riding a pillion
olly and i had spent great part of the afternoon in brushing up and cleaning an old black riding skirt of my mother’s, which it was a wonder i had not cut up into garments for the poor. when we had cleaned it with hollands, and ironed it nicely, it looked very well; for our house was so airy, that our clothes never had the moth.
precisely at the hour named, an old man in purple livery rode up to the door, on a grey horse with a pillion. mark, who was very lively this morning, 242told me he thought the horse looked like a bolter; but i knew he was only laughing at me. then he asked me how i meant to mount; i said, with a chair, to be sure. he said, “nonsense!” and lifted me up in a moment, and arranged my riding-skirt as nicely as if he had been a lady’s groom. then he told the old man to be careful of me; but the old coachman proved to be both dull and deaf, by reason of great age; so mark whispered me that he was not afraid of his running away with me, if the horse did not; finishing with “good-bye, mistress blower.”
i gave him an indignant look, and said, “for shame, mark! i have not deserved that!”
“well,” said he, “i think you have.” and just then the old man jerked the rein of the old horse, which moved off 243so suddenly, that i was fain to catch hold of the old man’s coat; and the last glance i had of mark was a merry one.
at first i felt a little bit frightened; but soon got used to my new position; especially as the horse walked till we were off the stones. still we seemed a long while getting out of london; and we met a great many people returning to it, in carts, waggons, and coaches.
at length we got quite out of town, and between green hedges, with trees beyond them that were turning all manner of colours; with only a house here and there, or a wayside inn. at one of the latter we stopped in the middle of the day, to rest the horse, and take some refreshment. then we continued our journey, which lasted till sunset, and the latter part of which was mighty pleasant and delightsome; only i was 244beginning to be a little weary with so much shaking. but, when i saw how charming a place the country was, i wondered how people could live in towns ... unless on a bridge.
at length we turned off the highway into a bye-road, shaded with tall trees, which, after a mile or two, brought us to a straggling village; and, says the coachman, “mistress, now we’s in bucklands.” presently we passed the absolutest curiosity of a little old church!... it seemed hardly bigger than a nutmeg-grater!—and hard by it, the old parsonage, with three stone peaks in front, and a great pear-tree before the door.
then we came to a village green, with a clump of large trees in the midst, that had seats round them, whereon sat old men, while young men played 245cricket, and little boys were setting a puppy to bark at some white geese. here we came to a great iron gate, at which stood a hale, hearty-looking gentleman about fifty; square-built, and not over-tall; with a good-humoured, red, mottled face. and, says he, coming up to me, as we stopped, “mistress cherry, i’m squire blower. i can guess who you are, though my brother did not tell me you were such a pretty girl.—oh, the sinner!” and lifted me off the horse.
“well,” says he, “you don’t look quite sure that i’s i.... i am, though! certainly, not much like nat, who was always the beauty of the family. ah! now you laugh, which was just what i wanted. my brother said your silver laugh saved his life;—do you know what he meant by that?”
246we were now walking up a strait gravel walk, between clipped hedges, to an old red-brick house, with stone facings. “i suppose, sir,” said i, after thinking a little, “he meant that my laughing was as good as silver to him, because it saved him the doctor.”
“that was it, no doubt,” returns he; “just such an answer, mistress cherry, as i expected. i see we shall get on very well together, though nat is not here to help the acquaintance.—he has gone to see his old foster-mother, who is dying. people will die, you know, when they get to eighty or ninety.”
an old red-brick house
we were now going up a flight of shallow steps, with stone ballusters, which led us into a hall, paved with great diamonds of black and white marble, and hung about with guns, 247fishing-rods, and stag’s horns. an almanack and king charles’s golden rules were pasted against the wall; and a stuffed otter in a glass case hung over the great fire-place, where a wood-fire burned on the hearth.
before this wood-fire was spread a small turkey carpet; and on the carpet stood a table and four heavy chairs; in one of which sat an old lady knitting. the squire bluntly accosted her with “mother, here’s mistress cherry;” on which she said, “ho!”—laid down her knitting, and looked hard at me; first over, and then through her spectacles.
“hum!” says she, “mistress cherry, you are welcome. a good day to you. pray make yourself at home, and be seated.”
so i sat down over against her, and we looked at each other very stiff. she was 248short and fat, with round blue eyes, and a rosy complexion; and had a sharper, shrewder look than the squire.
“i dare say she’s hungry, mother,” says the squire; “give her a piece of gingerbread or something.—how soon shall we have supper?”
“you are always in such a hurry, father, to be eating;” says his lady. “forsooth, are we not to wait for your brother?”
and without waiting for his answer, she took a bunch of keys from her apron-string, and unlocked a little corner-cupboard, from which she brought me a slice of rich seed-cake, and a large glass of wine.
