Six Plays
by Lady Florence Henrietta Fisher Darwin · English · Gutenberg #5618 · 469,555 chars · public domain (US)
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Title: Six Plays
Author: Lady Florence Henrietta Fisher Darwin
Release date: May 1, 2004 [eBook #5618]
Most recently updated: December 18, 2014
Language: English
Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/5618
Credits: Transcribed from the 1921 W. Heffer & Sons edition by David Price
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SIX PLAYS ***
Transcribed from the 1921 W. Heffer & Sons edition by David Price, email
ccx074@pglaf.org
[Picture: Book cover]
[Picture: Florence Henrietta Darwin]
SIX PLAYS
By FLORENCE HENRIETTA DARWIN
and an Introduction by CECIL SHARP
Memoir and Portrait of the Author
* * * * *
W. HEFFER & SONS LTD.,
CAMBRIDGE, 1921.
SIX PLAYS
BY
FLORENCE HENRIETTA DARWIN
The Plays may be had in paper covers at
1s. 6d. net as under
1. LOVERS’ TASKS
2. BUSHES & BRIARS
3. MY MAN JOHN
4. PRINCESS ROYAL }
5. THE SEEDS OF LOVE } In one volume
6. THE NEW YEAR
W. HEFFER & SONS LTD.
CAMBRIDGE
INTRODUCTION
I HAVE been asked to write a few lines of introduction to these volumes
of Country Plays, and I do so, not because I can claim any right to speak
with authority on the subject of drama, but in order that I may associate
myself and express my sympathy with the endeavour which the author has
made to restore to his rightful estate the English peasant with whom my
work for twenty years or more has brought me into close relations.
There have been few serious attempts to depict English country life on
the stage. Nor, for that matter, can it be said that the English peasant
has fared over well in our literature. Nevertheless, the English
countryman has qualities all his own, no less distinctive nor less
engaging than those of his Irish, Scottish, Russian, or Continental
neighbours, even though his especial characteristics have hitherto been
for the most part either ignored or grossly travestied by the playwright.
Now in these plays, as it seems to me, he has at last come into his own
kingdom and is painted, perhaps for the first time on the stage, in his
true colours, neither caricatured on the one hand, nor, on the other,
sentimentalised, but faithfully portrayed by a peculiarly sympathetic and
skilful hand.
It is well, too, that an authentic record should be preserved of the life
that has been lived in our country villages year in year out for
centuries before its last vestiges—and they are all that now remain—have
been completely submerged in the oncoming tide of modern civilisation and
progress. Moreover, the songs and dances of the English peasantry that
have become widely known in the last few years have awakened a general
interest and curiosity in all that concerns the lives and habits of
country people and there are many who will be glad to know what manner of
men and women were they who created things of so rare and delicate a
beauty.
These plays are very simple plays. With one exception, “The New Year,”
they rest for their effects upon dialogue rather than upon dramatic
action or plot. There is nothing harrowing, problematical, or
pathological about any of them. The stories are as simple, obvious and
naïve, and have the same happy endings as those which the folk delight to
sing about in their own songs, and from which, indeed, judging by the
titles she has given to her plays, the author drew her inspiration.
It will be noticed that Lady Darwin has eliminated dialect from the
speech which she has put into the mouths of her characters. This is not
because the English villager has no vernacular of his own—there are as
many dialects in England as there are counties—but because dialect, as no
doubt Lady Darwin knew full well, is not of the essence of speech. It is
the way in which language is used for the purpose of expression, the
order in which words are strung together, the subtle, elusive turns of
speech, the character of its figures and metaphors, rather than local
peculiarities of intonation and pronunciation, which betray and illumine
character. And it is upon these, the essential characteristics of
speech, that the author of these plays has wisely and, for the most part,
wholly, relied to give life and character to the actors of her dramas.
The results she has achieved by these means is nothing less than amazing.
So accurately has she caught the peculiar inflections, the inversions,
the curious meanderings and involutions of peasant speech, so
penetrating—uncanny at times—is her insight into the structure and
working of the peasant mind, that, did one not know that this was
scarcely the fact, one would have been tempted to suspect that the author
had herself been born and bred in a country village and lived all her
days amongst those whose characters and habits of mind she has described
with such fidelity.
Take, for instance, the lesson on courtship which My Man John gives to
his master—is not the actual phrasing almost photographic in its
accuracy? Note, too, the frequent use of homely metaphor:—
’Tis with the maids as ’tis with the fowls when they be come out from
moult. They be bound to pick about this way and that in their new
feathers.
I warrant she be gone shy as a May bettel when ’tis daylight.
Ah, you take and let her go quiet, same as I lets th’ old mare when
her first comes up from grass.
I likes doing things my own way, mother. Womenfolk, they be so
buzzing. ’Tis like a lot of insects around of any one on a summer’s
day. A-saying this way and that—whilst a man do go at everything
quiet and calm-like.
and the following typical sentences:—
Well, mother, I count I’m back a smartish bit sooner nor what you did
expect.
There was a cow—well, ’tis a smartish lot of cows as I’ve seen in my
time, but this one, why, the king haven’t got the match to she in all
his great palace, and that’s the truth, so ’tis.
I bain’t one as can judge of that, my lord, seeing that I be got a
poor old badger of a man, and the days when I was young and did carry
a heart what could beat with love, be ahind of I, and the feel of
them clean forgot.
The task of selection has not been an easy one. “The New Year” is the
only Country play on large and ambitious lines which Lady Darwin left
behind her, and it is on this account, as well as for its own merits,
which I venture to think are very considerable, that it has been
included. “Princess Royal” was written for a special occasion, and is
frankly more conventional and artificial than the others, but it will
nevertheless appeal to folk-dancers, and for that reason, rather than
perhaps for its intrinsic value, room has been found for it. The
remaining four are, in their several ways, typical of the author’s work,
and I for one have little doubt but that they will make a wide appeal,
more especially perhaps to those simple-minded people (of whom I am
persuaded there are many, even in these latter-days) who are able to
appreciate the unpretentious beauty of an art that is well-nigh artless
in its simplicity. Some of them may be too slight in design, too
delicate in texture, their beauty too elusive, to succeed on the
professional stage; I do not know. But there is a large demand for plays
of a non-professional character; and that Lady Darwin’s will be acted
with pleasure and listened to with delight in hut or hall or
country-house of a winter’s evening, I cannot doubt.
CECIL SHARP.
FLORENCE HENRIETTA DARWIN
FLORENCE HENRIETTA FISHER was born at 3, Onslow Square, London, in the
year 1864; but to those of a younger generation it seemed that nearly the
whole of her youth had been spent in the New Forest, so largely did it
figure in her stories of the past. It was at Whitley Ridge,
Brockenhurst, that her earliest plays were written, and many marvellous
characters created; their names still live. It was there that she became
a very good violin player, as well as a musician in a wider sense. It
was in Brockenhurst Church that, in 1886, she married Frederic William
Maitland, later Downing professor of the laws of England.
Mr. and Mrs. Maitland lived in Cambridge; for the first two years at
Brookside, and afterwards in the West Lodge of Downing College.
Along with her love of music there had begun, and there continued a love
of animals, and, from Moses, a dog of Brockenhurst days, there stretched
down a long procession of dogs, cats, monkeys, foxes, moles, merecats,
mongeese, bush cats and marmosets, accompanied by a variety of birds. If
such a thing as a dumb animal has ever existed it certainly was not one
of hers, for, besides what they were able to say for themselves, they
spoke much through her. Not only were they able to recount all that had
happened to them in past home or jungle, they were perfectly able to give
advice in every situation and to join in every discussion. Neither were
their pens less ready than their tongues, and many were the letters of
flamboyant script and misspelt word that came forth from cage or basket.
Frederic William Maitland possessed a small property at Brookthorpe,
Gloucestershire; and near this property, in a house in the village of
Edge and at the top of the Horsepools hill, he and his wife and their two
children spent most of their holidays. They were happy days. Animals
increased in number and rejoiced in freedom, fairs were attended, dancing
bears and bird carts came at intervals to the door, gipsies were
delighted in and protected, and it was there that many friendships with
country people were made. Several days a week would find Mrs. Maitland
driving down to Brookthorpe in donkey or pony cart to see tenants, to
enquire for or feed the sick, to visit the school, to advise and be
advised in the many difficulties of human life. With a wonderful memory
and power of reproducing that which she had heard, she brought back rare
harvest from these expeditions. All through her days she was told more
in a week than many people hear in a life-time.
After much illness, Professor Maitland was told that he must leave
England, and in 1898 the Maitlands set sail to the island of Grand
Canary; and it was there that they spent each winter, with the exception
of one in Madeira, until Professor Maitland’s death in 1906. The beauty
and warmth of the island were a joy to Mrs. Maitland, washing out all the
difficulties of housekeeping and the labour of cooking. The day of
hardest work still left her time to set forth, accompanied by a faithful
one-legged hen, to seek the shade of chestnut or loquat tree, and there
to write. The song of frogs rising from watery palm grove, the hot dusty
scent of pepper tree, the cool scent of orange, the mountains sharp and
black against the evening sky, the brightly coloured houses crowded to
the brink of still brighter sea, were all things she loved, and their
images remained with her always. She became an expert talker of what she
called kitchen Spanish, and her store of country history increased
greatly, for, from Candelaria, the washer-woman to Don Luis the grocer,
she met no one who was not ready to tell her all the marvels that ever
they knew.
In 1906 Frederic William Maitland landed on the island too ill to reach
the house that Mrs. Maitland had gone out earlier to prepare for him. He
was taken to an hotel in the city of Las Palmas, and there, on December
the 19th, he died.
In the spring of 1907 Mrs. Maitland returned to England.
In 1909 she added on to a small farm house at Brookthorpe, and there she
went to live. She was thus able to renew many friendships, and in some
slight degree take up the life that had been so dear to her. It was
during these last eleven years at Brookthorpe that she wrote all her
plays dealing with country people; the first for a class of village
children to whom she taught singing, the later ones in response to a
growing demand not only from other Gloucestershire villages, but from
village clubs and institutes scattered over a large part of England. She
saw several of her plays acted by the Oakridge and the Sapperton players,
and these performances and letters from other performers gave her great
pleasure.
In 1913 she married Sir Francis Darwin. Their life at Brookthorpe was
varied by months spent at his house in Cambridge. It was there that she
died on March 5th, 1920.
During her last years she had much illness to contend with. Unable to
play her violin, she turned to the spinet. She practised for hours,
wrote plays, and attended to her house when many would have lain in their
beds.
Her religion became of increasingly great comfort and interest to her,
and it was in that light that she came, more and more, to look at all
things.
In the minds of many who knew her in those years rose up the words: I
have fought a good fight.
E. M.
THE LOVERS’ TASKS
CHARACTERS
FARMER DANIEL,
ELIZABETH, _his wife_.
MILLIE, _her daughter_.
ANNET, _his niece_.
MAY, _Annet’s sister_, _aged ten_.
GILES, _their brother_.
ANDREW, _a rich young farmer_.
GEORGE _and_ JOHN, _servants to Giles_.
AN OLD MAN.
ACT I.—Scene 1.
_The parlour at Camel Farm_.
_Time_: _An afternoon in May_.
ELIZABETH _is sewing by the table with_ ANNET. _At the open doorway_ MAY
_is polishing a bright mug_.
ELIZABETH. [_Looking up_.] There’s Uncle, back from the Fair.
MAY. [_Looking out of the door_.] O Uncle’s got some rare big packets
in his arms, he has.
ELIZABETH. Put down that mug afore you damage it, May; and, Annet, do
you go and help your uncle in.
MAY. [_Setting down the mug_.] O let me go along of her too—[ANNET
_rises and goes to the door followed by_ MAY, _who has dropped her
polishing leather upon the ground_.
ELIZABETH. [_Picking it up and speaking to herself in exasperation_.]
If ever there was a careless little wench, ’tis she. I never did hold
with the bringing up of other folks children and if I’d had my way, ’tis
to the poor-house they’d have went, instead of coming here where I’ve
enough to do with my own.
[_The_ FARMER _comes in followed by_ ANNET _and_ MAY _carrying large
parcels_.
DANIEL. Well Mother, I count I’m back a smartish bit sooner nor what you
did expect.
ELIZABETH. I’m not one that can be taken by surprise, Dan. May, lay
that parcel on the table at once, and put away your uncle’s hat and
overcoat.
DAN. Nay, the overcoat’s too heavy for the little maid—I’ll hang it up
myself.
[_He takes off his coat and goes out into the passage to hang it up_.
_May runs after him with his hat_.
ANNET. I do want to know what’s in all those great packets, Aunt.
ELIZABETH. I daresay you’ll be told all in good season. Here, take up
and get on with that sewing, I dislike to see young people idling away
their time.
[_The_ FARMER _and_ MAY _come back_.
MAY. And now, untie the packets quickly, uncle.
DANIEL. [_Sinking into a big chair_.] Not so fast, my little maid, not
so fast—’tis a powerful long distance as I have journeyed this day, and
’tis wonderful warm for the time of year.
ELIZABETH. I don’t hold with drinking nor with taking bites atween
meals, but as your uncle has come a good distance, and the day is warm,
you make take the key of the pantry, Annet, and draw a glass of cider for
him.
[_She takes the key from her pocket and hands it to_ ANNET, _who goes
out_.
DANIEL. That’s it, Mother—that’s it. And when I’ve wetted my mouth a
bit I’ll be able the better to tell you all about how ’twas over there.
MAY. O I’d dearly like to go to a Fair, I would. You always said that
you’d take me the next time you went, Uncle.
DANIEL. Ah and so I did, but when I comed to think it over, Fairs baint
the place for little maids, I says to mother here—and no, that they
baint, she answers back. But we’ll see how ’tis when you be growed a bit
older, like. Us’ll see how ’twill be then, won’t us Mother?
ELIZABETH. I wouldn’t encourage the child in her nonsense, if I was you,
Dan. She’s old enough to know better than to ask to be taken to such
places. Why in all my days I never set my foot within a fair, pleasure
or business, nor wanted to, either.
MAY. And never rode on the pretty wood horses, Aunt, all spotted and
with scarlet bridles to them?
