II. SOMEBODY KNOCKS AND COMES IN
Miller Loveday was the representative of an ancient family ofcorn-grinders whose history is lost in the mists of antiquity. Hisancestral line was contemporaneous with that of De Ros, Howard, and De LaZouche; but, owing to some trifling deficiency in the possessions of thehouse of Loveday, the individual names and intermarriages of its memberswere not recorded during the Middle Ages, and thus their private lives inany given century were uncertain. But it was known that the family hadformed matrimonial alliances with farmers not so very small, and oncewith a gentleman-tanner, who had for many years purchased after theirdeath the horses of the most aristocratic persons in the county--fierysteeds that earlier in their career had been valued at many hundredguineas.
It was also ascertained that Mr. Loveday's great-grandparents had beeneight in number, and his great-great-grandparents sixteen, every one ofwhom reached to years of discretion: at every stage backwards his siresand gammers thus doubled and doubled till they became a vast body ofGothic ladies and gentlemen of the rank known as ceorls or villeins, fullof importance to the country at large, and ramifying throughout theunwritten history of England. His immediate father had greatly improvedthe value of their residence by building a new chimney, and setting up anadditional pair of millstones.
Overcombe Mill presented at one end the appearance of a hard-worked houseslipping into the river, and at the other of an idle, genteel place, half-cloaked with creepers at this time of the year, and having no visibleconnexion with flour. It had hips instead of gables, giving it a round-shouldered look, four chimneys with no smoke coming out of them, twozigzag cracks in the wall, several open windows, with a looking-glasshere and there inside, showing its warped back to the passer-by; snowydimity curtains waving in the draught; two mill doors, one above theother, the upper enabling a person to step out upon nothing at a heightof ten feet from the ground; a gaping arch vomiting the river, and alean, long-nosed fellow looking out from the mill doorway, who was thehired grinder, except when a bulging fifteen stone man occupied the sameplace, namely, the miller himself.
Behind the mill door, and invisible to the mere wayfarer who did notvisit the family, were chalked addition and subtraction sums, many ofthem originally done wrong, and the figures half rubbed out andcorrected, noughts being turned into nines, and ones into twos. Thesewere the miller's private calculations. There were also chalked in thesame place rows and rows of strokes like open palings, representing thecalculations of the grinder, who in his youthful ciphering studies hadnot gone so far as Arabic figures.
In the court in front were two worn-out millstones, made useful again bybeing let in level with the ground. Here people stood to smoke andconsider things in muddy weather; and cats slept on the clean surfaceswhen it was hot. In the large stubbard-tree at the corner of the gardenwas erected a pole of larch fir, which the miller had bought with othersat a sale of small timber in Damer's Wood one Christmas week. It rosefrom the upper boughs of the tree to about the height of a fisherman'smast, and on the top was a vane in the form of a sailor with his armstretched out. When the sun shone upon this figure it could be seen thatthe greater part of his countenance was gone, and the paint washed fromhis body so far as to reveal that he had been a soldier in red before hebecame a sailor in blue. The image had, in fact, been John, one of ourcoming characters, and was then turned into Robert, another of them. Thisrevolving piece of statuary could not, however, be relied on as a vane,owing to the neighbouring hill, which formed variable currents in thewind.
The leafy and quieter wing of the mill-house was the part occupied byMrs. Garland and her daughter, who made up in summer-time for thenarrowness of their quarters by overflowing into the garden on stools andchairs. The parlour or dining-room had a stone floor--a fact which thewidow sought to disguise by double carpeting, lest the standing of Anneand herself should be lowered in the public eye. Here now the mid-daymeal went lightly and mincingly on, as it does where there is no greedycarnivorous man to keep the dishes about, and was hanging on the closewhen somebody entered the passage as far as the chink of the parlourdoor, and tapped. This proceeding was probably adopted to kindly avoidgiving trouble to Susan, the neighbour's pink daughter, who helped atMrs. Garland's in the mornings, but was at that moment particularlyoccupied in standing on the water-butt and gazing at the soldiers, withan inhaling position of the mouth and circular eyes.
