Produced by Andrew Sly, Barbara Kosker, Stephen Hope and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net [Illustration: THE MUNIMENT ROOM, S. MARY REDCLIFFE.] Bristol Bells _A STORY OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY_ BY EMMA MARSHALL AUTHOR OF 'BRISTOL DIAMONDS,' 'THE TOWER ON THE CLIFF,' 'HER SEASON IN BATH,' ETC. The budding floweret blushes at the light, The meads are dappled with the yellow hue, In daisied mantle is the mountain dight, The tender cowslip bendeth with the dew. CHATTERTON. LONDON SEELEY AND CO. LIMITED ESSEX STREET, STRAND 1892 _PREFACE_ The incidents in the life of Thomas Chatterton which are introduced into this story are gathered chiefly from Mr Masson's exhaustive essay and a biography of the poet by Mr Chatterton Dix. In these books full details may be found of the pathetic life, misdirected genius, and tragic death of the boy poet. Several citizens of Bristol, who are connected with his sad history, appear in the following tale; the other characters are wholly imaginary. WOODSIDE LEIGH WOODS, CLIFTON, _February 1892._ _CONTENTS._ CHAP. PAGE I. LONGING FOR FLIGHT, 1 II. THE SQUIRE, 13 III. AN ELEGY, 28 IV. THE LETTER DELIVERED, 39 V. THE ORCHARD GATE, 48 VI. THE SYMPATHY OF POVERTY, 58 VII. CONSULTATION, 68 VIII. THE SONGS OF ROWLEY THE PRIEST, 77 IX. THE POET'S FRIENDS, 87 X. A LONG RESPITE, 99 XI. CHRISTMAS AT THE FARM, 109 XII. THE FINAL BLOW, 118 XIII. AN UNSUCCESSFUL SUIT, 128 XIV. ON THE HILLSIDE, 137 XV. THE LAST EVENING, 152 XVI. FORGIVENESS, 164 XVII. THE LAST, 176 Bristol Bells CHAPTER I LONGING FOR FLIGHT. 'Grandfather! I want to speak to you; please listen.' 'Well, who said I would not listen? But speak up, Biddy.' The old man put his hand to his ear, and his granddaughter leaned over the back of his chair. 'Don't call me Biddy, grandfather. I am Bryda.' 'Bryda! Phew! Your poor mother was called Biddy, and you ain't better than she was that I know of.' 'Well, never mind; but this is what I want to say, and Betty is quite of my mind. Do let me go to Bristol. Jack Henderson heard old Mrs Lambert say she would like a bright, sharp girl to help her in the house, and I am bright and sharp, grandfather!' 'I daresay, and make you a drudge!' 'No; I shouldn't be a drudge. I should be treated well, and you know Mrs Lambert is a relation.' 'Relation! that's very pretty, when she has taken no heed of you for years. No, no; stay at home, Biddy, and put such silly stuff out of your head. Goody Lambert may find somebody else--not my granddaughter. Come! it's about supper-time. Where's Bet? She doesn't want to gad about; she knows when she is well off.' Bryda pouted, and darted out of the large parlour of Bishop's Farm into the orchard, where the pink-and-white blossoms of the trees were all smiling in the westering sunshine of the fair May evening. The level rays threw gleams of gold between the thickly-serried ranks of the old trees--many of them with gnarled, crooked branches, covered with white lichen--some, more recently planted, spreading out straight boughs--the old and young alike all covered with the annual miracle of the spring's unfailing gift of lovely blossoms, which promised a full guerdon of fruit in after days. In and out amongst the trees Bryda threaded her way, sometimes brushing against one of the lower boughs, which shed its pink-and-white petals on her fair head as she passed. 'Betty!' she called. 'Bet, are you here? Bet!' Bryda had come to a wicket-gate opening on a space of rugged down, golden with gorse, and from which could be seen an extensive view of Bristol in one direction, and of the village of Langholm and the woods of Leigh on the other. Bishop's Farm was on the high ground of the Mendips, not a mile distant from the church of Dundry, whose tower is a landmark of this district, and is seen as a beacon to the country-side for many miles. 'Yes, here I am. Bryda, what is the matter?' Betty was seated on a bit of rock, anxiously looking down on a lamb which the shepherd had brought from the fold, as it seemed, to die. 'It's just dying, that's what it. It's no use making a to-do Miss Betty. Lor'! the master can afford to lose one lamb, and it's no fault of mine.' 'It should have been brought in last evening, Silas. I'll carry it in myself, poor dear little thing.' 'Better not, better not; let it die in peace, miss. No mortal power can save it now. The mother is all but dying, too, and if I save her it's as much as I can do. There, I told you so. It's gone, poor dumb thing.' For the lamb give one little feeble moan rather than a bleat, drew its thick legs together convulsively, and then lay still. 'Dead! Oh, take it away, Silas,' Bryda exclaimed; 'I cannot bear to see anything dead. Come away, Betty,' she entreated. 'There, there, Miss Biddy, don't take on. I'll carry it off, and don't trouble your heads no more about it. We've all got to die, and the lamb is no worse off than we. Can't say but I am sorry though,' Silas said, in a softer tone, as he picked up the dead lamb. 