“thank you, madam; i am not hungry,” said i.
“pooh! child, you must be;” returns she, rather authoritatively. “never 249be afraid of eating and drinking before company, as if it were a crime!”
so, thus admonished, i ate and drank: though i would as lief have waited a little.
“are you stiff with your ride?” says she.
“a little, madam,” said i; “for i was ne’er on a horse before.”
“is it possible,” cries she, bursting out a-laughing. “father, did you hear that?”
“famous!” said he; and they eyed me as if i were a curiosity.
“do you know, now,” says the squire’s lady to me, after a while, “i never was in lunnon!”
“that seems as strange to me, madam,” said i, “as it seems to you that i should never have been on horseback.”
“it is strange,” says she. “both are strange.”
250“and now i’ll tell you something that is strange,” says the squire, “since we all seem surprising one another. do you know, mistress cherry,” stepping up behind his wife, and laying a hand on each of her shoulders, while he spoke to me over her head, “that this little round-about woman was once as pretty a girl as you are?”
“stuff! squire,” says his lady.
“fact!” persisted he. “nay, prettier!”
“not a word of truth in it,” says she, shaking him off. “i was all very well,—nothing more. come, father, here’s gatty going to spread the cloth for supper, which you’ll be glad of. but, gatty, in the first place shew mistress cherry to her chamber, ... she will perhaps like to dress a little. you’ll excuse my attending you, my dear; the stairs try my breath.”
251i followed gatty up stairs to the prettiest room that ever was! when i came down, the cloth was spread, and the squire’s lady signed me to the chair over against her, and was just going to say something, when, crossing between me and the sun, i saw the shadow of a man against the wall, and knew it for master blower’s. ah! what came over me at that moment, to make me so stupid, i know not.—perhaps that saucy saying of mark’s ... but whatever it was, instead of my going up to master blower, when he came in, which he did the next moment, and asking him simply and straitforwardly how he was, i must needs colour all over like a goose, and wait till he came quite up to me, without having a word to say for myself.
“ah, cherry!” says he, taking my 252hand quite frankly, “how glad i am to see you! are you quite well?”
and, the moment i heard his pleasant voice, i was quite comfortable again, and felt myself at home for the first time.
“quite, thank you, sir,” said i, “and i hope you are better than you were.”
“well, now that civil things have passed on both sides,” said the squire, who had already seated himself, “come and say grace, nat, for here’s a couple of beautiful fowls getting cold.”
—well, the supper was as pleasant as could be, and it was growing quite dusk before the table was cleared, yet the squire would not hear of having candles; so then his lady desired gatty to carry lights into the green parlour, “where,” says she, “i and this young person will 253retire, and be good enough company for each other, i dare say.”
oh, i’m a young person, am i? thought i. so i followed her into the green parlour, where she settled herself in an easy chair, with her feet on a footstool, and made me sit facing her. “now,” says she, “the men can prose by themselves, and we’ll have a coze by ourselves. pray, child, how was it you came to think of nursing my brother?”
so i began to tell her how i went to him in hope of his telling me how to find my father; but then, she wanted to know how my father came to be missing, so i had to go further back. and then i could not help putting in by the way how good and excellent a man he was, how tender a father, how loving a husband, which brought in my mother. 254but i checked myself, and begged the lady’s pardon for entering on that, which i knew could no ways interest her.—“nay, let me hear it all,” says she, “i shall like to hear something about your mother.” so then i told her of her holy life, and saintlike end; and of master blower’s invaluable ministrations, which of course interested her a good deal; and indeed i saw a tear steal down her cheek, while i kept mine down as well as i could. then i went on to the plague, and my father’s heaviness of spirits; and his going forth and never coming back, and my going in quest of him, and all the events of that terrible day, which i could not go over without crying very heartily. she wept too; yet cried, “go on, go on!” so then i got to master blower, and the sleeping watchman, and my getting into 255the house, and going from room to room, and hearing him yawn,—which made her laugh; though she cried again when she heard of his praying, and of his sufferings that fearful night and many days after. at the end of all, she got up, put her arms about my neck, and kissed me. “cherry,” says she, “you’re an excellent creature!”—just then, a great bell began to ring,—“that’s the prayer-bell!” says she. “we will return to the hall, my dear.”
so we returned to the hall, much more at our ease together than when we left it. and there, standing in a row, were half a dozen men and women servants, and the table had candles and a large bible on it. master blower read, and then prayed: had i not been so tired, i could have wished him to go on all 256night! then we dispersed to our several chambers; and i had so much to think about that it seemed as though i should never get to sleep: however, i did at last.
