheltered her during so many hours of her residency. Her attention was fixed upon the miller's wing of the irregular building before her, than upon that occupied by her mother. For she could not help expecting every movement to see someone run out with a wild face and announce some awful clearing up of the mystery. Every sound set her on the alert, and hearing the tread of a horse in the lane, she looked around eagerly. Gazing at her over the hedge was Festus Derriman, mounted on such an incredibly tall animal that he could see to her very feet over the thick and broad thorn fence. She no sooner recognized him than she withdrew her glance, but as his eyes were fixed steadily upon her, this was a futile manoeuvre. I saw you look round, he exclaimed, crossly. What have I done to make you behave like that? Come, Miss Garland, be fair. It's no use to turn your back upon me. As she did not turn, he went on. Well, now, this is enough to provoke a saint. Now I tell you what, Miss Garland, here I'll stay till you do turn round, if it's all the afternoon. You know my temper, what I say I mean. He seated himself firmly in the saddle, plucked some leaves from the hedge, and began humming a song to show how absolutely indifferent he was to the flight of time. What have you come for, that you are so anxious to see me, and quiet, Annie, when, at last, he had varied her patience, rising and facing him with the added independence which came from a sense of the hedge between them. There, I knew you would turn round, he said, his hot angry face invaded by a smile in which his teeth showed like white, hemmed in by red edges. What do you want, Mr. Derriman, said she. What do you want, Mr. Derriman? Now, listen to that. Is that my encouragement? Annie bowed superciliously and moved away. I have just heard news that explains all that, said the giant, eyeing her movements with somnolent irascibility. My uncle has been letting things out. He was here late last night, and he saw you. Indeed he didn't, said Annie. Oh, now he saw trumpet-major laughter coating somebody like you in that garden walk, and when he came you ran indoors. It's not true, and I wish to hear no more. Upon my life he said so. How can you do it, Ms. Garland, when I, who have enough money to buy up all the laugh days, would gladly come to terms with you? What a simpleton you must be to pass me over for him. There, now you're angry because I said simpleton. I didn't mean simpleton. I meant misguided. Misguided Rosebud. That's it. Run off. He continued in a raised voice, as Annie made towards the garden door. But I'll have you yet. Much reason you have to be. Too proud to stay with me. But it won't last long. I shall marry you, madam, if I choose, as you'll see. When he was quite gone, and Annie had come down from the not altogether unrelished pure and excitement that he always caused her. She returned to her seat under the tree, and began to wonder what Festus Doriman's story meant, which, from the earnestness of his tone, did not seem like a pure invention. It suddenly flashed upon her mind that she herself had heard voices in the garden, and that the person seen by Farmer Deriman, of whose visit and reclamation of his box that Mila had told her, might have been Matilda and Jean Laute. She further recalled the strange agitation of Miss Johnson on the preceding evening, and that it occurred just at the entry of the dragoon, till, my degrees, suspicion amounted to conviction that he knew more than anyone else supposed of that lady's disappearance. It was just at this time that the trumpet major descended to the mill after his talk with his brother on the down. As fate would have it, instead of entering the house, he turned aside to the garden and walked down that pleasant enclosure, to learn if he were likely to find in the other half of it the woman he loved so well. Yes, there she was, sitting on a seat of logs that he had repaired for her, under the apple tree, but she was not facing in his direction. He walked with a noisier tread, he cuffed, he shook above. He did everything in short, but the one thing that Festus did in the same circumstances, called out to her. He would not have ensured on that for the world. Any of his signs would have been sufficient to attract her a day or two earlier. Now she would not turn. At last, in his fond anxiety, he did what he had never done before without an invitation and crossed over into Mrs. Garland's half of the garden, till he stood before her. When she could not escape him, she arose and, saying, Good afternoon, Trumpet Major, in a glacial manner unusual with her, walked away to another part of the garden. Love Day, quite a loss, had not the strength of mind to possible further. He had a vague apprehension that some imperfect knowledge of the previous night's unhappy business had reached her and, unable to remedy the evil, without telling more than he dared, he went into the mill, where his father still was, looking dullful enough, walked with his concern at events and the extra quantity of flow upon his face, through sticking so closely to business that day. Well, John, Bob has told you all, of course. A queer, strange perplexing thing, isn't it? I can't make it out at all. There must be something wrong in a woman, or it couldn't have happened. I haven't been so upset for years. Nor have I. I won't. It should have happened for all I own in the world, said the ragoon. Have you spoke to Annie Garland today, or has anyone been talking to her? Festus Derriman wrote by half an hour ago and talked to her over the hedge. John guessed the rest and, after standing on the threshold in silence a while, walked away towards the camp. All this time his brother Robert had been hastening along in pursuit of the woman who had withdrawn from the scene to void the exposure and complete overthrow which would have resulted had she remained. As the distance lengthened between himself and the mill, Bob