'I'd sooner see it frisking about in the meadow yonder than lying so cold and quiet.' And then Silas, in his smock frock and wide hat, strode away over gorse and heather, and left the sisters alone. Of these sisters Betty was the younger of the two by one year, but older in many ways--older in her careful thought for others, in her unselfish life, in her patience and tender forbearance with her somewhat irascible old grandfather. Bryda and Betty had lived with their grandfather at Bishop's Farm ever since they could remember anything. Their aunt, their father's sister by the farmer's first marriage, a widow, took the charge of the house after her husband's death, when she had come to her old home at her father's bidding rather than at his invitation. He had been angry with her for marrying a sailor, had prophesied from the first that no good could come of it, and he was more triumphant than sorry that his prophecy had proved true. There are some people who feel a keen satisfaction when they are able to say with Peter Palmer of the Bishop's Farm, 'I told you so, and I knew how it would be.' Peter certainly repeated this often in the ears of his daughter, a stolid, heavy woman, whom it was difficult to rouse to any keen emotion, either of joy or sorrow. Mrs Burrow was one of those slow people to whom stagnation is life. She could scarcely read, and her writing was so much like hieroglyphics that on the rare occasions when she had to sign her name she used to get one of her nieces to write, 'Dorothy Burrow, her mark,' and then she would add the cross. She did not neglect the homely duties which devolved on her as head of her father's house. She managed the dairy and the poultry, and kept the farm servants up to the mark. Her world was a wholly different world from that of her young nieces, and the imaginative and enthusiastic Bryda especially had nothing in common with her. Biddy, who undertook the plain cooking and baking of the establishment, and had a light hand for pastry and cakes, and who mended the linen with unexampled neatness, was Mrs Burrow's favourite. She was useful, and had no new-fangled ways like Biddy, and would make a good wife when her turn came, but as to that flighty Biddy, the man who married her would repent it to his last hour. 'Do ask grandfather, Bet, to let me go to Mrs Lambert's.' 'I wonder you are in such a hurry to leave me,' was the reply. 'It's not _you_, it's this humdrum life. Here we live, with no books and no fun, day after day, month after month, year after year. Why, I shall be twenty at midsummer, and I have only been to Bristol twice, and to Wells once by the coach. Oh, Bet, I might as well be a turnip or--' A laugh from someone near made the girls spring up. 'So Bryda is like a turnip. That's good, I must say.' 'Jack, how you frightened me,' Betty said. 'I thought you was gone back to Bristol.' 'No, I have got another week's holiday. Uncle Antony sent word by the carrier that he would as lieve have my room as my company.' 'Oh, Jack, have you quarrelled with Mr Henderson?' 'Not exactly; but I am no favourite of his. Well, aren't you going to ask me to supper, Betty? I am hungry enough, I can tell you.' 'I must go and find out if there is enough supper for you,' Betty said, laughing. 'You and Bryda can follow when you like, but, Jack, don't fill her head with nonsense about going to Bristol. She will only be miserable if she goes to old Madam Lambert.' And then Betty let the wicket-gate click behind her, and went singing through the orchard. Jack Henderson was a giant in stature, with large ungainly hands and a somewhat slouching gait. If ever a man was cut out for a country life it was Jack Henderson. But his mother was a little of the fine lady, and when her husband's brother offered to take Jack as an apprentice in his jeweller's shop in Corn Street, Bristol, she eagerly accepted the proposal, or rather, I should say, Mr Henderson at last gave a somewhat reluctant consent to receive Jack and polish him up as he polished his old silver and chased gold in his Bristol shop. 'You can't make a silk purse out of a sow's ear,' had been Mr Henderson's remark when the bargain was finally struck, 'so don't expect it, Molly,' he said to his sister-in-law. 'But as you are a widow, and I promised poor Jim to do something for his children, I'll hold to the bargain.' The bargain was this. Mrs Henderson was to supply vegetables, cream and butter, and cider from her farm in return for her son's board, lodging, and learning the trade in her brother-in-law's shop in Corn Street. Jack Henderson threw his huge form on the ground at Bryda's feet, and said,-- 'What are you doleful about, Bryda--eh?' 'Don't ask me,' Bryda said. 'I might as well cry for the moon as ask grandfather to let me go to Mrs Lambert. He won't give me leave.' 'Go without,' was the prompt reply. 'I'll manage it.' Bryda shook her head. 'It would vex poor Bet if I did.' 'Well, it will vex me if you stay here. I'd give something to see you once a week, and if you stay here I sha'n't see you till next Whitsun'--p'r'aps not then.' Bryda made no answer to this. She was leaning forward, and looking past Jack to the lovely landscape stretched before her, listening intently, her eyes full of wistful longing, her small hands clasped round her knees, and a pair of little feet, which the thick, clumsy shoes of the village shoemaker could not altogether disguise, crossed one over the other close to Jack Henderson's large hand. 'Hush.' she said, 'there are the bells, Bristol bells calling--they always seem to call me--but it's no use.' Then, rallying, Bryda said,-- 'Tell me about that boy--you know who I mean.' 'Oh! the mad fellow at Lambert's, he is as mad as ever, writing and scribbling verses. But, all the same, he is not a bad sort of chap. Old Lambert hates him, but masters always hate their apprentices, just as Uncle Tom hates me.' 'Have you brought me any more poems, Jack?' 'No. You must come for 'em. I'll lay a wager Chatterton will give you a lot of stuff like the "Friar's Bridge" when he sees you.' 