ELIZABETH. Certainly not. I wonder at your asking such a question, May.
But you do say some very unsuitable things for a little child of your
age.
MAY. And did you get astride of the pretty horses at the Fair, Uncle?
DANIEL. Nay, nay,—they horses be set in the pleasure part of the Fair,
and where I goes ’tis all for doing business like.
[ANNET _comes back with the glass of cider_. DANIEL _takes it from her_.
DANIEL. [_Drinking_.] You might as well have brought the jug, my girl.
ELIZABETH. No, Father, ’twill spoil your next meal as it is.
[_The girls sit down at the table_, _taking up their work_.
DANIEL. [_Putting down his glass_.] But, bless my soul, yon was a Fair
in a hundred. That her was.
BOTH GIRLS. O do tell us of all that you did see there, Uncle.
DANIEL. There was a cow—well, ’tis a smartish lot of cows as I’ve seen
in my time, but this one, why, the King haven’t got the match to she in
all his great palace, and that’s the truth, so ’tis.
ANNET. O don ’t tell us about the cows, Uncle, we want to know about all
the other things.
MAY. The shows of acting folk, and the wild animals, and the nice
sweets.
ELIZABETH. They don’t want to hear about anything sensible, Dan.
They’re like all the maids now, with their thoughts set on pleasuring and
foolishness.
DANIEL. Ah, the maids was different in our day, wasn’t they Mother?
ELIZABETH. And that they were. Why, when I was your age, Annet, I
should have been ashamed if I couldn’t have held my own in any proper or
suitable conversation.
DANIEL. Ah, you was a rare sensible maid in your day, Mother. Do you
mind when you comed along of me to Kingham sale? “You’re never going to
buy an animal with all that white to it,” Dan, you says to me.
ELIZABETH. Ah—I recollect.
DANIEL. “’Tis true her has a whitish leg,” I says, “but so have I, and
so have you, Mother—and who’s to think the worse on we for that?” Ah, I
could always bring you round to look at things quiet and reasonable in
those days—that I could.
ELIZABETH. And a good thing if there were others of the same pattern
now, I’m thinking.
DANIEL. So ’twould be—so ’twould be. But times do bring changes in the
forms of the cattle and I count ’tis the same with the womenfolk. ’Tis
one thing this year and ’tis t’other in the next.
MAY. Do tell us more of what you did see at the Fair, Uncle.
DANIEL. There was a ram. My word! but the four feet of he did cover a
good two yards of ground; just as it might be, standing.
ELIZABETH. Come, Father.
DANIEL. And the horns upon the head of he did reach out very nigh as far
as might do the sails of one of they old wind-mills.
MAY. O Uncle, and how was it with the wool of him?
DANIEL. The wool, my wench, did stand a good three foot from all around
of the animal. You might have set a hen with her eggs on top of it—and
that you might. And now I comes to recollect how ’twas, you could have
set a hen one side of the wool and a turkey t’other.
MAY. O Uncle, that must have been a beautiful animal! And what was the
tail of it?
DANIEL. The tail, my little maid? Why ’twas longer nor my arm and as
thick again—’twould have served as a bell rope to the great bell yonder
in Gloucester church—and so ’twould. Ah, ’twas sommat like a tail, I
reckon, yon.
ELIZABETH. Come, Father, such talk is hardly suited to little girls, who
should know better than to ask so many teasing questions.
ANNET. ’Tisn’t only May, Aunt, I do love to hear what uncle tells, when
he has been out for a day or two.
ELIZABETH. And did you have company on the way home, Father?
DANIEL. That I did. ’Twas along of young Andrew as I did come back.
ELIZABETH. Along of Andrew? Girls, you may now go outside into the
garden for a while. Yes, put aside your work.
MAY. Can’t we stop till the packets are opened?
ELIZABETH. You heard what I said? Go off into the garden, and stop
there till I send for you. And take uncle’s glass and wash it at the
spout as you go.
ANNET. [_Taking the glass_.] I’ll wash it, Aunt. Come May, you see
aunt doesn’t want us any longer.
MAY. Now they’re going to talk secrets together. O I should dearly love
to hear the secrets of grown-up people. [ANNET _and_ MAY _go out
together_.
DANIEL. Annet be got a fine big wench, upon my word. Now haven’t her,
Mother?
ELIZABETH. She’s got old enough to be put to service, and if I’d have
had my way, ’tis to service she’d have gone this long time since, and
that it is.
DANIEL. ’Twould be poor work putting one of dead sister’s wenches out to
service, so long as us have a roof over the heads of we and plenty to eat
on the table.
ELIZABETH. Well, you must please yourself about it Father, as you do
most times. But ’tis uncertain work taking up with other folks children
as I told you from the first. See what a lot of trouble you and me have
had along of Giles.
DANIEL. Giles be safe enough in them foreign parts where I did send him.
You’ve no need to trouble your head about he, Mother—unless ’tis a letter
as he may have got sending to Mill.
ELIZABETH. No, Father, Giles has never sent a letter since the day he
left home. But very often there is no need for letters to keep
remembrance green. ’Tis a plant what thrives best on a soil that is
bare.
DANIEL. Well, Mother, and what be you a-driving at? I warrant as Mill
have got over them notions as she did have once. And, look you here,
’twas with young Andrew as I did journey back from the Fair. And he be
a-coming up presently for to get his answer.
ELIZABETH. All I say is that I hope he may get it then.
DANIEL. Ah, I reckon as ’tis rare put about as he have been all this
long while, and never a downright “yes” to what he do ask.
[MAY _comes softly in and hides behind the door_.
ELIZABETH. Well, that’s not my fault, Father.
DANIEL. But her’ll have to change her note this day, that her’ll have.
For I’ve spoke for she, and ’tis for next month as I’ve pitched the
wedding day.
ELIZABETH. And you may pitch, Father. You may lead the mare down to the
pond, but she’ll not drink if she hasn’t the mind to. You know what
Millie is. ’Tisn’t from my side that she gets it either.
DANIEL. And ’tain’t from me. I be all for easy going and each one to
his self like.
ELIZABETH. Yes, there you are, Father.
DANIEL. But I reckon as the little maid will hearken to what I says.
Her was always a wonderful good little maid to her dad. And her did
always know, that when her dad did set his foot down, well, there ’twas.
’Twas down.
ELIZABETH. Well, if you think you can shew her that, Father, ’tis a
fortunate job on all sides.
[_They suddenly see_ MAY _who has been quiet behind the door_.
ELIZABETH. May, what are you a-doing here I should like to know? Didn’t
I send you out into the garden along of your sister?
MAY. Yes, Auntie, but I’ve comed back.
ELIZABETH. Then you can be off again, and shut the door this time, do
your hear?
DANIEL. That’s it, my little maid. Run along—and look you, May, just
you tell Cousin Millie as we wants her in here straight away. And who
knows bye and bye whether there won’t be sommat in yon great parcel for a
good little wench.
MAY. O Uncle—I’d like to see it now.
DANIEL. Nay, nay—this is not a suitable time—Aunt and me has business
what’s got to be settled like. Nay—’tis later on as the packets is to be
opened.
ELIZABETH. Get along off, you tiresome child.—One word might do for
some, but it takes twenty to get you to move.—Run along now, do you hear
me?
[MAY _goes_.
Well, Father, I’ve done my share with Millie and she don’t take a bit of
notice of what I say. So now it’s your turn.
DANIEL. Ah, I count ’tis more man’s work, this here, so ’tis. There be
things which belongs to females and there be others which do not. You
get and leave it all to me. I’ll bring it off.
ELIZABETH. All right, Father, just you try your way—I’ll have nothing
more to do with it. [MILLIE _comes in_.]
MILLIE. Why, Father, you’re back early from the Fair.
DANIEL. That’s so, my wench. See that package over yonder?
MILLIE. O, that I do, Father.
DANIEL. Yon great one’s for you, Mill.
MILLIE. O Father, what’s inside it?
DANIEL. ’Tis a new, smart bonnet, my wench.
MILLIE. For me, Father?
DANIEL. Ah—who else should it be for, Mill?
MILLIE. O Father, you are good to me.
DANIEL. And a silk cloak as well.
MILLIE. A silken cloak, and a bonnet—O Father, ’tis too much for you to
give me all at once, like.
DANIEL. Young Andrew did help me with the choice, and ’tis all to be
worn on this day month, my girl.
MILLIE. Why, Father, what’s to happen then?
DANIEL. ’Tis for you to go along to church in, Mill.
MILLIE. To church, Father?
DANIEL. Ah, that ’tis—you in the cloak and bonnet, and upon the arm of
young Andrew, my wench.
MILLIE. O no, Father.
DANIEL. But ’tis “yes” as you have got to learn, my wench. And quickly
too. For ’tis this very evening as Andrew be coming for his answer. And
’tis to be “yes” this time.
MILLIE. O no, Father.
DANIEL. You’ve an hour before you, my wench, in which to get another
word to your tongue.
MILLIE. I can’t learn any word that isn’t “no,” Father.
DANIEL. Look at me, my wench. My foot be down. I means what I says—
MILLIE. And I mean what I say, too, Father. And I say, No!
DANIEL. Millie, I’ve set down my foot.
MILLIE. And so have I, Father.
DANIEL. And ’tis “yes” as you must say to young Andrew when he do come
a-courting of you this night.
MILLIE. That I’ll never say, Father. I don’t want cloaks nor bonnets,
nor my heart moved by gifts, or tears brought to my eyes by fair words.
I’ll not wed unless I can give my love along with my hand. And ’tis not
to Andrew I can give that, as you know.
DANIEL. And to whom should a maid give her heart if ’twasn’t to Andrew?
A finer lad never trod in a pair of shoes. I’ll be blest if I do know
what the wenches be a-coming to.
ELIZABETH. There, Father, I told you what to expect.
DANIEL. But ’tis master as I’ll be, hark you, Mother, hark you, Mill.
And ’tis “Yes” as you have got to fit your tongue out with my girl, afore
’tis dark. [_Rising_.] I be a’going off to the yard, but, Mother,
her’ll know what to say to you, her will.
MILLIE. Dad, do you stop and shew me the inside of my packet. Let us
put Andrew aside and be happy—do!
DANIEL. Ah, I’ve got other things as is waiting to be done nor breaking
in a tricksome filly to run atween the shafts. ’Tis fitter work for
females, and so ’tis.
ELIZABETH. And so I told you, Father, from the start.
MILLIE. And ’tis “No” that I shall say.
[_Curtain_.]
ACT I.—Scene 2.
_It is dusk on the same evening_.
MILLIE _is standing by the table folding up the silken cloak_. ANNET
_sits watching her_, _on her knees lies a open parcel disclosing a
woollen shawl_. _In a far corner of the room_ MAY _is seated on a stool
making a daisy chain_.
ANNET. ’Twas very good of Uncle to bring me this nice shawl, Millie.
MILLIE. You should have had a cloak like mine, Annet, by rights.
ANNET. I’m not going to get married, Millie.
MILLIE. [_Sitting down with a sudden movement of despondence and
stretching her arms across the table_.] O don’t you speak to me of that,
Annet. ’Tis more than I can bear to-night.
ANNET. But, Millie, he’s coming for your answer now. You musn’t let him
find you looking so.
MILLIE. My face shall look as my heart feels. And that is all sorrow,
Annet.
ANNET. Can’t you bring yourself round to fancy Andrew, Millie?
MILLIE. No, that I cannot, Annet, I’ve tried a score of times, I
have—but there it is—I cannot.
ANNET. Is it that you’ve not forgotten Giles, then?
MILLIE. I never shall forget him, Annet. Why, ’tis a five year this day
since father sent him off to foreign parts, and never a moment of all
that time has my heart not remembered him.
ANNET. I feared ’twas so with you, Millie.
MILLIE. O I’ve laid awake of nights and my tears have wetted the pillow
all over so that I’ve had to turn it t’other side up.
ANNET. And Giles has never written to you, nor sent a sign nor nothing?
MILLIE. Your brother Giles was never very grand with the pen, Annet.
But, O, he’s none the worse for that.
ANNET. Millie, I never cared for to question you, but how was it when
you and he did part, one with t’other?
MILLIE. I did give him my ring, Annet—secret like—when we were walking
in the wood.
ANNET. What, the one with the white stones to it?
MILLIE. Yes, grandmother’s ring, that she left me. And I did say to
him—if ever I do turn false to you and am like to wed another, Giles—look
you at these white stones.
ANNET. Seven of them, there were, Millie.
MILLIE. And the day that I am like to wed another, Giles, I said to him,
the stones shall darken. But you’ll never see that day. [_She begins to
cry_.
ANNET. Don’t you give way, Millie, for, look you, ’tis very likely that
Giles has forgotten you for all his fine words, and Andrew,—well, Andrew
he’s as grand a suitor as ever maid had. And ’tis Andrew you have got to
wed, you know.
MILLIE. Andrew, Andrew—I’m sick at the very name of him.
ANNET. See the fine house you’ll live in. Think on the grand parlour
that you’ll sit in all the day with a servant to wait on you and naught
but Sunday clothes on your back.
MILLIE. I’d sooner go in rags with Giles at the side of me.
ANNET. Come, you must hearten up. Andrew will soon be here. And Uncle
says that you have got to give him his answer to-night for good and all.
MILLIE. O I cannot see him—I’m wearied to death of Andrew, and that’s
the very truth it is.
ANNET. O Millie—I wonder how ’twould feel to be you for half-an-hour and
to have such a fine suitor coming to me and asking for me to say Yes.
MILLIE. O I wish ’twas you and not me that he was after, Annet.
ANNET. ’Tisn’t likely that anyone such as Master Andrew will ever come
courting a poor girl like me, Millie. But I’d dearly love to know how
’twould feel.
[MILLIE _raises her head and looks at her cousin for a few minutes in
silence_, _then her face brightens_.
MILLIE. Then you shall, Annet.
ANNET. Shall what, Mill?
MILLIE. Know how it feels. Look here—’Tis sick to death I am with
courting, when ’tis from the wrong quarter, and if I’m to wed Andrew come
next month, I’ll not be tormented with him before that time,—so ’tis you
that shall stop and talk with him this evening, Annet, and I’ll slip out
to the woods and gather flowers.
