the royal baby for whose benefit muriel and agnes had been engaged did not live long; but he was succeeded by his brother prince william, and before he was old enough to do without nurses, a little princess came upon the scene. she was the last of the family, and she lived three years and a half. after her death, the services of the nurses were no longer needed. queen eleanor dismissed them with liberal wages and handsome presents, and the two who were left—agnes and avice—determined to go back to lincoln. avice was now a young woman of twenty.
but when they reached their old home, they found many changes. the good bishop grosteste was gone, but his chaplain, father thomas, had looked after their interests, and agnes found no difficulty in recovering her little property. happily for them, their tenants were anxious to leave the house, and before many days were over, they had slipped quietly back into the old place.
there were no banks in those days. a man’s savings bank was an old stocking or a tin mug. agnes disposed of the money she had left from the queen’s payment, partly in the purchase of a cow, and partly in a stocking, which was carefully locked up in the oak chest. they could live very comfortably on the produce of the cow and the garden, aided by what small sums they might earn in one way and another. and so the years went on, until avice in her turn married and was left a widow; but she had no child, and when her mother died avice was left alone.
“i can never do to live alone,” she said to herself; “i must have somebody to love and work for.”
and she began to think whom she could find to live with her. as she sat and span in the twilight, one name after another occurred to her mind, but only to be all declined with thanks.
there was her neighbour next door, annora goldhue: she had three daughters. no, none of them would do. joan was idle, and amy was conceited, and frethesancia had a temper. little roese might have done, who lived with old serena at the mill end; but old serena could not spare her. at last, as avice broke her thread for the fourth time, she pushed back the stool on which she was sitting, and rose with her determination taken, and spoke it out—
“i will go and see aunt filomena.”
aunt filomena lived about a mile from lincoln, on the newport road. her husband was a greensmith: that is to say, he worked in copper, and hawked his goods in the town when made. avice lost no time in going, but set out at once.
as she rounded the last turn in the lane, she heard the ring of daniel greensmith’s hammer on the anvil, and a few minutes’ more walking brought her in sight of the smith himself, who laid down his hammer and shaded his eyes to see who was coming.
“why, uncle dan, don’t you know me?” said avice.
“nay, who is to know thee, when thou comes so seldom?” said old dan, wiping his hot face with his apron. “art thou come to see me or my dame?”
“i want to see aunt filomena. is she in, uncle dan?”
“she’s in, unless she’s out,” said dan unanswerably. “and her tongue’s in, too. it’s at home, that is. was this morning, anyhow. what dost thou want of her?”
“well,” said avice, hesitating, “i want her advice—”
“then thou wants what thou’lt get plenty of,” said dan, with a comical twist of his mouth, as he turned over some long nails to find a suitable one. “i’ll be fain if thou’lt cart away a middling lot, for there’s more coming my way than i’ve occasion for at this present.”
avice laughed. “i daresay aunt is overworked a bit,” she said. “perhaps i can help her, uncle dan. folks are apt to lose their tempers when they are tired.”
“some folks are apt to lose ’em whether they are tired or not,” said the smith, with a shake of his grizzled head. “i’ve got six lasses, and four on ’em takes after her. i could manage one, and maybe i might tackle two; but when five on ’em gets a-top of a chap, why, he’s down afore he knows it. i’m a peaceable man enough if they’d take me peaceable. but them five rattling tongues, that gallops faster than sir otho’s charger up to the manor—eh, i tell thee what, avice, they do wear a man out!”
“poor uncle dan! i should think they do. but are all the girls at home? i thought mildred and emma were to be bound apprentices in lincoln.”
“fell through wi’ mildred,” said the smith. “didn’t offer good enough; and she”—by which pronoun he usually designated his vixenish wife—“wouldn’t hear on it. emma’s bound, worse luck! i could ha’ done wi’ emma. she and bertha’s the only ones as can be peaceable, like me.”
“mildred’s still at home, then?”