'You might send me _Felix Farley's Journal_ when you go back to business.' 'Look here, Bryda, you must come for it. I shall be off in the cart next Monday morning. I'll wait at the turn by the church till you come. Only old Tim will know, and he is as blind as a mole and deaf as a post. Now, come, there's a good girl.' 'But Mrs Lambert may not want me.' 'You are quick with your pen, write to the old lady and tell her you will come to be a grandchild to her, or what you like. Come, Bryda, say yes.' But Bryda still hesitated. The flight to Bristol was to the country-bred village maiden of a hundred and twenty years ago a serious matter. Just as she had seen the young swallows stretching their wings on the nests under the eaves, and fluttering and trembling before they followed their twittering parents, so did Bryda pause, before she could make up her mind to take this earnestly desired flight into the heart of the city from the heart of the hills. Bryda had few books, for books, of which there were not many in those days, did not find their way to the Mendip villages. But the girl lived in her own world of romance, and peopled it with airy phantoms, as many a maiden has done before her. Her prosaic aunt and the two or three cronies who paid visits to Bishop's Farm were much more unreal to her than the creations of her own brain. She loved Betty with the love that is born of dependence, for Betty exercised a half maternal care over the sister of whose beauty she was so proud, and who seemed to her simple soul so far superior to herself and to any of her neighbours. That Bryda should have the best of everything was a recognised fact with Betty--the best clothes, the brightest ribbons, the choicest food. Many a time had Betty stood as a shield between their Aunt Dorothy and the spoiled child, her sister, and skilfully covered any of Bryda's delinquencies by the garment which loving hands know so well how to throw over those who are dearest to them. Betty was very pretty, but she had no acknowledged admirers, while there was not a young man in the district who did not show signs of adoration for Bryda--mute signs, perhaps, but not the less sincere--a flower presented as she passed under the porch of the village church, or a fairing brought from Bristol, left with no words on the stone seat under the porch. But none had dared to make a formal declaration of love, except Jack Henderson, perhaps, who, on his not frequent visits to his old home at the Mendips, found Bryda more and more irresistible, and gave her reason to know, as at this time, that the sight of her was indispensable to his happiness. Poor Jack, he was to find out that the very temptation he put in Bryda's way--to take flight to the busy, toiling city, now lying at the distance of some miles below them, wrapt in the gathering blue haze of the May evening--was to widen and not lessen the distance between them. 'Well,' he said, drawing his huge ungainly form from the soft cushion of moss, where the daisies and golden cistus flowers had shut their eyes for the night, 'well, take my word for it, you'll find a lot of things you care for in Bristol, and I tell you, if I were you, I should write to Madam Lambert at once. You can send it by the carrier, tied up in brown paper. He baits his horse in Corn Street, close to Lambert's office, and he'll take it direct to Dowry Square. You'll get heaps of things you want. Books--why, bless you, Bristol is a mighty learned place. The folks there do nothing else than write histories, and read till they are blind. You'll get a lot of things there, and so you'll say when you are once there.' 'Bryda, Bryda,' it was Betty's voice calling in the orchard, 'Bryda, pray come; Aunt Dorothy is as cross as two sticks.' 'Is that anything new?' Bryda said, with a little laugh, as she sprang to her feet, waved her hand to Jack Henderson, and disappeared under the blossoming apple trees. He longed to follow her, but as she did not ask him to do so, he turned towards his home two miles away. That night, when Betty was quietly sleeping in the white-curtained tent-bed which the sisters shared, Bryda went to the lattice and opened it gently, and looked out into the calm of the summer night. The old-fashioned garden below sent up from its bushes of lavender and rosemary, and sweet-scented thyme and wallflower, a dewy fragrance. A honeysuckle just coming into full flower clasped the mullion of the old stone framework by the lattice with clinging tendrils. Above, the stars looked down, giving the sense of the infinite and eternal, which will strike at times the dullest heart with awe and reverence. The sounds were subtle and scarcely defined. The rustle of a bird in the nest, where she was guarding her newly-fledged young ones, a whisper of the breeze faintly stirring the leaves of a silver birch, whose white trunk shone out in the dim twilight, for the days were nearing midsummer and May was just melting into June. 'Yes,' Bryda said, 'I might gain much, but should I not lose more? And yet there is life, life in the city, and here it is sameness, and life, real life, is scarce felt. I wonder how it will be.' Bryda was about to close the lattice when her ear caught sounds more audible than the faint whisper of the breeze and the rustle of the leaves. Voices low and angry came from the kitchen, which was below her window. The voices grew louder, then a door was sharply shut, and Flick, the big watch-dog, gave a low growl and the gate of the farmyard clicked again and again as it swung violently backwards and forwards before it finally closed. The dwellers in farmhouses a hundred and twenty years ago on the height of the Mendips were early to bed and early to rise. It was therefore unusual to hear anyone coming or going between nine and ten o'clock. 