ANNET. How wild and unlikely you do talk, Mill.
MILLIE. In the dusk he’ll never know that ’tisn’t me. Being cousins, we
speak after the same fashion, and in the shape of us there’s not much
that’s amiss.
ANNET. But in the clothing of us, Mill—why, ’tis a grand young lady that
you look—whilst I—
MILLIE. [_Taking up the silken cloak_.] Here—put this over your gown,
Annet.
ANNET. [_Standing up_.] I don’t mind just trying it on, like.
MILLIE. [_Fastening it_.] There—and now the bonnet, with the veil
pulled over the face.
[_She ties the bonnet and arranges the veil on_ ANNET.
MILLIE. [_Standing back and surveying her cousin_.] There, Annet, there
May, who is to tell which of us ’tis?
MAY. [_Coming forward_.] O I should never know that ’twasn’t you,
Cousin Mill.
MILLIE. And I could well mistake her for myself too, so listen, Annet.
’Tis you that shall talk with Master Andrew when he comes to-night. And
’tis you that shall give him my answer. I’ll not burn my lips by
speaking the word he asks of me.
ANNET. O Mill—I cannot—no I cannot.
MILLIE. Don’t let him have it very easily, Annet. Set him a ditch or
two to jump before he gets there. And let the thorns prick him a bit
before he gathers the flower. You know my way with him.
MAY. And I know it too, Millie—Why, your tongue, ’tis very near as sharp
as when Aunt do speak.
ANNET. O Millie, take off these things—I cannot do it, that’s the truth.
MAY. [_Looking out through the door_.] There’s Andrew a-coming over the
mill yard.
MILLIE. Here, sit down, Annet, with the back of you to the light.
[_She pushes_ ANNET _into a chair beneath the window_.
MAY. Can I get into the cupboard and listen to it, Cousin Mill?
MILLIE. If you promise to bide quiet and to say naught of it afterwards.
MAY. O I promise, I promise—I’ll just leave a crack of the door open for
to hear well.
[MAY _gets into the cupboard_. MILLIE _takes up_ ANNET’S _new shawl and
puts it all over her_.
MILLIE. No one will think that ’tisn’t you, in the dusk.
ANNET. O Millie, what is it that you’ve got me to do?
MILLIE. Never you mind, Annet—you shall see what ’tis to have a grand
suitor and I shall get a little while of quiet out yonder, where I can
think on Giles.
[_She runs out of the door just as_ ANDREW _comes up_. ANDREW _knocks
and then enters the open door_.
ANDREW. Where’s Annet off to in such a hurry?
ANNET. [_Very faintly_.] I’m sure I don’t know. [ANDREW _lays aside
his hat and comes up to the window_. _He stands before_ ANNET _looking
down on her_. _She becomes restless under his gaze_, _and at last signs
to him to sit down_.
ANDREW. [_Sitting down on a chair a little way from her_.] The Master
said that I might come along to-night, Millie—Otherwise—[ANNET _is still
silent_.
Otherwise I shouldn’t have dared do so.
[ANNET _sits nervously twisting the ribbons of her cloak_.
The Master said, as how may be, your feeling for me, Millie, might be
changed like. [ANNET _is still silent_.
And that if I was to ask you once more, very likely ’twould be something
different as you might say.
[_A long silence_.
Was I wrong in coming, Millie?
ANNET. [_Faintly_.] ’Twould have been better had you stayed away like.
ANDREW. Then there isn’t any change in your feelings towards me, Millie?
ANNET. O, there’s a sort of a change, Andrew.
ANDREW. [_Slowly_.] O Mill, that’s good hearing. What sort of a change
is it then?
ANNET. ’Tis very hard to say, Andrew.
ANDREW. Look you, Mill, ’tis more than a five year that I’ve been
a-courting of you faithful.
ANNET. [_Sighing_.] Indeed it is, Andrew.
ANDREW. And I’ve never got naught but blows for my pains.
ANNET. [_Beginning to speak in a gentle voice and ending sharply_.] O
I’m so sorry—No—I mean—’Tis your own fault, Andrew.
ANDREW. But I would sooner take blows from you than sweet words from
another, Millie.
ANNET. I could never find it in my heart to—I mean, ’tis as well that
you should get used to blows, seeing we’re to be wed, Andrew.
ANDREW. Then ’tis to be! O Millie, this is brave news—Why, I do
scarcely know whether I be awake or dreaming.
ANNET. [_Very sadly_.] Very likely you’ll be glad enough to be dreaming
a month from now, poor Andrew.
ANDREW. [_Drawing nearer_.] I am brave, Millie, now that you speak to
me so kind and gentle, and I’ll ask you to name the day.
ANNET. [_Shrinking back_.] O ’twill be a very long distance from now,
Andrew.
ANDREW. Millie, it seems to be your pleasure to take up my heart and
play with it same as a cat does with the mouse.
ANNET. [_Becoming gay and hard in her manner_.] Your heart, Andrew?
’Twill go all the better afterwards if ’tis tossed about a bit first.
ANDREW. Put an end to this foolishness, Mill, and say when you’ll wed
me.
ANNET. [_Warding him off with her hand_.] You shall have my answer in a
new song Andrew, which I have been learning.
[ANDREW _sits down despondently and prepares to listen_.
ANNET. Now hark you to this, Andrew, and turn it well over in your mind.
[_She begins to sing_:
Say can you plough me an acre of land
Sing Ivy leaf, Sweet William and Thyme.
Between the sea and the salt sea strand
And you shall be a true lover of mine?
[_A slight pause_. ANNET _looks questioningly at_ ANDREW, _who turns
away with a heavy sigh_.
ANNET. [_Singing_.]
Yes, if you plough it with one ram’s horn
Sing Ivy Leaf, Sweet William and Thyme
And sow it all over with one peppercorn
And you shall be a true lover of mine.
ANDREW. ’Tis all foolishness.
ANNET. [_Singing_.]
Say can you reap with a sickle of leather
Sing Ivy Leaf, Sweet William and Thyme
And tie it all up with a Tom-tit’s feather
And you shall be a true lover of mine.
ANDREW. [_Rises up impatiently_.] I can stand no more. You’ve danced
upon my heart till ’tis fairly brittle, and ready to be broke by a
feather.
ANNET. [_Very gently_.] O Andrew, I’ll mend your heart one day.
ANDREW. Millie, the sound of those words has mended it already.
ANNET. [_In a harder voice_.] But very likely there’ll be a crack left
to it always.
[FARMER DANIEL _and_ ELIZABETH _come into the room_.
DANIEL. Well my boy, well Millie?
ANDREW. [_Boldly_.] ’Tis for a month from now.
DANIEL. Bless my soul. Hear that, Mother? Hear that?
ELIZABETH. I’m not deaf, Father.
DANIEL. [_Shaking_ ANDREW’S _hand_.] Ah my boy, I knowed as you’d bring
the little maid to the senses of she.
ELIZABETH. Millie has not shown any backwardness in clothing herself as
though for church.
DANIEL. ’Tis with the maids as ’tis with the fowls when they be come out
from moult. They be bound to pick about this way and that in their new
feathers.
ELIZABETH. Well, ’tis to be hoped the young people have fixed it up for
good and all this time.
DANIEL. Come Mill, my wench, you be wonderful quiet. Where’s your
tongue?
ELIZABETH. I think we’ve all had quite enough of Millie’s tongue,
Father. Let her give it a rest if she’ve a mind.
DANIEL. I warrant she be gone as shy as a May bettel when ’tis daylight.
But us’ll take it as she have fixed it up in her own mind like. Come,
Mother, such a time as this, you won’t take no objection to the drawing
of a jug of cider.
ELIZABETH. And supper just about to be served? I’m surprised at you,
Father. No, I can’t hear of cider being drawn so needless like.
DANIEL. Well, well,—have it your own way—but I always says, and my
father used to say it afore I, a fine deed do call for a fine drink, and
that’s how ’twas in my time.
ELIZABETH. Millie, do you call your cousins in to supper.
DANIEL. Ah, and where be the maids gone off to this time of night,
Mother?
ANDREW. Annet did pass me as I came through the yard, Master
[MAY, _quietly opens the cupboard door and comes out_.
ELIZABETH. So that’s where you’ve been, you deceitful little wench.
ANDREW. Well, to think of that, Millie.
ELIZABETH. And how long may you have bid there, I should like to know?
DANIEL. Come, come, my little maid, ’tis early days for you to be
getting a lesson in courtship.
MAY. O there wasn’t any courtship, Uncle, and I didn’t hear nothing at
all to speak of.
ELIZABETH. There, run along quick and find your sister. Supper’s late
already, and that it is.
ANNET. I’ll go with her.
[_She starts forward and hurriedly moves towards the door_.
ELIZABETH. Stop a moment, Millie. What are you thinking of to go
trailing out in the dew with that beautiful cloak and bonnet. Take and
lay them in the box at once, do you hear?
DANIEL. That’s it, Mill. ’Twouldn’t do for to mess them up afore the
day. ’Twas a fair price as I gived for they, and that I can tell you, my
girl.
[ANNET _stops irresolutely_. MAY _seizes her hand_.
MAY. Come off, come off, “Cousin Millie”; ’tis not damp outside, and O
I’m afeared to cross the rickyard by myself.
[_She pulls_ ANNET _violently by the hand and draws her out of the door_.
ELIZABETH. Off with the cloak this minute, Millie.
MAY. [_Calling back_.] She’s a-taking of it off, Aunt, she is.
ELIZABETH. I don’t know what’s come to the maid. She don’t act like
herself to-day.
DANIEL. Ah, that be asking too much of a maid, to act like herself, and
the wedding day close ahead of she.
ELIZABETH. I’d be content with a suitable behaviour, Father. I’m not
hard to please.
DANIEL. Ah, you take and let her go quiet, same as I lets th’ old mare
when her first comes up from grass.
ELIZABETH. ’Tis all very well for you to talk, Father but ’tis I who
have got to do.
DANIEL. Come Mother, come Andrew, I be sharp set. And ’tis the feel of
victuals and no words as I wants in my mouth.
ELIZABETH. Well, Father, I’m not detaining you. There’s the door, and
the food has been cooling on the table this great while.
DANIEL. Come you, Andrew, come you, Mother. Us’ll make a bit of a
marriage feast this night.
[_He leads the way and the others follow him out_.
[_Curtain_.]
ACT II.—Scene 1.
_A woodland path_. GILES _comes forward with his two servants_, GEORGE
_and_ JOHN, _who are carrying heavy packets_.
GILES. ’Tis powerful warm to-day. We will take a bit of rest before we
go further.
GEORGE. [_Setting down his packet_.] That’s it, master. ’Tis a rare
weight as I’ve been carrying across my back since dawn.
JOHN. [_Also setting down his burden_.] Ah, I be pleased for to lay
aside yon. ’Tis wonderful heavy work, this journeying to and fro with
gold and silver.
GILES. Our travelling is very nigh finished. There lies the road which
goes to Camel Farm.
GEORGE. Oh, I count as that must be a rare sort of a place, master.
JOHN. Seeing as us haven’t stopped scarce an hour since us landed off
the sea.
GEORGE. But have come running all the while same as the fox may run in
th’ early morning towards the poultry yard.
JOHN. Nor broke bread, nor scarce got a drop of drink to wet th’ insides
of we.
GILES. ’Tis very little further that you have got to journey, my good
lads. We are nigh to the end of our wayfaring.
GEORGE. And what sort of a place be we a-coming to, master?
GILES. ’Tis the place out of all the world to me.
JOHN. I count ’tis sommat rare and fine in that case, seeing as we be
come from brave foreign parts, master.
GILES. ’Tis rarer, and finer than all the foreign lands that lie beneath
the sun, my lads.
GEORGE. That’s good hearing, master. And is the victuals like to be as
fine as the place?
GILES. O, you’ll fare well enough yonder.
JOHN. I was never one for foreign victuals, nor for the drink that was
over there neither.
GILES. Well, the both of you shall rest this night beneath the grandest
roof that ever sheltered a man’s head. And you shall sit at a table
spread as you’ve not seen this many a year.
GEORGE. That’ll be sommat to think on, master, when us gets upon our
legs again.
JOHN. I be thinking of it ahead as I lies here, and that’s the truth.
[_The two servants stretch themselves comfortably beneath the trees_.
_GILES walks restlessly backwards and forwards as though impatient at any
delay_. _From time to time he glances at a ring which he wears_,
_sighing heavily as he does so_.
[_An old man comes up_, _leaning on his staff_.
OLD MAN. Good-morning to you, my fine gentlemen.
GILES. Good-morning, master.
OLD MAN. ’Tis a wonderful warm sun to-day.
GILES. You’re right there, master.
OLD MAN. I warrant as you be journeying towards the same place where I
be going, my lord.
GILES. And where is that, old master?
OLD MAN. Towards Camel Farm.
GILES. You’re right. ’Tis there and nowhere else that we are going.
OLD MAN. Ah, us’ll have to go smartish if us is to be there in time.
GILES. In time for what, my good man?
OLD MAN. In time for to see the marrying, my lord.
GILES. The marrying? What’s that you’re telling me?
OLD MAN. ’Tis at noon this day that she’s to be wed.
GILES. Who are you speaking of, old man?
OLD MAN. And where is your lordship journeying this day if ’tis not to
the marrying?
GILES. Who’s getting wed up yonder, tell me quickly?
OLD MAN. ’Tis th’ old farmer’s daughter what’s to wed come noon-tide.
GILES. [_Starting_.] Millie! O that is heavy news. [_Looking at his
hand_.] Then ’tis as I feared, for since daybreak yesterday the
brightness has all gone from out of the seven stones. That’s how ’twould
be, she told me once.
[_He turns away from the others in deep distress of mind_.
GEORGE. Us’ll see no Camel Farm this day.
JOHN. And th’ inside of I be crying out for victuals.
OLD MAN. Then you be not of these parts, masters?
GEORGE. No, us be comed from right over the seas, along of master.
JOHN. Ah, ’tis a fine gentleman, master. But powerful misfortunate in
things of the heart.
GEORGE. Ah, he’d best have stopped where he was. Camel Farm baint no
place for the like of he to go courting at.