There was a flutter in the little dining-room--the sensitiveness ofhabitual solitude makes hearts beat for preternaturally small reasons--anda guessing as to who the visitor might be. It was some militarygentleman from the camp perhaps? No; that was impossible. It was theparson? No; he would not come at dinner-time. It was the well-informedman who travelled with drapery and the best Birmingham earrings? Not atall; his time was not till Thursday at three. Before they could thinkfurther the visitor moved forward another step, and the diners got aglimpse of him through the same friendly chink that had afforded him aview of the Garland dinner-table.
'O! It is only Loveday.'
This approximation to nobody was the miller above mentioned, a hale manof fifty-five or sixty--hale all through, as many were in those days, andnot merely veneered with purple by exhilarating victuals and drinks,though the latter were not at all despised by him. His face was indeedrather pale than otherwise, for he had just come from the mill. It wascapable of immense changes of expression: mobility was its essence, aroll of flesh forming a buttress to his nose on each side, and a deepravine lying between his lower lip and the tumulus represented by hischin. These fleshy lumps moved stealthily, as if of their own accord,whenever his fancy was tickled.
His eyes having lighted on the table-cloth, plates, and viands, he foundhimself in a position which had a sensible awkwardness for a modest manwho always liked to enter only at seasonable times the presence of a girlof such pleasantly soft ways as Anne Garland, she who could make applesseem like peaches, and throw over her shillings the glamour of guineaswhen she paid him for flour.
'Dinner is over, neighbour Loveday; please come in,' said the widow,seeing his case. The miller said something about coming in presently;but Anne pressed him to stay, with a tender motion of her lip as itplayed on the verge of a solicitous smile without quite lapsing intoone--her habitual manner when speaking.
Loveday took off his low-crowned hat and advanced. He had not come aboutpigs or fowls this time. 'You have been looking out, like the rest o'us, no doubt, Mrs. Garland, at the mampus of soldiers that have come uponthe down? Well, one of the horse regiments is the --th Dragoons, my sonJohn's regiment, you know.'
The announcement, though it interested them, did not create such aneffect as the father of John had seemed to anticipate; but Anne, wholiked to say pleasant things, replied, 'The dragoons looked nicer thanthe foot, or the German cavalry either.'
'They are a handsome body of men,' said the miller in a disinterestedvoice. 'Faith! I didn't know they were coming, though it may be in thenewspaper all the time. But old Derriman keeps it so long that we neverknow things till they be in everybody's mouth.'
This Derriman was a squireen living near, who was chiefly distinguishedin the present warlike time by having a nephew in the yeomanry.
'We were told that the yeomanry went along the turnpike road yesterday,'said Anne; 'and they say that they were a pretty sight, and quitesoldierly.'
'Ah! well--they be not regulars,' said Miller Loveday, keeping backharsher criticism as uncalled for. But inflamed by the arrival of thedragoons, which had been the exciting cause of his call, his mind wouldnot go to yeomanry. 'John has not been home these five years,' he said.
'And what rank does he hold now?' said the widow.
'He's trumpet-major, ma'am; and a good musician.' The miller, who was agood father, went on to explain that John had seen some service, too. Hehad enlisted when the regiment was lying in this neighbourhood, more thaneleven years before, which put his father out of temper with him, as hehad wished him to
follow on at the mill. But as the lad had enlistedseriously, and as he had often said that he would be a soldier, themiller had thought that he would let Jack take his chance in theprofession of his choice.
Loveday had two sons, and the second was now brought into theconversation by a remark of Anne's that neither of them seemed to carefor the miller's business.
'No,' said Loveday in a less buoyant tone. 'Robert, you see, must needsgo to sea.'
'He is much younger than his brother?' said Mrs. Garland.
About four years, the miller told her. His soldier son wastwo-and-thirty, and Bob was twenty-eight. When Bob returned from hispresent voyage, he was to be persuaded to stay and assist as grinder inthe mill, and go to sea no more.
'A sailor-miller!' said Anne.
'O, he knows as much about mill business as I do,' said Loveday; 'he wasintended for it, you know, like John. But, bless me!' he continued, 'Iam before my story. I'm come more particularly to ask you, ma'am, andyou, Anne my honey, if you will join me and a few friends at a leetlehomely supper that I shall gi'e to please the chap now he's come? I cando no less than have a bit of a randy, as the saying is, now that he'shere safe and sound.'