'I wonder who it was?' Bryda thought. 'And there is grandfather coming up to bed. How slowly he comes, and--what can be the matter?' For, as the heavy footsteps reached the landing by the girl's bedroom, there was a pause, and then a prolonged sigh, which was more like a groan. Bryda stood transfixed, her hand on the latch of the door, which she had not courage to lift. Another heavy sigh, and then the slow footsteps were heard getting fainter and fainter as the old man passed along the passage to his room. Then all was quiet, and Bryda, still haunted with the fear of something unusual and strange, lay down by Betty's side and was soon asleep. How often some cherished wish when fulfilled comes to us, not as the phantom of delight, as we pictured it, but with a grave and sober mien which makes us scarcely recognise that the desire which is granted is 'the tree of life,' for the fruit too often has a bitter taste, or ere we can grasp it is turned to dust and ashes. Bryda's longings were to be satisfied, but not as she had imagined. The way was to be made plain for her departure from Bishop's Farm; the home of her childhood and early girlhood was to be hers no longer. Her grandfather went up to his bed that night a ruined man. CHAPTER II THE SQUIRE. The next morning the poor old farmer came down to the plentiful breakfast prepared by Dorothy Burrow looking ten years older than when he had left the kitchen the night before. He refused all food, and sat in the settle by the fire, holding his thin hands over the smouldering embers, and shuddering every now and then and moaning to himself. 'You ain't cold now, father?' Dorothy bawled in his ear. 'It is hot enow in the fields, even now, I can tell you. Do you want a bigger fire--eh?' The old man shook his head. 'What _do_ you want then? Don't sit there as if you was crazy--sighing and muttering.' 'Here, grandfather,' Betty said, approaching the settle and sitting down by her grandfather's side, 'here. I've put a drop of rum in the new milk, now take a draught of it, do, and you will feel quite spry and lively. Come!' Betty always took a common sense view of things, and she added,-- 'You can't feel well if you don't break your fast.' She succeeded in making the old man swallow half the contents of the thick-lipped mug. Then she put another faggot on the fire, not heeding Dorothy's remark that they should all be smothered with heat, and sat down on the bench at the table, by Bryda's side, to discuss her own breakfast with a keen appetite. Bryda, who was thinking over the loud, angry voices she had heard on the previous night, connected her grandfather's appearance with some mysterious visitor, who had evidently left the house in anger. So she did not do justice to the particular griddle cake, done to a turn, which Betty had put on her plate. 'Something is wrong,' she whispered to Betty. 'I know there is. I wish we knew what it is.' They were not left long in doubt. As soon as the scraping of the heavy boots of the farm servants was heard on the brick floor of the back kitchen, where they took their meals, and the benches pushed back by the general servant of the farm, Mr Palmer spoke, jerking his thumb in the direction of the open door. 'Shut yonder door,' he said, 'and come here all of you.' The girls obeyed, Bryda and Betty seating themselves on either side of their grandfather, while Dorothy Burrow stood before him, her stout red arms uncovered, her elbows stuck on either side of her thick waist, and the frills of her big calico cap blown back from her stolid face. 'Well,' she said, 'what's up, father?' The old man shook his head, and thumped his fist irritably. 'Didn't I say I was going to tell you summat?' he said. 'Hold your tongue till I've done it. Years agone,' he began, 'I had a son--your father, Biddy and Bet. You don't remember him--how should you. He and your poor silly mother died when you were babes.' 'I remember him well enow,' Dorothy began; 'I had cause for he disgraced the family.' 'Hold you tongue, Doll.' 'Yes, Aunt Dorothy, do be quiet,' Bryda said in a trembling voice. 'Well, he went wrong, very wrong, and I wanted to get him out of the country, to escape the justices. It was a big sum, and I borrowed it of Squire Bayfield up Binegar way. I put my name to a paper that I'd be surety it should be paid on demand. The old Squire was a kind-hearted chap, and he never pressed me. I spoke to him last fall, when he was out with the beagles, as stout and as strong as ever, I thought. I told him times were bad, and the crops scarce, and I had lost a lot of sheep in the hard winter. And says he, "All right, I'll not come down on you." So I was easy in my mind, and if he had lived it would have been all right; but he dropped down dead last Candlemas, and his son, who has come back from foreign parts, says he will have the cash or sell me up.' 'How much is it?' Betty asked, with white trembling lips. 'Three hundred pounds. I paid interest, I did, but this chap, curse him, says he will have the lump sum or he'll put the bailiffs in.' 'Are you bound to pay him the sum?' Bryda asked. 'I expect not.' 'Yes, the paper says, or heirs of his body.' 