JOHN. Ah, master be used to them great palaces, all over gold and marble
with windows as you might drive a waggon through, and that you might.
GEORGE. All painted glass. And each chair with golden legs to him, and
a sight of silver vessels on the table as never you did dream of after a
night’s drinking, old man. [GILES _comes slowly towards them_.
GILES. And who is she to wed, old man?
OLD MAN. Be you a-speaking of the young mistress up at Camel Farm, my
lord?
GILES. Yes. With whom does she go to church to-day?
OLD MAN. ’Tis along of Master Andrew that her do go. What lives up
Cranham way.
GILES. Ah, th’ old farmer was always wonderful set on him. [_A pause_.
OLD MAN. I be a poor old wretch what journeys upon the roads, master,
and maybe I picks a crust here and gets a drink of water there, and the
shelter of the pig-stye wall to rest the bones of me at night time.
GILES. What matters it if you be old and poor, master, so that the heart
of you be whole and unbroken?
OLD MAN. Us poor old wretches don’t carry no hearts to th’ insides of
we. The pains of us do come from the having of no victuals and from the
winter’s cold when snow do lie on the ground and the wind do moan over
the fields, and when the fox do bark.
GILES. What is the pang of hunger and the cold bite of winter set
against the cruel torment of a disappointed love?
OLD MAN. I baint one as can judge of that, my lord, seeing that I be got
a poor old badger of a man, and the days when I was young and did carry a
heart what could beat with love, be ahind of I, and the feel of them
clean forgot.
GILES. Then what do you up yonder at the marrying this morning?
OLD MAN. Oh, I do take me to those places where there be burying or
marriage, for the hearts of folk at these seasons be warmed and kinder,
like. And ’tis bread and meat as I gets then. Food be thrown out to the
poor old dog what waits patient at the door.
GILES. [_Looks intently at him for a moment_.] See here, old master. I
would fain strike a bargain with you. And ’tis with a handful of golden
pieces that I will pay your service.
OLD MAN. Anything to oblige you, my young lord.
GILES. [_To_ GEORGE.] Take out a handful from the bag of gold. And
you, John, give him some of the silver.
[GEORGE _and_ JOHN _untie their bags and take out gold and silver_.
_They twist it up in a handkerchief which they give to the old man_.]
OLD MAN. May all the blessings of heaven rest on you, my lord, for ’tis
plain to see that you be one of the greatest and finest gentlemen ever
born to the land.
GILES. My good friend, you’re wrong there, I was a poor country lad, but
I had the greatest treasure that a man could hold on this earth. ’Twas
the love of my cousin Millie. And being poor, I was put from out the
home, and sent to seek my fortune in parts beyond the sea.
OLD MAN. Now, who’d have thought ’twas so, for the looks of you be
gentle born all over.
GILES. “Come back with a bushel of gold in one hand and one of silver in
t’other” the old farmer said to me, “and then maybe I’ll let you wed my
daughter.”
OLD MAN. And here you be comed back, and there lie the gold and the
silver bags.
GILES. And yonder is Millie given in marriage to another.
GEORGE. ’Taint done yet, master.
JOHN. ’Tisn’t too late, by a long way, master.
GILES. [_To_ OLD MAN.] And so I would crave something of you, old
friend. Lend me your smock, and your big hat and your staff. In that
disguise I will go to the farm and look upon my poor false love once
more. If I find that her heart is already given to another, I shall not
make myself known to her. But if she still holds to her love for me,
then—
GEORGE. Go in the fine clothes what you have upon you, master. And even
should the maid’s heart, be given to another, the sight of so grand a
cloth and such laces will soon turn it the right way again.
JOHN. Ah, that’s so, it is. You go as you be clothed now, master. I
know what maids be, and ’tis finery and good coats which do work more on
the hearts of they nor anything else in the wide world.
GILES. No, no, my lads. I will return as I did go from yonder. Poor,
and in mean clothing. Nor shall a glint of all my wealth speak one word
for me. But if so be as her heart is true in spite of everything, my
sorrowful garments will not hide my love away from her.
OLD MAN. [_Taking off his hat_.] Here you are master.
[GILES _hands his own hat to_ GEORGE. _He then takes off his coat and
gives it to_ JOHN. _The_ OLD MAN _takes off his smock_, _GILES puts it
on_.
OLD MAN. Pull the hat well down about the face of you, master, so as the
smooth skin of you be hid.
GILES. [_Turning round in his disguise_.] How’s that, my friends?
GEORGE. You be a sight too straight in the back, master.
GILES. [_Stooping_.] I’ll soon better that.
JOHN. Be you a-going in them fine buckled shoes, master?
GILES. I had forgot the shoes. When I get near to the house ’tis
barefoot that I will go.
GEORGE. Then let us be off, master, for the’ time be running short.
JOHN. Ah, that ’tis. I count it be close on noon-day now by the look of
the sun.
OLD MAN. And heaven be with you, my young gentleman.
GILES. My good friends, you shall go with me a little further. And when
we have come close upon the farm, you shall stop in the shelter of a wood
that I know of and await the signal I shall give you.
GEORGE. And what’ll that be, master?
GILES. I shall blow three times, and loudly from my whistle, here.
JOHN. And be we to come up to the farm when we hears you?
GILES. As quickly as you can run. ’Twill be the sign that I need all of
you with me.
GEORGE _and_ JOHN. That’s it, master. Us do understand what ’tis as we
have got to do.
OLD MAR. Ah, ’tis best to be finished with hearts that beat to the tune
of a maid’s tongue, and to creep quiet along the roads with naught but
them pains as hunger and thirst do bring to th’ inside. So ’tis.
[_Curtain_.]
ACT III.—Scene 1.
_The parlour at Camel Farm_. ELIZABETH, _in her best dress_, _is moving
about the room putting chairs in their places and arranging ornaments on
the dresser_, _etc._ MAY _stands at the door with a large bunch of
flowers in her hands_.
ELIZABETH. And what do you want to run about in the garden for when I’ve
just smoothed your hair and got you all ready to go to church?
MAY. I’ve only been helping Annet gather some flowers to put upon the
table.
ELIZABETH. You should know better then. Didn’t I tell you to sit still
in that chair with your hands folded nicely till we were ready to start.
MAY. Why, I couldn’t be sitting there all the while, now could I, Aunt?
ELIZABETH. This’ll be the last time as I tie your ribbon, mind.
[_She smoothes_ MAY’S _hair and ties it up for her_. ANNET _comes into
the room with more flowers_.
ELIZABETH. What’s your cousin doing now, Annet?
ANNET. The door of her room is still locked, Aunt. And what she says is
that she do want to bide alone there.
ELIZABETH. In all my days I never did hear tell of such a thing, I don’t
know what’s coming to the world, I don’t.
MAY. I count that Millie do like to be all to herself whilst she is
a-dressing up grand in her white gown, and the silken cloak and bonnet.
ANNET. Millie’s not a-dressing of herself up. I heard her crying
pitiful as I was gathering flowers in the garden.
ELIZABETH. Crying? She’ll have something to cry about if she doesn’t
look out, when her father comes in, and hears how she’s a-going on.
MAY. I wonder why Cousin Millie’s taking on like this. I shouldn’t, if
’twas me getting married.
ELIZABETH. Look you, May, you get and run up, and knock at the door and
tell her that ’twill soon be time for us to set off to church and that
she have got to make haste in her dressing.
MAY. I’ll run, Aunt, only ’tis very likely as she’ll not listen to
anything that I say. [MAY _goes out_.
ELIZABETH. Now Annet, no idling here, if you please. Set the nosegay in
water, and when you’ve given a look round to see that everything is in
its place, upstairs with you, and on with your bonnet, do you hear?
Uncle won’t wish to be kept waiting for you, remember.
ANNET. I’m all ready dressed, except for my bonnet, Aunt. ’Tis Millie
that’s like to keep Uncle waiting this morning. [_She goes out_.
[DANIEL _comes in_.
DANIEL. Well, Mother—well, girls—but, bless my soul, where’s Millie got
to?
ELIZABETH. Millie has not seen fit to shew herself this morning, Father.
She’s biding up in her room with the door locked, and nothing that I’ve
been able to say has been attended to, so perhaps you’ll kindly have your
try.
DANIEL. Bless my soul—where’s May? Where’s Annet? Send one of the
little maids up to her, and tell her ’tis very nigh time for us to be
off.
ELIZABETH. I’m fairly tired of sending up to her, Father. You’d best go
yourself.
[MAY _comes into the room_.
MAY. Please Aunt, the door, ’tis still locked, and Millie is crying ever
so sadly within, and she won’t open to me, nor speak, nor nothing.
ELIZABETH. There, Father,—perhaps you’ll believe what I tell you another
time. Millie has got that hardened and wayward, there’s no managing of
her, there’s not.
DANIEL. Ah, ’twon’t be very long as us’ll have the managing of she.
’Twill be young Andrew as’ll take she in hand after this day.
ELIZABETH. ’Tis all very well to talk of young Andrew, but who’s a-going
to get her to church with him I’d like to know.
DANIEL. Why, ’tis me as’ll do it, to be sure.
ELIZABETH. Very well, Father, and we shall all be much obliged to you.
[DANIEL _goes to the door and shouts up the stairs_.
DANIEL. Well, Millie, my wench. Come you down here. ’Tis time we did
set out. Do you hear me, Mill. ’Tis time we was off.
[ELIZABETH _waits listening_. _No answer comes_.
DANIEL. Don’t you hear what I be saying, Mill? Come you down at once.
[_There is no answer_.
DANIEL. Millie, there be Andrew a-waiting for to take you to church.
Come you down this minute.
ELIZABETH. You’d best take sommat and go and break open the door,
Father. ’Tis the sensiblest thing as you can do, only you’d never think
of anything like that by yourself.
DANIEL. I likes doing things my own way, Mother. Women-folk, they be so
buzzing. ’Tis like a lot of insects around of anyone on a summer’s day.
A-saying this way and that—whilst a man do go at anything quiet and
calm-like. [ANNET _comes in_.
ANNET. Please, Uncle, Millie says that she isn’t coming down for no one.
DANIEL. [_Roaring in fury_.] What! What’s that, my wench—isn’t
a-coming down for no one? Hear that, Mother, hear that? I’ll have
sommat to say to that, I will. [_Going to the door_.
DANIEL. [_Roaring up the stairs_.] Hark you, Mill, down you comes this
moment else I’ll smash the door right in, and that I will.
[DANIEL _comes back into the room_, _storming violently_.
DANIEL. Ah, ’tis a badly bred up wench is Millie, and her’d have growed
up very different if I’d a-had the bringing up of she. But spoiled she
is and spoiled her’ve always been, and what could anyone look for from a
filly what’s been broke in by women folk!
ELIZABETH. There, there, Father—there’s no need to bluster in this
fashion. Take up the poker and go and break into the door quiet and
decent, like anyone else would do. And girls—off for your bonnets this
moment I tell you.
[_She takes up a poker and hands it to_ DANIEL, _who mops his face and
goes slowly out and upstairs_. ANNET _and_ MAY _leave the room_. _The
farmer is heard banging at the door of Millie’s bedroom_.
[ELIZABETH _moves about the room setting it in order_. ANDREW _comes in
at the door_. _He carries a bunch of flowers_, _which he lays on the
table_.
ANDREW. Good-morning to you, mistress.
ELIZABETH. Good-morning, Andrew.
ANDREW. What’s going on upstairs?
ELIZABETH. ’Tis Father at a little bit of carpentering.
ANDREW. I’m come too soon, I reckon.
ELIZABETH. We know what young men be upon their wedding morn! I warrant
as the clock can’t run too fast for them at such a time.
ANDREW. You’re right there, mistress. But the clock have moved powerful
slow all these last few weeks—for look you here, ’tis a month this day
since I last set eyes on Mill or had a word from her lips—so ’tis.
ELIZABETH. You’ll have enough words presently. Hark, she’s coming down
with Father now.
[ANDREW _turns eagerly towards the door_. _The farmer enters with_
MILLIE _clinging to his arm_, _she wears her ordinary dress_. _Her hair
is ruffled and in disorder_, _and she has been crying_.
DANIEL. Andrew, my lad, good morning to you.
ANDREW. Good morning, master.
DANIEL. You mustn’t mind a bit of an April shower, my boy. ’Tis the way
with all maids on their wedding morn. Isn’t that so, Mother?
ELIZABETH. I wouldn’t make such a show of myself if I was you, Mill. Go
upstairs this minute and wash your face and smooth your hair and put
yourself ready for church.
DANIEL. Nay, she be but just come from upstairs, Mother. Let her bide
quiet a while with young Andrew here; whilst do you come along with me
and get me out my Sunday coat. ’Tis time I was dressed for church too,
I’m thinking.
ELIZABETH. I don’t know what’s come to the house this morning, and
that’s the truth. Andrew, I’ll not have you keep Millie beyond a five
minutes. ’Tis enough of one another as you’ll get later on, like.
Father, go you off upstairs for your coat. ’Tis hard work for me,
getting you all to act respectable, that ’tis.
[DANIEL _and_ ELIZABETH _leave the room_. ANDREW _moves near_ MILLIE
_and holds out both his hands_. _She draws herself haughtily away_.
ANDREW. Millie—’tis our wedding day.
MILLIE. And what if it is, Andrew.
ANDREW. Millie, it cuts me to the heart to see your face all wet with
tears.
MILLIE. Did you think to see it otherwise, Andrew?
ANDREW. No smile upon your lips, Millie.
MILLIE. Have I anything to smile about, Andrew?
ANDREW. No love coming from your eyes, Mill.
MILLIE. That you have never seen, Andrew.
ANDREW. And all changed in the voice of you too.
MILLIE. What do you mean by that, Andrew?
ANDREW. Listen, Millie—’tis a month since I last spoke with you. Do you
recollect? ’Twas the evening of the great Fair.
MILLIE And what if it was?
ANDREW. Millie, you were kinder to me that night than ever you had been
before. I seemed to see such a gentle look in your eyes then. And when
you spoke, ’twas as though—as though—well—’twas one of they quists
a-cooing up in the trees as I was put in mind of.
MILLIE. Well, there’s nothing more to be said about that now, Andrew.
That night’s over and done with.