“mildred’s at home yet. and so’s el’nor, and so’s susanna, and so’s ankaret; and every one on ’em’s tongue’s worse nor t’other. and”—a very heavy sigh—“so’s she!”
avice knew that uncle dan was usually a man of fewer words than this. for him to be thus loquacious showed very strong emotion or irritation of some sort. she went round to the back door, and before she reached it, she heard enough to let her guess the sort of welcome she might expect to receive.
just inside the open door stood aunt filomena, a thin, red-faced, voluble woman, with her arms akimbo, pouring out words as fast as they could come; and in the yard, just outside the door, opposite to her, stood her daughter ankaret, in exactly the same attitude, also thin, red-faced, and voluble. the two were such precise counterparts of one another that avice had hard work to keep her gravity. inside the house, susanna and mildred, and outside eleanor, were acting as interested spectators; the funniest part of the scene being that neither of them listened to a word said by the other, but each ran at express speed on her own rails. the youngest daughter, bertha, was nowhere to be seen.
for a minute the whole appearance of things struck avice as so excessively comical that she could scarcely help laughing. but then she realised how shocking it really was. what sort of mothers, in their turn, could such daughters be expected to make? she waited for a moment’s pause, and when it occurred, which was not for some minutes, she said—
“aunt filomena!”
“oh, you’re there, are you?” demanded the amiable filomena. “you just thank the stars you’ve got no children! if ever an honest woman were plagued with six good-for-nothing, sluttish, slatternly shrews of girls as me! here’s that ankaret—i’ve told her ten times o’er to wash the tubs out, and get ’em ready for the pickling, and i come to see if they are done, and they’ve never been touched, and my lady sitting upstairs a-making her gown fine for sunday! i declare, i’ll—”
her intentions were drowned in an equally shrill scream from miss ankaret. “you never told me a word—not once! and ’tain’t my place to scour them tubs out, neither. it’s susanna as always—”
“then i won’t!” broke in susanna. “and you might be ashamed of yourself, i should think, to put such messy work on me when eleanor—”
“you’d best let me alone!” fiercely chimed in eleanor.
“oh dear, dear!” cried avice, putting her hands over her ears. “my dear cousins, are you going to drive each other deaf? why, i would rather scour out twenty tubs than fight over them like this! are you not christian women? come, now, who is going to scour the tubs? i will take one myself if you will do the others. who will join me?”
and avice began to turn up her sleeves in good earnest. “no, avice, don’t you; you’ll spoil your gown,” said eleanor, looking ashamed of her vehemence. “see, i’ll get them done. mildred, won’t you help?”
“well, i don’t mind if i do,” was the rather lazy answer.
but ankaret and susanna declined to touch the work, the latter cynically offering to lend her apron to avice.
as avice scrubbed away, she began to regret her errand. to be afflicted with such a lifelong companion as one of these lively young ladies would be far worse than solitude. but where was the youngest?—the quiet little bertha, who took after her peaceable father, and whom avice had rarely heard to speak? she asked eleanor for her youngest sister.
“oh, she’s somewhere,” said eleanor carelessly.
“she took her work down to the brook,” added mildred. “she’s been crying her eyes out over emma’s going.”
“ay, emma and bertha are the white chicks among the black,” said eleanor, laughing; “they’ll miss each other finely, i’ve no doubt.”
avice finished her work, returned susanna’s apron, and instead of requesting advice from her aunt, went down to the brook in search of bertha. she found her sitting on a green bank, with very red eyes.
“well, my dear heart?” said avice kindly to bertha.
the kind tone brought poor bertha’s tears back. she could only sob out—“emma’s gone!”
“and thou art all alone, my child,” said avice, stroking her hair. she knew that loneliness in a crowd is the worst loneliness of all. “well, so am i; and mine errand this very day was to see if i could prevail on thy mother to grant me one of her young maids to dwell with me. what sayest thou? shall i ask her for thee?”
“o cousin! i would be so—” bertha’s ecstatic tone went no farther. it was in quite a different voice that she said—“but then there’s father! oh no, cousin. thank you so much, but it won’t do.”
“that will we ask father,” said avice.
“father couldn’t get on, with me and emma both away,” said bertha, in a tone which she tried to make cheerful. “he’d be quite lost—i know he would.”
“well, but—” began avice.
“then he’d find his self again as fast as he could,” said a gruff voice, and they looked up in surprise to see old dan standing behind them. “thou’s done well, lass. thou’s ta’en advice o’ thy own kind heart, and not o’ other folks. thee take the little maid to thee, and i’ll see thee safe out on’t. she’ll be better off a deal wi’ thee, and she can see our emma every day then. so dry thy eyes, little un; it’ll be all right, thou sees.”
“but, father, you’ll not do without me!”
“don’t thee be conceited, lass.” old dan was trying hard to swallow a lump in his throat. “i’ll see thee by nows and thens. thou’ll be a deal better off. and there’s—there’s el’nor.”