'Ask a lawyer about it. Ask Mr Lambert,' Betty said. 'It ain't no good. The young fellow was here blustering last night. He says he is in want of cash, and he must have it. That's the long and the short of it. No, there's no hope. So the stock must go, and the bits of furniture that have stood here since I was no higher than the table.' 'Lor'!' the old man said, wandering back into the past, 'I can see my mother now a-polishing and rubbing yonder bureau till I could see my face in it. Well, well, it's not for myself I grieve, it's for you children.' Bryda had risen, and stood with one hand on her grandfather's shoulder and the other grasping the carved elbow of the old oak settle. Her lips were firmly shut, and her whole bearing determined, almost defiant. Presently she said,-- 'I never knew before it was as bad as this. I never knew my father was what Aunt Dorothy says--a disgrace. But did _you_ know it, Betty?' 'I guessed something, not much; but, Bryda, it is all over now.' 'All over,' the girl said, with flashing eyes, 'all over! Such a stain can never be wiped away.' Then, with a sudden impulse of pity and tenderness, Bryda stooped, and kissing the furrowed brow of the old man, she said,-- 'Ah, poor grandfather!' 'He was such a fine, handsome boy, was our Phil. There was not one to match him--straight as a dart, and that strong, he could get the better of the strongest in the wrestling matches. Oh, he was a fine fellow was Phil! To see him on horseback was a treat.' 'What did he do? I wish to know now, grandfather.' But the old father shook his head. 'It is so long ago, now--near nineteen years. Yes, nineteen years. Betty was born just after, and her mother died of a broken heart, they said. Hearts don't break.' 'Do you know, Aunt Dorothy, what my father did?' 'Well, if you must know--he forged a cheque. If he hadn't been got off to America he would have been--hung. Father scraped up a hundred pounds, and sent him packing, and borrowed the three hundred to pay the man Phil had robbed. That's the long and short of it. I wasn't here, but that's what father told me, and I suppose it's gospel truth. It's over and done with now, and no one need have been the wiser if that fool, young Bayfield, had not come and stormed at father. Shameful, I call it.' Then Dorothy threw her apron over her face, and leaving the kitchen, called Betty to come and look after the butter. 'It is churning day,' she said, 'and to spoil pounds of good butter won't mend matters.' Betty obeyed, and Bryda was left with her grandfather. 'Is my father dead?' she asked, putting her mouth close to the old man's ear. 'Dead? Yes. I never heard a word of him since the ship sailed from Bristol one dark night. I put him aboard. No one knew. When I got back there was Bet wailing. She was born--and your poor silly mother died. Poor thing! poor thing! She said, "I am glad to die, take care of my babes." And I said I would, and so I did--eh, Biddy?' 'Yes, yes, grandfather; and now we will take care of you. I'll go and earn my keep at any rate; but first I shall go and see Mr Bayfield.' 'No, no; it's like a lamb running into the jaws of a lion. He will only storm at you. There's nought to be done but sell up, and pay the cash down. But I'll do it myself. He sha'n't send his fellows here to knock about the things. The stock must go. The sheep will fetch summat--and there's two fine young heifers, beside the milch cows.' Three hundred pounds looked an enormous sum in the eyes of the Somersetshire maiden, but she was determined to make an appeal to the hard-hearted young Squire. Binegar was some miles from the hamlet of Upton, where Bishop's Farm stood; but Bryda was well used to long rambles over hill and dale, and she ran up to her room full of her scheme. 'I will tell no one--no, not even Bet,' she thought. 'They shall see for once I can be of use. And then I will go to Bristol and see Mr Lambert, and tell him I will come and be the useful girl about the place his mother wants.' Bryda took some pains with her appearance, as she stood before a little glass, which gave but a distorted reflection of the fair face which gazed into it. Bryda exchanged her blue homespun skirt for a red camlet, a material then much used for women's dress. It was made with short elbow sleeves, and the bodice cut low. Over this Bryda pinned a white kerchief, confining the ends at the waist with a silver buckle which had belonged to her mother. Then she tied back her bright hair, which was the colour of a cornfield rippling in the sunshine, with a blue ribbon, and perched on the top of her pretty head a bonnet of Dunstable straw which would have disguised most faces so ugly was its shape. But Bryda's face could not lend itself to any disguise. Her luminous eyes seemed to shine the brighter under the shadow of the peak. Her clear rose-and-white complexion was set off by the clumsy knot of faded ribbon strings which passed under the high crown of the bonnet was tied under Bryda's dimpled chin, and defined its beautiful outline. Thus equipped, Bryda stepped quietly downstairs, and went out at the back door of the farm. In the yard, on a barrel turned up for a seat, sat Silas the shepherd. He was cutting huge slices of coarse bread with a clasp knife, and crowding them into his mouth, with morsels of Cheddar cheese. 'I want to take one of the dogs for a walk, Silas. Which can you spare?' 'Neither,' was the short response. 'Oh, let me have one, Silas. Let me have Flick. Here, Flick, will you come?' 'Where be thee going?' 