ANDREW. I’ve carried the thought of it in my heart all this time,
Millie.
MILLIE. I never asked you to, Andrew.
ANDREW. I’ve brought you a nosegay of flowers, Mill. They be rare
blossoms with grand names what I can’t recollect to all of them.
[MILLIE _takes the nosegay_, _looks at it for an instant_, _and then lets
it fall_.
MILLIE. I have no liking for flowers this day, Andrew.
ANDREW. O Millie, and is it so as you and me are going to our marriage?
MILLIE. Yes, Andrew. ’Tis so. I never said it could be different. I
have no heart to give you. My love was given long ago to another. And
that other has forgotten me by now.
ANDREW. O Millie, you shall forget him too when once you are wed to me,
I promise you.
MILLIE. ’Tis beyond the power of you or any man to make me do that,
Andrew.
ANDREW. Millie, what’s the good of we two going on to church one with
t’other?
MILLIE. There’s no good at all, Andrew.
ANDREW. Millie, I could have sworn that you had begun to care sommat
more than ordinary for me that last time we were together.
MILLIE. Then you could have sworn wrong. I care nothing for you,
Andrew, no, nothing. But I gave my word I’d go to church with you and be
wed. And—I’ll not break my word, I’ll not.
ANDREW. And is this all that you can say to me to-day, Mill?
MILLIE. Yes, Andrew, ’tis all. And now, ’tis very late, and I have got
to dress myself.
ELIZABETH. [_Calling loudly from above_.] Millie, what are you stopping
for? Come you up here and get your gown on, do.
[MILLIE _looks haughtily at_ ANDREW _as she passes him_. _She goes
slowly out of the room_.
[ANDREW _picks up the flowers and stands holding them_, _looking
disconsolately down upon them_. MAY _comes in_, _furtively_.
MAY. All alone, Andrew? Has Millie gone to put her fine gown on?
ANDREW. Yes, Millie’s gone to dress herself.
MAY. O that’s a beautiful nosegay, Andrew. Was it brought for Mill?
ANDREW. Yes, May, but she won’t have it.
MAY. Millie don’t like you very much, Andrew, do she?
ANDREW. Millie’s got quite changed towards me since last time.
MAY. And when was that, Andrew?
ANDREW. Why, last time was the evening of the Fair, May.
MAY. When I was hid in the cupboard yonder, Andrew?
ANDREW. So you were, May. Well, can’t you recollect how ’twas that she
spoke to me then?
MAY. O yes, Andrew, and that I can. ’Twas a quist a-cooing in the tree
one time—and then—she did recollect herself and did sharpen up her tongue
and ’twas another sort of bird what could drive its beak into the flesh
of anyone—so ’twas.
ANDREW. O May—you say she did recollect herself—what do you mean by
those words?
MAY. You see, she did give her word that she would speak sharp and rough
to you.
ANDREW. What are you talking about, May? Do you mean that the tongue of
her was not speaking as the heart of her did feel?
MAY. I guess ’twas sommat like that, Andrew.
ANDREW. O May, you have gladdened me powerful by these words.
MAY. But, O you must not tell of me, Andrew.
ANDREW. I will never do so, May—only I shall know better how to be
patient, and to keep the spirit of me up next time that she do strike out
against me.
MAY. I’m not a-talking of Mill, Andrew.
ANDREW. Who are you talking of then, I’d like to know?
MAY. ’Twas Annet.
ANDREW. What was?
MAY. Annet who was dressed up in the cloak and bonnet of Millie that
night and who did speak with you so gentle and nice.
ANDREW. Annet!
ELIZABETH. [_Is heard calling_.] There, father, come along down and
give your face a wash at the pump.
MAY. Let’s go quick together into the garden, Andrew, and I’ll tell you
all about it and how ’twas that Annet acted so.
[_She seizes_ ANDREW’S _hand and pulls him out of the room with her_.
[_Curtain_.]
ACT III.—Scene 2.
_A few minutes later_.
ELIZABETH _stands tying her bonnet strings before a small mirror on the
wall_. DANIEL _is mopping his face with a big_, _bright handkerchief_.
ANNET, _dressed for church_, _is by the table_. _She sadly takes up the
nosegay of flowers which_ ANDREW _brought for_ MILLIE, _and moves her
hand caressingly over it_.
ELIZABETH. If you think that your neckerchief is put on right ’tis time
you should know different, Father.
DANIEL. What’s wrong with it then, I’d like to know?
ELIZABETH. ’Tis altogether wrong. ’Tis like the two ears of a heifer
sticking out more than anything else that I can think on.
DANIEL. Have it your own way, Mother—and fix it as you like.
[_He stands before her and she rearranges it_.
ANNET. These flowers were lying on the ground.
ELIZABETH. Thrown there in a fine fit of temper, I warrant.
DANIEL. Her was as quiet as a new born lamb once the door was broke open
and she did see as my word, well, ’twas my word.
ELIZABETH. We all hear a great deal about your word, Father, but ’twould
be better for there to be more do and less say about you.
DANIEL. [_Going over to Annet and looking at her intently_.] Why, my
wench—what be you a-dropping tears for this day?
ANNET. [_Drying her eyes_.] ’Twas—’twas the scent out of one of the
flowers as got to my eyes, Uncle.
DANIEL. Well, that’s a likely tale it is. Hear that, Mother? ’Tis with
her eyes that this little wench do snuff at a flower. That’s good,
bain’t it?
ELIZABETH. I haven’t patience with the wenches now-a-days. Lay down
that nosegay at once, Annet, and call your cousin from her room. I
warrant she has finished tricking of herself up by now.
DANIEL. Ah, I warrant as her’ll need a smartish bit of time for to take
the creases out of the face of she.
[ANDREW _and_ MAY _come in_.]
DANIEL. Well, Andrew, my lad, ’tis about time as we was on the way to
church I reckon.
ANDREW. I count as ’tis full early yet, master.
[_He takes up the nosegay from the table and crosses the room to the
window where_ ANNET _is standing_, _and trying to control her tears_.
ANDREW. Annet, Millie will have none of my blossoms. I should like it
well if you would carry them in your hand to church this day.
ANNET. [_Looking wonderingly at him_.] Me, Andrew?
ANDREW. Yes, you, Annet. For, look you, they become you well. They
have sommat of the sweetness of you in them. And the touch of them is
soft and gentle. And—I would like you to keep them in your hands this
day, Annet.
ANNET. O Andrew, I never was given anything like this before.
ANDREW. [_Slowly_.] I should like to give you a great deal more,
Annet—only I cannot. And ’tis got too late.
ELIZABETH. Too late—I should think it was. What’s come to the maid! In
my time girls didn’t use to spend a quarter of the while afore the glass
as they do now. Suppose you was to holler for her again, Father.
DANIEL. Anything to please you, Mother—
MAY. I hear her coming, Uncle. I hear the noise of the silk.
[MILLIE _comes slowly into the room in her wedding clothes_. _She holds
herself very upright and looks from one to another quietly and coldly_.
MAY. Andrew’s gived your nosegay to Annet, Millie.
MILLIE. ’Twould have been a pity to have wasted the fresh blossoms.
MAY. But they were gathered for you, Mill.
MILLIE. Annet seems to like them better than I did.
DANIEL. Well, my wench—you be tricked out as though you was off to the
horse show. Mother, there bain’t no one as can beat our wench in looks
anywhere this side of the country.
ELIZABETH. She’s right enough in the clothing of her, but ’twould be
better if her looks did match the garments more. Come, Millie, can’t you
appear pleasanter like on your wedding day?
MILLIE. I’m very thirsty, Mother. Could I have a drink of water before
we set out?
ELIZABETH. And what next, I should like to know?
MILLIE. ’Tis only a drink of water that I’m asking for.
DANIEL. Well, that’s reasonable, Mother, bain’t it?
ELIZABETH. Run along and get some for your cousin, May. [MAY _runs out
of the room_.
DANIEL. Come you here, Andrew, did you ever see a wench to beat ourn in
looks, I say?
ANDREW. [_Who has remained near_ ANNET _without moving_.] ’Tis very
fine that Millie’s looking.
DANIEL. Fine, I should think ’twas. You was a fine looking wench,
Mother, the day I took you to church, but ’tis my belief that Millie have
beat you in the appearance of her same as the roan heifer did beat th’
old cow when the both was took along to market. Ah, and did fetch very
near the double of what I gived for the dam.
[MAY _returns carrying a glass bowl full of water_.
MAY. Here’s a drink of cold water, Millie. I took it from the spring.
[MILLIE _takes the bowl_. _At the same moment a loud knocking is heard
at the outside door_.
ELIZABETH. Who’s that, I should like to know?
[MILLIE _sets down the bowl on the table_. _She listens with a sudden
intent_, _anxiety on her face as the knock is repeated_.
DANIEL. I’ll learn anyone to come meddling with me on a day when ’tis
marrying going on.
[_The knocking is again heard_.
MILLIE. [_To_ MAY, _who would have opened the door_.] No, no. ’Tis I
who will open the door.
[_She raises the latch and flings the door wide open_. GILES _disguised
as a poor and bent old man_, _comes painfully into the room_.
ELIZABETH. We don’t want no beggars nor roadsters here to-day, if you
please.
DANIEL. Ah, and that us don’t. Us be a wedding party here, and ’tis for
you to get moving on, old man.
MILLIE. He is poor and old. And he has wandered far, in the heat of the
morning. Look at his sad clothing.
ANDREW. [_To_ ANNET.] I never heard her put so much gentleness to her
words afore.
MILLIE. And ’tis my wedding day. He shall not go uncomforted from here.
ELIZABETH. I never knowed you so careful of a poor wretch afore, Millie.
’Tis quite a new set out, this.
MILLIE. I am in mind of another, who may be wandering, and hungered, and
in poor clothing this day.
MAY. Give him something quick, Aunt, and let him get off so that we can
start for the wedding.
MILLIE. [_Coming close to_ GILES.] What is it I can do for you, master?
GILES. ’Tis only a drink of water that I ask, mistress.
MILLIE. [_Taking up the glass bowl_.] Only a drink of water, master?
Then take, and be comforted.
[_She holds the bowl before him for him to drink_. _As he takes it_, _he
drops a ring into the water_. _He then drinks and hands the bowl back
to_ MILLIE. _For a moment she gazes speechless at the bottom of the
bowl_. _Then she lifts the ring from it and would drop the bowl but for_
MAY, _who takes it from her_.
MILLIE. Master, from whom did you get this?
GILES. Look well at the stones of it, mistress, for they are clouded and
dim.
MILLIE. And not more clouded than the heart which is in me, master. O
do you bring me news?
GILES. Is it not all too late for news, mistress?
MILLIE. Not if it be the news for which my heart craves, master.
GILES. And what would that be, mistress?
[MILLIE _goes to_ GILES, _and with both hands slowly pushes back his big
hat and gazes at him_.
MILLIE. O Giles, my true love. You are come just in time. Another hour
and I should have been wed.
GILES. And so you knew me, Mill?
MILLIE. O Giles, no change of any sort could hide you from the eyes of
my love.
GILES. Your love, Millie. And is that still mine?
MILLIE. It always has been yours, Giles. O I will go with you so gladly
in poor clothing and in hunger all over the face of the earth.
[_She goes to him and clasps his arm_; _and_, _standing by his side_,
_faces all those in the room_.
ELIZABETH. [_Angrily_.] Please to come to your right senses, Millie.
DANIEL. Come, Andrew, set your foot down as I’ve set mine.
ANDREW. Nay, master. There’s naught left for me to say. The heart does
shew us better nor all words which way we have to travel.
MAY. And are you going to marry a beggar man instead of Andrew, who
looks so brave and fine in his wedding clothes, Millie?
MILLIE. I am going to marry him I have always loved, May—and—O Andrew, I
never bore you malice, though I did say cruel and hard words to you
sometimes.—But you’ll not remember me always—you will find gladness too,
some day.
ANDREW. I count as I shall, Millie.
DANIEL. Come, come, I’ll have none of this—my daughter wed to a beggar
off the highway! Mother, ’tis time you had a word here.
ELIZABETH. No, Father, I’ll leave you to manage this affair. ’Tis you
who have spoiled Mill and brought her up so wayward and unruly, and ’tis
to you I look for to get us out of this unpleasant position.
MAY. Dear Millie—don’t wed my brother Giles. Why, look at his ragged
smock and his bare feet.
MILLIE. I shall be proud to go bare too, so long as I am by his side,
May.
[GILES _goes to the door and blows his whistle three times and loudly_.
MAY. What’s that for, Giles?
GILES. You shall soon see, little May.
DANIEL. I’ll be hanged if I’ll stand any more of this caddling nonsense.
Here, Mill—the trap’s come to the door. Into it with you, I say.
GILES. I beg you to wait a moment, master.
DANIEL. Wait!—’Tis a sight too long as we have waited this day. If all
had been as I’d planned, we should have been to church by now. But
womenfolk, there be no depending on they. No, and that there bain’t.
[GEORGE, JOHN _and the_ OLD MAN _come up_. GEORGE _and_ JOHN _carry
their packets and the_ OLD MAN _has_ GILES’ _coat and hat over his arm_.
ELIZABETH. And who are these persons, Giles?
[GEORGE _and_ JOHN _set down their burdens on the floor and begin to mop
their faces_. _The_ OLD MAN _stretches out his fine coat and hat and
buckled shoes to_ GILES.
OLD MAN. Here they be, my lord, and I warrant as you’ll feel more homely
like in they, nor what you’ve got upon you now. [GILES _takes the things
from him_.
GILES. Thank you, old master. [_He turns to_ MILLIE.] Let me go into
the other room, Millie. I will not keep you waiting longer than a few
moments.
[_He goes out_.
ELIZABETH. [_To_ GEORGE.] And who may you be, I should like to know?
You appear to be making very free with my parlour.
GEORGE. We be the servants what wait upon Master Giles, old Missis.
ELIZABETH. Old Missis, indeed. Father, you shall speak to these
persons.
DANIEL. Well, my men. I scarce do know whether I be a-standing on my
head or upon my heels, and that’s the truth ’tis.
GEORGE. Ah, and that I can well understand, master, for I’m a married
man myself, and my woman has a tongue to her head very similar to that of
th’ old missis yonder—so I know what ’tis.