was conscious of some cooling down of the excitement that had prompted him to set out, but he did not pause in his work till he had reached the head of the river which fed the mill stream. Here, for some indefinite reason, he allowed his eyes to be attracted by the bubbling spring whose waters never failed or lessened and he stopped as if to look longer at the scene. It was really because his mind was so absorbed by John's story. The sun was warm, his spot was a pleasant one, and he deposited his bundle and sat down. By degrees, as he reflected first on John's view and then on his own, his convictions became unsettled till at length he was so balanced between the impulse to go on and the impulse to go back that a puff of wind either way would have been well nice efficient to decide for him. When he allowed John's story to repeat itself in his ears, the reasonableness and good sense of his advice seemed beyond question. When, on the other hand, he thought of his poor Matilda's eyes and her, to him pleasant ways, the charming arrangements to marry and her probable willingness still, he could hardly bring himself to do otherwise than follow on the road at the top of his feet. This strife of thought was so well maintained that sitting and standing, he remained on the borders of the spring till the shadows had stretched out eastwards, and the chance of overtaking Matilda had grown considerably less. Still, he did not positively go towards home. At last he took a guinea from his pocket and resolved to put the question to the hazard. The heads I go, tails I don't. The piece of gold spun in the air and came down, heads. No, I won't go after all, he said. I won't be steered by accidents anymore. He picked up his bundle and switched and retraced his steps towards overcombed mill, knocking down the brambles and nettles as he went with gloomy and indifferent blows. When he got within sight of the house, he beheld David in the road. All right, all right again, Captain shouted that retainer. A wedding after all. Hurrah! Ah, she's back again, cried Bob, seizing David aesthetically and dancing round with him. No, but it's all the same. It's of no consequence at all, and no harm will be done. Maestro and Mrs. Garland have made up a match and mean to marry at once, that the wedding rituals may not be wasted. They felt it would be a thousand pities to let such good things get blue veneed for want of a ceremony to use them upon. And at last they have thought of this. Victuals? I don't care for the victuals, bitterly cried Bob, in a tone of far higher thought. How you disappoint me! And he went slowly towards the house. His father appeared in the opening of the mill door, looking more cheerful than when they had parted. What, Robert? You have been after her? He said. Faith, then, I wouldn't have followed her if I had been as sure as you were that she went to Vane's conifers. Since you told me that, I have not looked for her at all. I was wrong, Father. Bob replied gravely, throwing down his bundle and stick. Matilda, I find, has not gone away in conifers. She has gone away for other reasons. I followed her some way, but I have come back again. She may grow. Why is she gone? said the astonished miller. Bob had intended for Matilda's sake to give no reason to a living soul for her departure, but he could not read his father thus reservedly, and he told, She has made great fools of us, said the miller deliberately, and she might have made us greater ones. Bob, I thought, thou hast more sense. Well, don't say anything against her, Father, implored Bob. It was a sorry haul, and there is an end on it. Let her down quietly and keep the secret. You promise that? I do, laughed at her elder, remained thinking a while, and then went on. Well, what I was going to say is this. I have hit upon a plan to get out of the awkward corner she has put us in. What you'll think of it, I can't say. David has just given me the heads. And do it hurt your feelings, my son, at such a time? No, I'll bring myself to bear it anyhow. Why should I object to other people's happiness because I have lost mine? said Bob, with saintly self-sacrifice in his ear. Well said, answered the miller heartily, but you may be sure that there'll be no seemingly rejoicing to disturb here in your present frame of mind. All the morning I felt more ashamed than I cared to own, at the thought of how the neighbours, great and small, would laugh at what they would call your folly, when they knew what had happened. So I resolved to take this step to stave it off, if so be it was possible. And when I saw Mrs. Garland, I knew I had done right. She pitied me so much for having had the house cleaned in vain, and laid in provisions to waste, that it put her into the humour to agree. We mean to do it right off at once, for the pies and cakes get mouldy and the black pot stale. It was a good thought of mine and hers, and I'm glad it's settled. He concluded cheerfully. Poor Matilda, murmured Bob. There I was afraid to hurt thy feelings, said the miller with self-reproach, making preparations for thy wedding and using them for my own. No, said Bob heroically. It shall not. It will bring a great comfort in my sorrow to feel that this splendid grub and the ale, and your stunning new suit of clothes and the great table-flots you have bought, will be just as useful now as if I had married myself. Poor Matilda. But you won't expect me to join in. You hardly can. I can cheer off that day very easily, you know. Nonsense, Bob, said the miller reproachfully. I couldn't stand it. I should break down. Do take me if I would have asked her then, if I had known it was going to drive thee out of the house. Now come, Bob. I'll find a way of arranging it and sobering it down, so that it shall be as melancholy as you can require, in short, just like a funeral, if thou wilt promise to stay. Very well, said the afflicted one. On that condition, final stay. End of chapter.