'For a long walk, that's all.' 'You'll find it nearly broiling 'cross the hill. The old ewe died early this morning. There's another loss for the master. But, lor', he's dazed like. If I told him the whole flock was dead he wouldn't care. Master is queerish this morning.' 'He is not well,' Bryda said. 'Don't trouble him, Silas, if you can help, and let me have Flick.' Flick was only waiting the word of command from his master, with anxious upturned nose and eyes scanning Silas's rugged face. 'Get along with you,' was the not very gracious dismissal. And the old dog leaped for joy, gave his low, deep-mouthed bay, scuttled round the yard twice, sending two sedate cats clambering up the old wall, with its high lichen-covered coping, where they turned at bay, with swelled tails and arched backs, to spit at their enemy. So bright was the sky, and so full of life was everything around her, that as Bryda tripped lightly on her way she had almost forgotten what was her errand. The church clock of Dundry struck ten as she passed. The village was quiet, almost deserted. The people were out at their daily toil on the hills, and only a few white-headed children were making dust pies by the churchyard gate, two or three women, with babies in their arms, gossiping at their cottage doors. 'Where's she off to, I wonder? That's Peter Palmer's girl, she is mighty proud, and never passes good-morning or the time of day, not she.' 'Pride must have a fall,' said another. 'Look at her in her fine red gown as if 'twere a Fair day.' And then the women hushed their squalling babies with somewhat rough vehemence and turned to other subjects. Bryda was a little doubtful of the nearest road to Rock House when she came to the place where four roads met. The old sign-post had lost one of its arms, and the lettering on another was defaced. Bryda knew Rock House was several miles nearer Dundry than the town of Binegar, but she could not feel sure which of the four roads that looked so much alike was the right one. As she stood hesitating, a young man, with a gun under his arm, leaped over the hedge into the road. Flick growled as he approached, and Bryda, putting her hand through his collar, said,-- 'Down, Flick.' Then, addressing the young man, she said,-- 'Please, sir, can you tell me the way to Rock House, Squire Bayfield's?' Then she added demurely, 'I have business with him.' 'Well,' was the reply, 'the Squire is a lucky man, that's all I have to say.' Bryda's colour rose, for this young man's gaze was a little too openly admiring. She curtsied, with a grace which was very different from the low bob of the country maiden generally, and said,-- 'I beg you, sir, to be so good as to tell me which road I am to take, right or left.' 'It's right ahead,' was the reply; 'I am going the same way. Your dog is not a very pleasant companion; he looks as if he would fly at my throat if he could.' 'He knows his manners, sir,' Bryda said, 'and he will not fly at anyone without reason. Down!' she said, 'quiet, Flick.' This, with a pat on his shaggy head, was taken as a sign that Bryda's companion was not the foe Flick had at first imagined, and he walked gravely by her side, as if unconscious of a third person's presence. Bryda volunteered no conversation, and for some minutes there was silence. Presently the man asked,-- 'Have you any acquaintance with Squire Bayfield?' 'No, sir; not with the young Squire. He has been in foreign parts for years.' 'Yes, that's true; he came home a week ago to find his father dead and buried, and the old place a ruin for him to build up, and money short to do it.' Again there was silence, till a pair of large gates came in sight and a long avenue of firs leading up to a house, of which the low front was seen at the end of the drive. 'Is this Squire Bayfield's house, sir?' 'Yes, and I have business there also, so we will walk up to the door together.' Bryda hesitated, and then said,-- 'I have business with the Squire, sir; but it is of a private nature, and I must see him alone.' 'That I'll warrant you shall do, madam,' and insensibly the man's manner became more respectful. This was no country maiden to whom he might offer any familiarity, praise her beauty, or rally her on her charms. Bryda had always about her that innate purity and refinement, which acts as a shield against the shafts of impertinent admiration which men of a certain type in the eighteenth century were apt to offer to win favour with the belles of town or country. A short flight of stone steps led to the front entrance of the house, and here the young man paused. After a moment's hesitation he opened the door, and a parcel of dogs of all shapes and sizes came rushing out, whining and capering with delight. Immediately Flick stood at bay, and a scrimmage seemed imminent, when the young man took a short whip from a peg in the hall, and thrashing right and left, with a great many oaths and curses, exclaimed, 'The brutes--the underbred brutes,' as the dogs went whining and yelping back to the place whence they came. 