ELIZABETH. Put them both out of the door, Father, do you hear me? ’Tis
to the cider as they’ve been getting. That’s clear.
MILLIE. My good friends, what is it that you carry in those bundles
there?
GEORGE. ’Tis gold in mine.
JOHN. And silver here.
ELIZABETH. Depend upon it ’tis two wicked thieves we have got among us,
flying from justice.
MILLIE. No, no—did not you hear them say, their master is Giles.
GEORGE. And a better master never trod the earth.
JOHN. And a finer or a richer gentleman I never want to see.
ELIZABETH. Do you hear that, Father? O you shocking liars—’tis stolen
goods that you’ve been and brought to our innocent house this day. But,
Father, do you up and fetch in the constable, do you hear?
MAY. O I’ll run. I shall love to see them going off to gaol.
MILLIE. Be quiet, May. Can’t you all see how ’tis. Giles has done the
cruel hard task set him by Father—and is back again with the bushel of
silver and that of gold to claim my hand. [GILES _enters_.] But
Giles—I’d have given it to you had you come to me poor and forlorn and
ragged, for my love has never wandered from you in all this long time.
ANDREW. No, Giles—and that it has not. Millie has never given me one
kind word nor one gentle look all the years that I’ve been courting of
her, and that’s the truth. And you can call witness to it if you care.
GILES. Uncle, Aunt, I’ve done the task you set me years ago—and now I
claim my reward. I went from this house a poor wretch, with nothing but
the hopeless love in my heart to feed and sustain me. I have returned
with all that the world can give me of riches and prosperity. Will you
now let me be the husband of your daughter?
MILLIE. O say ye, Uncle, for look how fine and grand he is in his
coat—and the bags are stuffed full to the brim and ’tis with gold and
silver.
ELIZABETH. Well—’tis a respectabler end than I thought as you’d come to,
Giles. And different nor what you deserved.
DANIEL. Come, come, Mother.—The fewer words to this, the better. Giles,
my boy—get you into the trap and take her along to the church and drive
smart.
ANDREW. Annet—will you come there with me too?
ANNET. O Andrew—what are you saying?
DANIEL. Come, come. Where’s the wind blowing from now? Here, Mother,
do you listen to this.
ELIZABETH. I shall be deaf before I’ve done, but it appears to me that
Annet’s not lost any time in making the most of her chances.
DANIEL. Ah, and she be none the worse for that. ’Tis what we all likes
to do. Where’d I be in the market if I did let my chances blow by me?
Hear that, Andrew?
ANDREW. I’m a rare lucky man this day, farmer.
DANIEL. Ah, and ’tis a rare good little wench, Annet—though she bain’t
so showy as our’n. A rare good little maid. And now ’tis time we was
all off to church, seeing as this is to be a case of double harness like.
MAY. O Annet, you can’t be wed in that plain gown.
ANNET. May, I’m so happy that I feel as though I were clothed all over
with jewels.
ANDREW. Give me your hand, Annet.
MAY. [_Mockingly_.] Millie—don’t you want to give a drink of water to
yon poor old man?
MILLIE. That I will, May? Here—fetch me something that’s better than
water for him.
ELIZABETH. I’ll have no cider drinking out of meal times here.
MILLIE. Then ’twill I have to be when we come back from church.
OLD MAN. Bless you, my pretty lady, but I be used to waiting. I’ll just
sit me down outside in the sun till you be man and wife.
ELIZABETH. And that’ll not be till this day next year if this sort of
thing goes on any longer.
DANIEL. That’s right, Mother. You take and lead the way. ’Tis the
womenfolk as do keep we back from everything. But I knows how to settle
with they—[_roaring_]—come Mill, come Giles, Andrew, Annet, May. Come
Mother, out of th’ house with all of you and to church, I say.
[_He gets behind them all and drives them before him and out of the
room_. _When they have gone_, _the_ OLD MAN _sinks on a bench in the
door-way_.
OLD MAN. I’m done with all the foolishness of life and I can sit me down
and sleep till it be time to eat.
[_Curtain_.]
BUSHES AND BRIARS
CHARACTERS
THOMAS SPRING, _a farmer_, _aged_ 35.
EMILY, _his wife_, _the same age_.
CLARA, _his sister_, _aged_ 21.
JESSIE AND ROBIN, _the children of Thomas and Emily_, _aged_ 10 _and_ 8.
JOAN, _maid to Clara_.
MILES HOOPER, _a rich draper_.
LUKE JENNER, _a farmer_.
LORD LOVEL.
GEORGE, _aged_ 28.
ACT I.—Scene 1.
_A wood_. _It is a morning in June_.
GEORGE, _carrying an empty basket_, _comes slowly through the wood_. _On
reaching a fallen tree he sits down on it_, _placing his basket on the
ground_. _With his stick he absently moves the grass and leaves that lie
before him_, _and is so deeply lost in his own thoughts that he does not
hear the approach of_ MILES _and_ LUKE _until they are by his side_.
MILES. Here’s the very man to tell us all we want to know.
LUKE. Why, if ’tisn’t George from Ox Lease.
[GEORGE _half rises_.
MILES. No, sit you down again, my lad, and we’ll rest awhile by the side
of you.
LUKE. That’s it, Miles. Nothing couldn’t have fallen out better for us,
I’m thinking.
MILES. You’re about right, Luke. Now, George, my man, we should very
much appreciate a few words with you.
GEORGE. [_Taking up his basket_.] Morning baint the time for words,
masters. I count as words will keep till the set of sun. ’Tis otherwise
with work.
MILES. Work, why, George, ’tis clear you are come out but to gather
flowers this morning.
LUKE. ’Tis the very first time as ever I caught George an idling away of
his time like this.
GEORGE. ’Tis over to Brook as I be going, masters, to fetch back a
couple of young chicken. Ourn be mostly old fowls, or pullets what do
lay.
LUKE. I never heard tell of young chicken being ate up at Ox Lease afore
July was in.
GEORGE. Nor me neither, master. Never heared nor seed such a thing.
But mistress, her says, you can’t sit a maid from town at table unless
there be poultry afore of she. They be rare nesh in their feeding, maids
from town, so mistress do say.
MILES. That just brings us to our little matter, George. When is it
that you expect the young lady?
GEORGE. The boxes of they be stacked mountains high in the bedroom since
yesterday. And I count as the maids will presently come on their own
feet from where the morning coach do set them down.
LUKE. Nay, but there’s only one maid what’s expected.
GEORGE. Miss Clara, what’s master’s sister; and the serving wench of
she.
MILES. Well, George, ’twas a great day for your master when old Madam
Lovel took little Miss Clara to be bred up as one of the quality.
GEORGE. A water plant do grow best by the stream, and a blossom, from
the meadows, midst the grass. Let each sort bide in the place where
’twas seeded.
MILES. No, no, George, you don’t know what you’re talking about. A
little country wench may bloom into something very modish and elegant,
once taken from her humble home and set amongst carpets of velvet and
curtains of satin. You’ll see.
GEORGE. ’Twould be a poor thing for any one to be so worked upon by
curtains, nor yet carpets, master.
MILES. Take my word for it, George, Ox Lease will have to smarten up a
bit for this young lady. I know the circles she has been moving in, and
’tis to the best of everything that she has been used.
GEORGE. [_Rising_.] That’s what mistress do say. And that’s why I be
sent along down to Brook with haymaking going on and all. Spring chicken
with sparrow grass be the right feeding for such as they. So mistress do
count.
MILES. Stop a moment, George. You have perhaps heard the letters from
Miss Clara discussed in the family from time to time.
GEORGE. Miss Clara did never send but two letters home in all the while
she was gone. The first of them did tell as how th’ old lady was dead
and had left all of her fortune to Miss Clara. And the second was to say
as how her was coming back to the farm this morning.
LUKE. And hark you here, George, was naught mentioned about Miss Clara’s
fine suitors in neither of them letters?
GEORGE. That I cannot say, Master Jenner.
MILES. Nothing of their swarming thick around her up in London, George?
GEORGE. They may be swarming by the thousand for aught as I do know.
They smells gold as honey bees do smell the blossom. Us’ll have a good
few of them a-buzzing round the farm afore we’re many hours older, so I
counts.
MILES. Well, George, that’ll liven up the place a bit, I don’t doubt.
LUKE. ’Tis a bit of quiet and no livening as Ox Lease do want. Isn’t
that so, George, my lad?
GEORGE. [_Preparing to set off_.] I’ll say good morning to you,
masters. I count I’ve been and wasted a smartish time already on the
road. We be a bit hard pressed up at the farm this day.
MILES. But George, my man, we have a good many questions to ask of you
before you set off.
GEORGE. Them questions will have to bide till another time, I reckon.
I’m got late already, master.
[_He hurries off_.
MILES. Arriving by the morning coach! I shall certainly make my call to
the farm before sunset. What do you say, Jenner?
LUKE. You’re a rich man, Miles, and I am poor. But we have always been
friends.
MILES. And our fathers before us, Luke.
LUKE. And the courting of the same maid shall not come between us.
MILES. [_Slowly_.] That’ll be all right, Luke.
LUKE. What I do say is, let’s start fair. Neck to neck, like.
MILES. As you please, my good Luke.
LUKE. Then, do you tell me honest, shall I do in the clothes I’m
a-wearing of now, Miles?
MILES. [_Regarding him critically_.] That neckerchief is not quite the
thing, Luke.
LUKE. ’Tis my Sunday best.
MILES. Step over to the High Street with me, my lad. I’ve got something
in the shop that will be the very thing. You shall have it half price
for ’tis only a bit damaged in one of the corners.
LUKE. I’m sure I’m very much obliged to you, Miles.
MILES. That’s all right, Luke.
LUKE. George would look better to my thinking if there was a new coat to
the back of him.
MILES. Ah, poor beggar, he would, and no mistake.
LUKE. I warrant as Emily do keep it afore him as how he was took in from
off the road by th’ old farmer in his day.
MILES. I flatter myself that I have a certain way with the ladies. They
come to me confidential like and I tell them what’s what, and how that,
this or t’other is worn about town. But with Missis Spring ’tis
different. That’s a woman I could never get the right side of no how.
LUKE. Ah, poor Thomas! There’s a man who goes down trod and hen
scratched if you like.
MILES. ’Tis altogether a very poor place up at Ox Lease, for young Miss.
LUKE. [_Pulling out his watch_.] Time’s slipping on. What if we were
to stroll on to the shop and see about my neckerchief, Miles?
MILES. I’m sure I’m quite agreeable, Luke. ’Twill help to pass away the
morning.
[_He puts his arm in_ LUKE’S _and they go briskly off in the direction of
the village_.
ACT I.—Scene 2.
CLARA, _followed by_ JOAN, _comes through the wood_. CLARA _is dressed
in a long_, _rich cloak and wears a bonnet that is brightly trimmed with
feathers and ribbons_. JOAN _wears a cotton bonnet and small shawl_.
_She carries her mistress’s silken bag over her arm_.
CLARA. [_Pointing to the fallen tree_.] There is the very resting place
for us. We will sit down under the trees for a while. [_She seats
herself_.
JOAN. [_Dusting the tree with her handkerchief before she sits on it_.]
Have we much further to go, mistress?
CLARA. Only a mile or two, so far as I can remember.
JOAN. ’Tis rough work for the feet, down in these parts, mistress.
CLARA. If London roads were paved with diamonds I’d sooner have my feet
treading this rugged way that leads to home.
JOAN. What sort of a place shall we find it when we gets there,
mistress.
CLARA. I was but seven when I left them all, Joan. And that is fourteen
years ago to-day.
JOAN. So many years may bring about some powerful big changes, mistress.
CLARA. But I dream that I shall find all just as it was when I went
away. Only that Gran’ma won’t be there.
[_There is a short silence during which_ CLARA _seems lost in thought_.
JOAN _flicks the dust off her shoes with a branch of leaves_.
JOAN. ’Tis the coaches I do miss down in these parts.
CLARA. I would not have driven one step of the way this morning, Joan.
In my fancy I have been walking up from the village and through the wood
and over the meadows since many a day. I have not forgotten one turn of
the path.
JOAN. The road has not changed then, mistress?
CLARA. No. But it does not seem quite so broad or so fine as I
remembered it to be. That is all.
JOAN. And very likely the house won’t seem so fine neither, mistress,
after the grand rooms which you have been used to.
JOAN. What company shall we see there, mistress?
CLARA. Well, there’s Thomas, he is my brother, and Emily his wife. Then
the two children.
CLARA. [_After a short silence_, _and as though to herself_.] And there
was George.
JOAN. Yes, mistress
CLARA. Georgie seemed so big and tall to me in those days. I wonder how
old he really was, when I was seven.
JOAN. Would that be a younger brother of yours, like, mistress
CLARA. No, George minded the horses and looked after the cows and
poultry. Sometimes he would drive me into market with him on a Saturday.
And in the evenings I would follow him down to the pool to see the cattle
watered.
JOAN. I’m mortal afeared of cows, mistress. I could never abide the
sight nor the sound of those animals.
CLARA. You’ll soon get over that, Joan.
JOAN. And I don’t care for poultry neither, very much. I goes full of
fear when I hears one of they old turkey cocks stamping about.
CLARA. [_Pulling up the sleeve of her left arm_.] There, do you see
this little scar? I was helping George to feed the ducks and geese when
the fierce gander ran after me and knocked me down and took a piece right
out of my arm.
JOAN. [_Looking intently on the scar_.] I have often seen that there
mark, mistress. And do you think as that old gander will be living along
of the poultry still?
CLARA. I wish he might be, Joan.
JOAN. What with the cows and the horses and the ganders, we shall go
with our lives in our hands, as you might say.
CLARA. [_As though to herself_.] When the days got colder, we would sit
under the straw rick, George and I. And he would sing to me. Some of
his songs, I could say off by heart this day.
JOAN. [_Looking nervously upward_.] O do look at that nasty little
thing dropping down upon us from a piece of thread silk. Who ever put
such a thing up in the tree I’d like to know.
CLARA. [_Brushing it gently aside_.] That won’t hurt you—a tiny
caterpillar.
JOAN. [_After a moment_.] What more could the farm hand do, mistress?