Mrs. Garland wanted to catch her daughter's eye; she was in some doubtabout her answer. But Anne's eye was not to be caught, for she hatedhints, nods, and calculations of any kind in matters which should beregulated by impulse; and the matron replied, 'If so be 'tis possible,we'll be there. You will tell us the day?'
He would, as soon as he had seen son John. ''Twill be rather untidy, youknow, owing to my having no womenfolks in the house; and my man David isa poor dunder-headed feller for getting up a feast. Poor chap! his sightis bad, that's true, and he's very good at making the beds, and oilingthe legs of the chairs and other furniture, or I should have got rid ofhim years ago.'
'You should have a woman to attend to the house, Loveday,' said thewidow.
'Yes, I should, but--. Well, 'tis a fine day, neighbours. Hark! Ifancy I hear the noise of pots and pans up at the camp, or my earsdeceive me. Poor fellows, they must be hungry! Good day t'ye, ma'am.'And the miller went away.
All that afternoon Overcombe continued in a ferment of interest in themilitary investment, which brought the excitement of an invasion withoutthe strife. There were great discussions on the merits and appearance ofthe soldiery. The event opened up, to the girls unbounded possibilitiesof adoring and being adored, and to the young men an embarrassment ofdashing acquaintances which quite superseded falling in love. Thirteenof these lads incontinently stated within the space of a quarter of anhour that there was nothing in the world like going for a soldier. Theyoung women stated little, but perhaps thought the more; though, injustice, they glanced round towards the encampment from the corners oftheir blue and brown eyes in the most demure and modest manner that couldbe desired.
In the evening the village was lively with soldiers' wives; a tree fullof starlings would not have rivalled the chatter that was going on. Theseladies were very brilliantly dressed, with more regard for colour thanfor material. Purple, red, and blue bonnets were numerous, with bunchesof cocks' feathers; and one had on an Arcadian hat of green sarcenet,turned up in front to show her cap underneath. It had once belonged toan officer's lady, and was not so much stained, except where theoccasional storms of rain, incidental to a military life, had caused thegreen to run and stagnate in curious watermarks like peninsulas andislands. Some of the prettiest of these butterfly wives had beenfortunate enough to get lodgings in the cottages, and were thus sparedthe necessity of living in huts and tents on the down. Those who had notbeen so fortunate were not rendered more amiable by the success of theirsisters-in-arms, and called them names which brought forth retorts andrejoinders; till the end of these alternative remarks seemed dependentupon the close of the day.
One of these new arrivals, who had a rosy nose and a slight thickness ofvoice, which, as Anne said, she couldn't help, poor thing, seemed to haveseen so much of the world, and to have been in so many campaigns, thatAnne would have liked to take her into their own house, so as to acquiresome of that practical knowledge of the history of England which the ladypossessed, and which could not be got from books. But the narrowness ofMrs. Garland's rooms absolutely forbade this, and the houseless treasuryof experience was obliged to look for quarters elsewhere.
That night Anne retired early to bed. The events of the day, cheerful asthey were in themselves, had been unusual enough to give her a slightheadache. Before getting into bed she went to the window, and lifted thewhite curtains that hung across it. The moon was shining, though not asyet into the valley, but just peeping above the ridge of the down, wherethe white cones of the encampment were softly touched by its light. Thequarter-guard and foremost tents showed themselves prominently; but thebody of the camp, the officers' tents, kitchens, canteen, andappurtenances in the rear were blotted out by the ground, because of itsheight above her. She could discern the forms of one or two sentriesmoving to and fro across the disc of the moon at intervals. She couldhear the frequent shuffling and tossing of the horses tied to thepickets; and in the other direction the miles-long voice of the sea,whispering a louder note at those points of its length where hampered inits ebb and flow by some jutting promontory or group of boulders. Loudersounds suddenly broke this approach to silence; they came from the campof dragoons, were taken up further to the right by the camp of theHanoverians, and further on still by the body of infantry. It wastattoo. Feeling no desire to sleep, she listened yet longer, looked atCharles's Wain swinging over the church tower, and the moon ascendinghigher and higher over the right-hand streets of tents, where, instead ofparade and bustle, there was nothing going on but snores and dreams, thetired soldiers lying by this time under their proper canvases, radiatinglike spokes from the pole of each tent.
At last Anne gave up thinking, and retired like the rest. The night woreon, and, except the occasional 'All's well' of the sentries, no voice washeard in the camp or in the village below.