'Now, madam,' the young man said, after apologising for this uproar, 'let me show you into the only habitable room in the place where you can have your desired interview with the Squire.' He pushed open a door as he spoke, and holding it for Bryda to pass, closed it again, and left her alone. Bryda was in the old library, which was full of deed boxes and papers. Books lined the walls, and a big chair at the farther end by the bay window was the magistrate's seat, where Mr Bayfield had, after the custom of the time, tried prisoners for poaching, petty larceny, and other offences. Bryda felt frightened, and yet gathered up all her courage to meet Mr Bayfield when he appeared. The summer sunshine, lying on the wide expanse of open country, did not touch this gloomy room, which looked full north, and only caught a gleam of brightness later in the day for a short space. Bryda walked to the window and looked out. Flick was lying on the terrace, his nose on his big ungainly paws, his ears pricked up--on guard, and watching for a return of the yapping crew which the young man's whip had so summarily dismissed. The aspect of everything was dreary and cheerless. The dark firs, the decayed urns, which flanked either side of the stone steps, the rough terrace of loose stones, the long grass of the pleasance below, where a few flowers were bravely struggling to show themselves under difficulties. 'What a dreary place!' Bryda exclaimed. 'But, oh, I wish the Squire would come. I wish Betty was here; but I must make the best of it now I have come here. No gentleman would be cruel to an old man like grandfather, and--' She stopped, for the door opened and the same man whom she had met on the road came in. He made a low bow, and advancing, said,-- 'The Squire, otherwise David Bayfield, is at your service, madam. I pray you be seated, and let me ask you to take such refreshment as this miserable house can afford. I have ordered it to be brought.' But Bryda stood like a fawn at bay, and said with all the calmness she could command,-- 'I do not understand, sir. I am at a loss to know whether--' 'I am the Squire? Yes, fair lady, I have the misfortune to bear that ill-starred title, and I beg you to be seated and open out your business.' But Bryda, though trembling from head to foot, repressed all outward sign of fear, and still stood, her hand on the back of the old carved oak chair, which, when she had turned from the window, she had grasped at the entrance of the young Squire. 'My business, sir, will not detain you long,' she said. 'My poor grandfather, Mr Palmer, to save a son, _my father_'--this was said with infinite sadness--'yes, my father, from disgrace, borrowed a sum of money, a very large sum, from the old Squire. He never pressed him for payment, and indeed it is doubtful that he ever expected it. I came to ask you, sir, to be pitiful, and give my grandfather time, at least. He has had years of poor crops, and many losses of stock. He is already behind hand. If you press him, as I heard you did last night, you will ruin him, you will kill him,' she added with vehemence--'yes, you will kill an old man, who is over seventy, and,' clasping her hands, 'make us all wretched and miserable.' 'Madam,' David Bayfield began, coming nearer, while Bryda, with the shield of the old magistrate's chair before her, felt secure, 'madam, I feel like a poacher on trial, you the judge. Listen to a prisoner pleading; I pray you, be merciful. You speak of ruin--the money I claim by right of your respected grandfather it is absolutely necessary I should have. I hold the note of hand. I showed it to the old man last night. It sets forth that the money is payable on demand to my father, or heirs of his body. I _must have_ the money.' Bryda looked straight into the face before her, and with flashing eyes, drawing her small figure up to its full height, she said,-- 'Very good, sir; I need detain you no longer, but return whence I came from my bootless errand. I do not envy you, sir; it is always better to be the injured than the injurer. Permit me to pass, sir, as I must lose no time.' The door opened at this moment, and an old man-servant came shuffling in, a tray in his hand, loaded with a silver goblet of spiced wine and a few wheaten cakes. He eyed Bryda curiously, and placing the tray on a small table covered with dust, he put a chair before it, and was retiring, when Bryda seized the moment for escape. She came swiftly round from the chair, and before the servant could close the door she had gone out into the hall. 'Nay, madam, I pray you, do not leave my house thus. It will put me in the position of an inhospitable brute. I beseech you take some refreshment ere you depart.' 'I did not come here for refreshment, sir,' Bryda said. 'I came in the hope of finding a merciful gentleman, who would not hasten an old man to his grave by cruelty and hard usage. This hope is at an end. There is nothing left for me but to repent I ever came hither.' 'But, my dear madam, hearken. I would fain win your favour. I am not one to make fair speeches, but I am not cruel. Right is right, and--' 'Mercy is mercy,' Bryda said. 'Good-day to you, sir. Flick, Flick!' The dog was at her side in an instant. He gave an ominous growl as the Squire tried to follow, and then Mr Bayfield stood like a statue on the top step of the cracked flight and watched Bryda's light figure as it passed under the sombre firs, Flick striding at her side as she walked swiftly, at a pace which was nearly running, towards the white gates, and then vanished out of sight. The Squire clenched his teeth and muttered a string of oaths, turned into the house, swallowed the contents of the silver mug at one draught, and then sat down before the table, with its many pigeon-holes and secret drawers, to curse his stupidity in allowing Bryda to depart without another attempt to detain her. She was so entirely different from any woman he had met. There was a mingling of dignity and sweetness which he was not slow