CLARA. He would clasp on his bells and dance in the Morris on certain
days, Joan.
JOAN. ’Tis to be hoped as there’ll be some dancing or something to liven
us all up a bit down here.
CLARA. Why, Joan, I believe you’re tired already of the country.
JOAN. ’Tis so powerful quiet and heavy like, mistress.
CLARA. ’Tis full of sounds. Listen to the doves in the trees and the
lambs calling from the meadow.
JOAN. I’d sooner have the wheels of the coaches and the cries upon the
street, and the door bell a ringing every moment and fine gentlemen and
ladies being shewn up into the parlour.
CLARA. [_Stretching out her arms_.] O how glad I am to be free of all
that. And most of all, how glad to be ridded of one person.
JOAN. His lordship will perhaps follow us down here, mistress.
CLARA. No, I have forbidden it. I must have a month of quiet, and he is
to wait that time for his answer.
JOAN. O mistress, you’ll never disappoint so fine a gentleman.
CLARA. You forget that Lord Lovel and I have played together as
children. It is as a brother that I look upon him.
JOAN. His lordship don’t look upon you as a sister, mistress.
CLARA. [_Rising_.] That is a pity, Joan. But see, it is getting late
and we must be moving onwards.
[JOAN _rises and smoothes and shakes out her skirt_.
CLARA. Here, loosen my cloak, Joan, and untie the ribbons of my bonnet.
JOAN. O mistress, keep the pretty clothes upon you till you have got to
the house.
CLARA. No, no—such town garments are not suited to the woods and
meadows. I want to feel the country breeze upon my head, and my limbs
must be free from the weight of the cloak. I had these things upon me
during the coach journey. They are filled with road dust and I dislike
them now.
JOAN. [_Unfastening the cloak and untying the bonnet_.] They are fresh
and bright for I brushed and shook them myself this morning.
CLARA. [_Retying a blue ribbon which she wears in her hair_.] I have
taken a dislike to them. See here, Joan, since you admire them, they
shall be yours.
JOAN. Mine? The French bonnet and the satin cloak?
CLARA. To comfort you for the pains of the country, Joan.
JOAN. O mistress, let us stop a moment longer in this quiet place so
that I may slip them on and see how they become me.
CLARA. As you will. Listen, that is the cuckoo singing.
JOAN. [_Throwing off her cotton bonnet and shawl and dressing herself
hastily in the bonnet and cloak_.] O what must it feel like to be a
grand lady and wear such things from dawn to bed time.
CLARA. I am very glad to be without them for a while. How good the air
feels on my head.
JOAN. There, mistress, how do I look?
CLARA. Very nicely, Joan. So nicely that if you like, you may keep them
upon you for the remainder of the way.
JOAN. O mistress, may I really do so?
CLARA. Yes. And Joan, do you go onwards to the farm by the quickest
path which is through this wood and across the high road. Anyone will
shew you where the place is. I have a mind to wander about in some of
the meadows which I remember. But I will join you all in good time.
JOAN. Very well, mistress. If I set off in a few moments it will do, I
suppose? I should just like to take a peep at myself as I am now, in the
little glass which you carry in your silk bag.
CLARA. [_Going off_.] Don’t spend too much time looking at what will be
shewn you, Joan.
JOAN. Never fear, mistress. I’ll be there afore you, if I have to run
all the way. [CLARA _wanders off_.
[JOAN _sits down again on the trunk of the fallen tree_. _She opens the
silken bag_, _draws out a small hand glass and looks long and steadily at
her own reflection_. _Then she glances furtively around and_, _seeing
that she is quite alone_, _she takes a small powder box from the bag and
hastily opening it_, _she gives her face several hurried touches with the
powder puff_.
JOAN. [_Surveying the effect in the glass_.] Just to take off the brown
of my freckles. Now if any one was to come upon me sitting here they
wouldn’t know as I was other than a real, high lady. All covered with
this nice cloak as I be, the French bonnet on my head, and powder to my
face, who’s to tell the difference? But O—these must be hid first.
[_She perceives her cotton bonnet and little shawl on the ground_. _She
hastily rolls them up in a small bundle and stuffs them into the silken
bag_. _Then she takes up the glass and surveys herself again_.
JOAN. How should I act now if some grand gentleman was to come up and
commence talking to me? Perhaps he might even take me for a lady of
title in these fine clothes, and ’twould be a pity to have to undeceive
him.
[_She arranges her hair a little under the bonnet and then lowers the
lace veil over her face_.
[MILES _and_ LUKE _come slowly up behind her_. MILES _nudges_ LUKE _with
his elbow_, _signing to him to remain where he is whilst he steps forward
in front of_ JOAN.
MILES. Pardon me, madam, but you appear to have mistook the way. Allow
me to set you on the right path for Ox Lease.
JOAN. [_Letting the mirror fall on her lap and speaking very low_.] How
do you know I am going to Ox Lease, sir?
MILES. You see, madam, I happen to know that a stylish young miss from
town is expected there to-day.
LUKE. [_Coming forward and speaking in a loud whisper_.] Now Miles. I
count as you made one of the biggest blunders of the time. Our young
lady be journeying along of her servant wench. This one baint she.
MILES. If we have made a small error, madam, allow me to beg your
pardon.
JOAN. Don’t mention it, sir. Everyone is mistaken sometimes.
LUKE. Well, I’m powerful sorry if we have given any offence, mam.
JOAN. [_Looking up at_ LUKE _with sudden boldness and speaking in a
slow_, _affected voice_.] There’s nothing to make so much trouble about,
sir.
MILES. Can we be of any assistance to you, madam? The wood may appear
rather dense at this point.
JOAN. That it does. Dense and dark—and the pathway! My goodness, but
my feet have never travelled over such rough ground before.
Muss. That I am sure of, madam. I have no doubt that the delicate
texture of your shoes has been sadly treated by our stones and ruts.
JOAN. [_Insensibly pulling her skirts over her thick walking shoes_.]
Well, it’s vastly different to London streets, where I generally take
exercise—at least when I’m not a-riding in the coach.
MILES. The country is but a sad place at the best, Miss Clara Spring.
JOAN. [_Looking round furtively and speaking in a whisper_.] O, how did
you guess my—my name?
LUKE. Come, ’twasn’t a hard matter, that.
MILES. Missey can command my services.
JOAN. [_Rallying_, _and standing up_.] Then gentlemen, do you walk a
bit of the road with me and we could enjoy some conversation as we go
along.
LUKE. [_Offering his arm_.] You take my arm, Miss Clara—do—.
MILES. [_Also offering his arm_.] I shall also give myself the pleasure
of supporting Miss.
JOAN. [_Taking an arm of each_.] O thank you, kindly gentlemen. Now we
shall journey very comfortably, I am sure.
[_They all set out walking in the direction of the farm_.
ACT II.—Scene 1.
_The kitchen of Ox Lease Farm_. _There are three doors_. _One opens to
the staircase_, _one to the garden and a third into the back kitchen_.
_At a table in the middle of the room_ EMILY _stands ironing some net
window curtains_. JESSIE _and_ ROBIN _lean against the table watching
her_. _By the open doorway_, _looking out on the garden_, _stands_
THOMAS, _a mug of cider in one hand and a large slice of bread in the
other_. _As he talks_, _he takes alternate drinks and bites_.
EMILY. [_Speaking in a shrill_, _angry voice_.] Now Thomas, suppose you
was to take that there bread a step further away and eat it in the
garden, if eat it you must, instead of crumbling it all over my clean
floor.
THOMAS. Don’t you be so testy, Emily. The dogs’ll lick the crumbs up as
clean as you like presently.
EMILY. Dogs? I’d like to see the dog as’ll shew its nose in here to-day
when I’ve got it all cleaned up against the coming of fine young madam.
THOMAS. [_Finishing his bread and looking wistfully at his empty hand_.]
The little maid’ll take a brush and sweep up her daddy’s crumbs, now,
won’t her?
EMILY. I’ll give it to any one who goes meddling in my brush cupboard
now that I’ve just put all in order against the prying and nozzling of
the good-for-nothing baggage what’s coming along with your sister.
ROBIN. What’s baggage, Mother?
EMILY. [_Sharply_.] Never you mind. Get and take your elbow off my
ironing sheet.
JESSIE. [_Looking at her father_.] I count as you’d like a piece more
bread, Dad?
THOMAS. Well, I don’t say but ’twouldn’t come amiss. ’Tis hungry work
in th’ hayfield. And us be to go without our dinners this day, isn’t
that so, Emily?
EMILY. [_Slamming down her iron on the stand_.] If I’ve told you once,
I’ve told you twenty times, ’twas but the one pair of hands as I was
gived at birth. Now, what have you got to say against that, Thomas?
THOMAS. [_Sheepishly_.] I’m sure I don’t know.
EMILY. And if so be as I’m to clean and wash and cook, and run, and
wait, and scour, and mend, for them lazy London minxes, other folk must
go without hot cooking at mid-day.
THOMAS. [_Faintly_.] ’Twasn’t nothing cooked, like. ’Twas a bit of
bread as I did ask for.
JESSIE. [_Getting up_.] I’ll get it for you, Dad. I know where the
loaf bides and the knife too. I’ll cut you, O such a large piece.
EMILY. [_Seizing her roughly by the hand_.] You’ll do nothing of the
sort. You’ll take this here cold iron into Maggie and you’ll bring back
one that is hot. How am I to get these curtains finished and hung and
all, by the time the dressed up parrots come sailing in, I’d like to
know.
[JESSIE _runs away with the iron_.
THOMAS. [_Setting down his mug and coming to the table_.] I’d leave the
windows bare if it was me, Emily. The creeping rose do form the
suitablest shade for they, to my thinking.
EMILY. That shews how much you know about it, Thomas. No, take your
hands from off my table. Do you think as I wants dirty thumbs shewing
all over the clean net what I’ve washed and dried and ironed, and been
a-messing about with since ’twas light?
THOMAS. Now that’s what I be trying for to say. There’s no need for you
to go and work yourself into the fidgets, Emily, because of little Clara
coming back. Home’s home. And ’twon’t be neither the curtains nor the
hot dinner as Clara will be thinking of when her steps into th’ old place
once more.
JESSIE. [_Running back with the hot iron which she sets down on the
table_.] What will Aunt Clara be thinking of then, Dad?
THOMAS. [_Shy and abashed under a withering glance from_ EMILY _who has
taken up the iron and is slamming it down on the net_.] Her’ll remember,
very like, how ’twas when her left—some fourteen year ago. And her’ll
have her eyes on Gran’ma’s chair, what’s empty.
ROBIN. I should be thinking of the hot fowl and sparrow grass what’s for
dinner.
THOMAS. And her’ll look up to th’ old clock, and different things what’s
still in their places. The grand parts where she have been bred up will
be forgot. ’Twill be only home as her’ll think on.
EMILY. I haven’t patience to listen to such stuff.
THOMAS. [_After a pause_.] I count that ’tisn’t likely as a young woman
what’s been left riches as Clara have, would choose to make her home
along of such as we for always, like.
EMILY. We have perches and plenty of them for barn door poultry, but
when it comes to roosting spangled plumes and fancy fowls, no thank you,
Thomas, I’m not going to do it.
ROBIN. Do let us get and roost some fancy fowls, Mother.
JESSIE. What are spangled plumes, Mother?
EMILY. [_Viciously_.] You’ll see plenty of them presently.
ROBIN. Will Aunt Clara bring the fowls along of she?
[_A slight pause during which_ EMILY _irons vigorously_.
EMILY. [_As she irons_.] Some folk have all the honey. It do trickle
from the mouths of them and down to the ground.
ROBIN. Has Aunt Clara got her mouth very sticky, then?
EMILY. And there be others what are born to naught but crusts and the
vinegar.
JESSIE. Like you, Mother—Least, that’s what Maggie said this morning.
EMILY. What’s that?
JESSIE. That ’twas in the vinegar jar as your tongue had growed, Mother.
EMILY. I’ll learn that wench to keep her thoughts to herself if she
can’t fetch them out respectful like. [_Shouting_.] Mag, come you here
this minute—what are you after now, I’d like to know, you ugly, idle
piece of mischief?
[MAGGIE, _wiping a plate comes from the back kitchen_.
MAGGIE. Was you calling, mistress?
EMILY. What’s this you’ve got saying to Miss Jessie, I should like to
know.
JESSIE. [_Running to_ MAGGIE _and laying her hand on her arm_.] Dear
Maggie, ’tis only what you did tell about poor mother’s tongue being in
the vinegar jar.
MAGGIE. O Miss Jessie.
EMILY. Hark you here, my girl—if ’twasn’t hay time you should bundle up
your rags and off with you this minute. But as ’tis awkward being short
of a pair of hands just now, you’ll bide a week or two and then you’ll
get outside of my door with no more character to you nor what I took you
with.
THOMAS. Come, come Emily. The girl’s a good one for to work, and that
she is.
EMILY. Be quiet, Thomas. This is my business, and you’ll please to keep
your words till they’re wanted.
MAGGIE. O mistress, I didn’t mean no harm, I didn’t.
EMILY. I don’t want no words nor no tears neither.
MAGGIE. [_Beginning to cry loudly_.] I be the only girl as have stopped
with you more nor a month, I be. T’others wouldn’t bide a day, some of
them.
EMILY. Be quiet. Back to your work with you. And when the hay is all
carried, off with you, ungrateful minx, to where you came from.
JESSIE. O let us keep her always, Mother, she’s kind.
ROBIN. Don’t you cry, Mag. I’ll marry you when I’m a big man like
Daddy.
THOMAS. Harken to them, Emily! She’s been a good maid to the children.
I’d not part with any one so hasty, if ’twas me.
EMILY. [_Very angrily_.] When I want your opinion, Thomas, I’ll ask for
it. Suppose you was to go out and see after something which you do
understand.
THOMAS. O I’ll go down to the field fast enough, I can tell you. ’Twas
only being hungered as drove me into the hornets’ nest, as you might say.
EMILY. [_Ironing fiercely_.] What’s that?
THOMAS. Nothing. I did only say as I was a-going back to the field when
George do come home.