“eleanor’s not always in a good temper,” said bertha doubtfully.
“she’s best o’ t’other lot,” said old dan. “she’s none so bad, by nows and thens. i shall do rarely, thou’ll see. but, avice—dost thou think thou could just creep off like at th’ lee-side o’ th’ house, wi’ the little maid, afore she sees thee? when thou’rt gone i’ll tell her, and then i’ll have a run for’t till it’s o’er. she’s better to take when first comings-off is done. she’ll smooth down i’ th’ even, as like as not, and then i’ll send el’nor o’er wi’ the little maid’s bits o’ gear. or, if she willn’t go, i can bring ’em myself, when work’s done. let’s get it o’er afore she finds aught out!”
avice scarcely knew whether to laugh or to be sorry. poor, weak, easy-tempered dan! they took his advice, and crept round by the lee-side of the house, under cover of the hedge. when they were out of sight, with a belt of trees between, old dan took leave of them.
“thou’ll be good to the little maid, avice,” said he. “i know thou will, or i’d never ha’ let her go. but she’ll be better off—ay, a deal better off, she’ll be. she gets put upon, she does. and being youngest, thou sees—i say, my lass, thou’d best call her aunt. she’s so much elder than thee; it’ll sound better nor cousin.”
“very good, father,” said bertha. “but, o father! who’ll stitch your buttons on, and comb your hair when you rest after work, and sing to you? o father, let me go back!”
“tut, tut, lass!” said old dan, clearing his throat energetically. “if one wife and four daughters cannot keep a man’s buttons on, there’s somewhat wanting somewhere. i shall miss thy singing, i dare say; but i can come down, thou knows, of a holy-day even, to hear thee. and as to combin’—stars knows i shall get enough o’ that, and a bit o’er that i can spare for old christopher next door. he’s got no wife, and only one lass, and she’s a peaceable un. he’s a deal to be thankful for. now, god be wi’ ye both. keep a good heart, and step out. i’ll let ye get a bit on afore i tell her. and then i’ll run for’t!”
avice and bertha “stepped out” accordingly; and as nobody came after them, they concluded that things were tolerably smooth. they did not see anybody from the smithy until two days later; and then, rather late in the evening—namely, about six o’clock—dan himself made his appearance, with one bundle slung on a stick over his shoulder, and another carried like a baby.
“well!” said he, as he sat down on the settle, and wiped his hot face with his apron. “well!”
“o father, i’m so glad!” said bertha. “are those my things? how good of you to bring them!”
“ay, they be,” said dan emphatically. “take ’em and make the best thou can of ’em; for thou’ll get no more where they came from, i can tell thee.”
“was aunt filomena very much put out?” asked avice, in a rather penitent tone.
“she wasn’t put out o’ nothing,” answered dan, “except conduct becoming a christian woman. she was turned into a wild dragon, all o’er claws and teeth, and there was three little dragons behind her, and they was all a-top o’ me together. if el’nor hadn’t thought better on’t, and come and stood by me, there wouldn’t have been much o’ me to bring these here.”
“then you did not run, uncle dan?” replied avice.
“she clutched me, lass!” responded dan, with awful solemnity. “and t’others, they had me too. thee try to run with a wild dragon holding on to thy hair, and three more to thy arms and legs—just do! i wonder i’m not tore to bits—i do. howsome’er, here i be; and i just wish i could stop. ay, i do so!”
and dan’s apron took another journey round his face.
“uncle dan, would you like to take bertha back?” was avice’s self-sacrificing suggestion.
“don’t name it!” cried dan, dropping the apron. “don’t name it! there wouldn’t be an inch on her left by morning light! i wonder there’s any o’ me. eh, but this world is a queer un. is she a good lass, avice?”
“yes, indeed she is,” said avice.
“i’m fain to hear it; and i’m fain thou’s fallen on thy feet, my little un. and, avice—if thou knows of any young man as wants to go soldiering, and loves a fray, just thee send him o’er to th’ smithy, and he shall ha’ the pick o’ th’ dragons. i hope he’ll choose ankaret. he’ll get my blessing!”
aunt filomena seemed to have washed her hands of her youngest daughter. she never came near them; and avice thought it the better part of valour to keep away from the smithy. when emma had a holiday, which was a rare treat, she often spent it with her sister; and on still rarer occasions eleanor paid a short visit. but the only frequent visitor was old uncle dan, and he came whenever he could, and always seemed sorry to go home.