to recognise. Her beauty was not her only attraction. He read in her clear eyes purity, and strength of purpose in her round, determined chin, with its slightly upward curve. David Bayfield felt ashamed of himself as he had never felt before, and unable to settle to any business matters, he went to the stable, saddled one of the horses, which had been eating off their heads there since his father's death, and galloped at a furious pace to Wells to consult his man of business there as to what steps should be taken. CHAPTER III AN ELEGY. Bryda had just reached the cross roads where she had met the Squire when a heavy lumbering cart came slowly in sight, which she recognised as Mrs Henderson's. If Jack was driving it, she would at once tell him what had happened; but Jack was not likely to be driving at that snail pace. It was Jack, however, indulging in a slumber as the old horse, who knew his way in the district as well or better than his master, plodded soberly along to his destination. 'Oh! it is Jack!' Bryda exclaimed. 'Jack, Jack, do stop!' Jack Henderson opened his sleepy eyes and called 'Wo, wo!' to the horse. 'Oh, Jack, will you take me up, I am so tired and so--' Jack brought his huge frame down into the dirty road with a mighty thud, and said,-- 'Why, Bryda, what's up? What are you doing here? Lor'! don't take on like this,' for poor Bryda's self-possession suddenly forsook her, and she began to cry helplessly, like a tired and frightened child. 'There, get up,' Jack said, 'and I'll take you home, but for mercy's sake don't cry.' Bryda climbed up the steps of the waggon, and Flick, looking highly satisfied with the arrangement, rubbed his nose against Jack's leg, and whined as if to say, 'I know she will be safe now,' waited with his red tongue lolling out of his big mouth, panting hard after the manner of dogs on a hot day, till Jack gathered the slack reins in his hand and mounted to the seat by Bryda's side. 'Well,' he said, 'I was amazed to see you. Why, you are six miles from Dundry. Come along home with me, and--' 'No, no; I must get back. If you will wait I will tell you everything--and, Jack, I want to go to Bristol, to Madam Lambert's. That will be a help. I am no use at the farm, Aunt Dolly is always telling me so; and now, now they will have a hard fight to get through at all. Grandfather has got to sell up all the stock to pay a debt.' 'Nonsense, get along, I don't believe it,' Jack said. 'What do you mean?' 'What I say.' And then Bryda poured the whole story into Jack's sympathetic ears, which he received with sundry ejaculations, which were anything but complimentary to Squire Bayfield. But Jack, however sympathetic, had only one thing to advise. 'Don't pay the money to the young scoundrel, don't you do it, and go to Bristol and get out of all the bother.' 'It is not that I want to get out of the bother, Jack,' Bryda said. 'How can you think so? I want to help by going away. Why, yesterday, I wanted to go for my own pleasure, now I _must_ go to try and help. Perhaps Madam Lambert will give me wages in time, then I can be a real help, and send Bet some money, and get comforts for poor grandfather.' 'You must get comforts for yourself first,' Jack said. He was so pleased that his favourite scheme of getting Bryda to Bristol was to be carried out that he forgot everything else. 'I am going back Monday,' he said, 'and you can come along with me.' 'No,' Bryda said decidedly, as Jack drew a little nearer to her. 'No, Jack, I shall go before Monday. I shall try to make Madam Lambert take me. She is a sort of relation, you know; and if she won't, well, I must try to get into a haberdasher's shop--or be a servant--or--' 'You stop that,' Jack said. 'I'll never see you a servant while I'm alive. You are too good and too beautiful to be a servant.' Jack laid emphasis on the last word, with a sharp slap of the whip on the drowsy old horse's fat back. Not that Jack Henderson wished to hasten on his way, he would have been content to jog along thus with Bryda at his side for days. To this simple-hearted young man whom Nature had designed for a farmer, but whose ambitious mother had willed that he should be a silversmith and jeweller, in the fond hope that he might succeed his childless uncle in his Bristol business, Bryda was an idol at whose shrine he worshipped, and whose smile sent him on his way rejoicing, while her frown, or a sharp word from her, made him miserable, and conscious that he was too dull and stupid and clumsy ever to win her as his wife. Jack's education had been of the scantiest. It had been begun at a village dame school, and finished at the Wells Grammar School. It is to be doubted if any school could have raised Jack Henderson above the ordinary type of the Somersetshire farmer's son. He had shut his Latin primer and his English grammar when he left Wells, and had never opened a book since, except his prayer book on Sundays, and then he could scarcely spell out the verse of the psalms, and shouted Tate and Brady to the accompaniment of scraping fiddle and trombone in the gallery of the church, with a refreshing disregard of words, though he supplied deficiencies by mystic utterances which filled in doubtful passages and could be interpreted according to the wishes of the hearer. Such was Jack Henderson, with his true Somersetshire dialect, where 'Z was, and is still preferred before 'S,
{'title': 'Bristol Bells: A Story of the Eighteenth Century by Emma Marshall', 'source': 'Project Gutenberg', 'lang': 'en'}