EMILY. There again. Did you ever know the man to be so slow before. I
warrant as he have gone drinking or mischiefing down at the Spotted Cow
instead of coming straight home with they chicken.
THOMAS. Nay, nay. George is not the lad to do a thing like that. A
quieter more well bred up lad nor George never trod in shoes.
EMILY [_Glancing at_ MAGGIE.] What are you tossing your head like that
for, Maggie? Please to recollect as you’re a lazy, good-for-nothing
little slut of a maid servant, and not a circus pony all decked out for
the show.
JESSIE. Maggie’s fond of Georgie. And Georgie’s kind to Mag.
MAGGIE. [_Fearfully_.] O don’t, Miss Jessie, for goodness sake.
EMILY. [_Viciously_.] I’ll soon put an end to anything in that quarter.
THOMAS. Now, Emily—take it quiet. Why, we shall have Clara upon us
before us knows where we are.
EMILY. [_Folding the curtains_.] I’ll settle her too, if she comes
before I’m ready for her.
ROBIN. [_Pointing through the open_.] There’s George, coming with the
basket.
[GEORGE _comes into the room_. _He carefully rubs his feet on the mat as
he enters_. _Then he advances to the table_. MAGGIE _dries her eyes
with the back of her hand_. JESSIE _is standing with her arm in_
MAGGIE’S.
EMILY. Well, and where have you been all this while, I’d like to know?
GEORGE. To Brook Farm, mam, and home.
EMILY. You’ve been up to some mischief on the way, I warrant.
THOMAS. Come, Emily.
[GEORGE _looks calmly into_ EMILY’S _face_. _Then his gaze travels
leisurely round the room_.
GEORGE. I was kept waiting while they did pluck and dress the chicken.
EMILY. [_Lifting the cloth covering the basket_, _and looking within
it_.] I’d best have gone myself. Of all the thick-headed men I ever did
see, you’re the thickest. Upon my word you are.
GEORGE. What’s wrong now, mistress?
EMILY. ’Taint chicken at all what you’ve been and fetched me.
GEORGE. I’ll be blowed if I do know what ’tis then.
EMILY. If I’d been given a four arms and legs at birth same as th’
horses, I’d have left a pair of them at home and gone and done the job
myself, I would. And then you should see what I’d have brought back.
GEORGE. You can’t better what I’ve got here. From the weight it might
be two fat capons. So it might.
EMILY. [_Seizing the basket roughly_.] Here, Mag, off into the pantry
with them. A couple of skinny frogs from out the road ditch would have
done as well. And you, Jess, upstairs with these clean curtains and lay
them careful on the bed. I’ll put them to the windows later.
THOMAS. George, my boy, did you meet with any one on the way, like?
EMILY. You’d best ask no questions if you don’t want to be served with
lies, Thomas.
GEORGE. [_Throwing a glance of disdain at_ EMILY.] Miles Hooper and
Farmer Jenner was taking the air ’long of one another in the wood,
master.
THOMAS. Miles Hooper and Luke a-taking of the air, and of a weekday
morning!
GEORGE. That they was, master. And they did stop I—
EMILY. Ah, now you’ve got it, Thomas. Now we shall know why George was
upon the road the best part of the day and me kept waiting for the
chicken.
GEORGE. [_Steadily_.] Sunday clothes to the back of both of them. And,
when was Miss Clara expected up at home.
THOMAS. Ah, ’tis a fair commotion all over these parts already, I
warrant. There wasn’t nothing else spoke of in market last time, but how
as sister Clara with all her money was to come home.
JESSIE. [_Coming back_.] I’ve laid the curtains on the bed, shall I
gather some flowers and set them on the table, mother?
EMILY. I’d like to see you! Flowers in the bedroom? I never heard tell
of such senseless goings on. What next, I’d like to know?
GEORGE. Miss Clara always did fill a mug of clover blooms and set it
aside of her bed when her was a little thing—so high.
JESSIE. Do you remember our fine aunt, then, Georgie?
GEORGE. I remembers Miss Clara right enough.
EMILY. Don’t you flatter yourself, George, as such a coxsy piece of town
goods will trouble herself to remember you.
THOMAS. The little maid had a good enough heart to her afore she was
took away from us.
JESSIE. Do you think our aunt Clara has growed into a coxsy town lady,
George?
GEORGE. No, I do not, Miss Jessie.
EMILY. [_Beginning to stir about noisily as she sets the kitchen in
order_.] Get off with you to the field, Thomas, can’t you. I’ve had
enough to do as ’tis without a great hulking man standing about and
taking up all the room.
THOMAS. Come, George, us’ll clear out down to th’ hay field, and snatch
a bite as we do go.
GEORGE. That’s it, master.
EMILY. [_Calling angrily after them_.] There’s no dinner for no one
to-day, I tell you.
[THOMAS _and_ GEORGE _go out of the back kitchen door_. EMILY _begins
putting the irons away_, _folding up the ironing sheet and setting the
chairs back against the wall_.
[JESSIE _and_ ROBIN, _from their places at the table_, _watch her
intently_.
EMILY. [_As she moves about_.] ’Twouldn’t be half the upset if the
wench was coming by herself, but to have a hussy of a serving maid
sticking about in the rooms along of us, is more nor I can stand.
[_She begins violently to sweep up the hearth_.
[_Steps are heard outside_.
JESSIE. Hark, what’s that, mother?
EMILY. I’ll give it to any one who wants to come in here.
JESSIE. [_Running to the open door_.] They’re coming up the path. ’Tis
our fine auntie and two grand gentlemen either side of she.
ROBIN. [_Running also to the door_.] O I want to look on her too.
EMILY. [_Putting the broom in a corner_.] ’Tis no end to the vexation.
But she’ll have to wait on herself. I’ve no time to play the dancing
bear. And that I’ve not.
[JOAN, _between_ MILES HOOPER _and_ LUKE JENNER, _comes up to the open
door_.
MILES. [_To Jessie_.] See here, my little maid, what’ll you give Mister
Hooper for bringing this pretty lady safe up to the farm?
JESSIE. I know who ’tis you’ve brought. ’Tis my Aunt Clara.
LUKE. You’re a smart little wench, if ever there was one.
ROBIN. I know who ’tis, too, ’cause of the spangled plumes in the bonnet
of she. Mother said as there’d be some.
EMILY. [_Coming forward_.] Well, Clara, if ’twas by the morning coach
as you did come, you’re late. If ’twas by th’ evening one, you’re too
soon by a good few hours.
MILES. Having come by the morning coach, Miss Clara had the pleasant
fancy to stroll here through the woodlands, Missis Spring.
LUKE. Ah, and ’twas lost on the way as we did find her, like a strayed
sheep.
MILES. And ours has been the privilege to bring the fair wanderer safely
home.
EMILY. [_Scornfully looking_ JOAN _over from head to foot_.] Where’s
that serving wench of yours got to, Clara?
MILES. Our young missy had a wish for solitude. She sent her maid on by
another road.
EMILY. The good-for-nothing hussy. I warrant as she have found
something of mischief for her idle hands to do.
MILES. If I may venture to say so, our Miss Clara is somewhat fatigued
by her long stroll. London young ladies are very delicately framed,
Missis Spring.
EMILY. [_Pointing ungraciously_.] There’s chairs right in front of you.
[MILES _and_ LUKE _lead_ JOAN _forward_, _placing her in an armchair with
every attention_. JOAN _sinks into it_, _and_, _taking a little fan from
the silken bag on her arm_, _begins to fan herself violently_.
EMILY. [_Watching her with fierce contempt_.] Maybe as you’d like my
kitchen wench to come and do that for you, Clara, seeing as your fine
maid is gadding about the high roads instead of minding what it concerns
her to attend to.
JOAN. [_Faintly_.] O no, thank you. The day is rather warm—that’s all.
EMILY. Warm, I should think it was warm in under of that great white
curtain.
JESSIE. Aunt Clara, I’m Jessie.
JOAN. Are you, my dear?
ROBIN. And I’m Robin.
MILES. Now, I wager, if you are both good little children, this pretty
lady will give you each a kiss.
JOAN. [_Faintly_.] To be sure I will.
JESSIE. Then you’ll have to take off that white thing from your face.
’Tis like what mother do spread over the currant bushes to keep the birds
from the fruit.
[JOAN _slowly raises her veil_, _showing her face_.
JESSIE. Shall I give you a kiss, Aunt?
EMILY. I’d be careful if I was you, Jess. Fine ladies be brittle as
fine china.
JESSIE. O I’ll kiss her very lightly, Mother.
[_She goes up to_ JOAN _and kisses her_. ROBIN _then reaches up his face
and_ JOAN _kisses him_.
ROBIN. [_Rubbing his mouth_.] The flour do come from Aunt same as it
does from a new loaf.
MILES. [_To_ JOAN.] You must pardon these ignorant little country
brats, Miss Clara.
JOAN. O there’s nothing amiss, thank you.
EMILY. Amiss, who said as there was? When folks what can afford to
lodge at the inn do come down and fasten theirselves on the top of poor
people, they must take things as they do find them and not start
grumbling at the first set off.
LUKE. There, there, Missis Spring. There wasn’t naught said about
grumbling. But Miss Clara have come a smartish long distance, and it
behoves us all as she should find summat of a welcome at the end of her
journey, like.
MILES. [_Aside to_ JOAN.] How strange this country tongue must fall on
your ears, Miss Clara!
JOAN. I don’t understand about half of what they say.
EMILY. [_Overhearing her_.] O, you don’t, don’t you. Well, Clara, I
was always one for plain words, and I say ’tis a pity when folks do get
above the position to which they was bred, and for all the fine satins
and plumes upon you, the body what’s covered by them belongs to Clara
Spring, what’s sister to Thomas. And all the world knows what Thomas
is—A poor, mean spirited, humble born man with but two coats to the back
of him, and with not a thought to the mind of him which is not
foolishness. And I judge from by what they be in birth, and not by the
bags of gold what have been left them by any old madams in their dotage.
So now you see how I takes it all and you and me can start fair, like.
JOAN. [_To_ LUKE.] O Mister—Mister Jenner, I feel so faint.
MILES. [_Taking her fan_.] Allow me. [_He begins to fan her_.] I
assure you she means nothing by it. It’s her way. You see, she knows no
better.
LUKE. I’d fetch out summat for her to eat if I was you, missis. ’Tis
famished as the poor young maid must be.
EMILY. She should have come when ’twas meal time then. I don’t hold
with bites nor drinks in between whiles.
JOAN. O I’m dying for a glass of milk—or water would do as well.
MILES. My dear young lady—anything to oblige. [_Turning to Jessie_.]
Come, my little maid, see if you can’t make yourself useful in bringing a
tray of refreshment for your auntie. And you [_turning to Robin_] trot
off and help sister.
EMILY. Not if I know it. Stop where you are, Jess. Robin, you dare to
move. If Clara wants to eat and drink I’m afeared she must wait till
supper time.
ROBIN. There be chicken and sparrow grass for supper, Aunt.
JESSIE. And a great pie of gooseberries.
JOAN. [_Faintly_.] O I couldn’t touch a mouthful of food, don’t speak
to me about it.
ROBIN. I likes talking of dinner. After I’ve done eating of it, I likes
next best to talk about it.
LUKE. See here, missis. Let’s have a glass of summat cool for Miss
Clara.
EMILY. [_Calling angrily_.] Maggie, Maggie, where are you, you great
lazy-boned donkey?
MAGGIE. [_Comes in from the back kitchen_, _her apron held to her
eyes_.] Did you call me, mistress?
EMILY. Get up a bucket of water from the well. Master’s sister wants a
drink.
MAGGIE. [_Between sobs_.] Shall I bring it in the bucket, or would the
young lady like it in a jug?
EMILY. [_With exasperation_.] There’s no end to the worriting that
other folks do make.
JESSIE. Let me go and help poor Maggie, mother.
ROBIN. [_To_ JOAN.] Do you know what Maggie’s crying for, Aunt Clara?
JOAN. I’m sure I don’t, little boy.
ROBIN. ’Tis because she’s got to go. Mother’s sent her off. ’Twas what
she said of mother’s tongue.
EMILY. [_Roughly taking hold of_ ROBIN _and_ JESSIE.] Come you along
with me, you ill-behaved little varmints. ’Tis the back kitchen and the
serving maid as is the properest place for such as you. I’ll not have
you bide ’mongst the company no longer. [_She goes out with the children
and followed by_ MAGGIE.]
[_Directly they have left the room_ JOAN, _whose manner has been
nervously shrinking_, _seems to recover herself and she assumes a
languid_, _artificial air_, _badly imitating the ways of a lady of
fashion_.
JOAN. [_Fanning herself with her handkerchief and her fan_.] Well, I
never did meet with such goings on before.
MILES. You and I know how people conduct themselves in London, Miss
Clara. We must not expect to find the same polite ways down here.
LUKE. Come now, ’tisn’t so bad as all that with we. There baint many
what has the tongue of mistress yonder.
JOAN. I’m quite unused to such people.
LUKE. And yet, Miss Clara, ’tisn’t as though they were exactly strangers
to you like.
JOAN. They feel as good as strangers to me, any way.
MILES. Ah, how well I understand that, Miss. ’Tisn’t very often as we
lay a length of fine silken by the side of unbleached woollen at my
counters.
JOAN. I could go through with it better perhaps, if I didn’t feel so
terrible faint and sinking.
LUKE. [_Going to the back kitchen door_.] Here, Maggie, stir yourself
up a bit. The lady is near fainting, I do count.
JESSIE. [_Runs in with a tray on which is a jug of water and a glass_.]
I’m bringing the drink for Aunt, Mr. Jenner. Maggie’s crying ever so
badly, and Mother’s sent her upstairs to wash her face and put her hair
tidy.
[JESSIE _puts the tray on the table near to where_ JOAN _is sitting_.
MILES HOOFER _busies himself in pouring out a glass of water and in
handing it with a great deal of exaggerated deference to_ JOAN.
JOAN. [_Drinking_.] Such a coarse glass!
MILES. Ah, you must let me send you up one from my place during your
stay here. Who could expect a lady to drink from such a thing as that?
JOAN. [_Laying aside the glass_.] There’s a taste of mould in the water
too.
JESSIE. It’s fresh. Mother drawed it up from the well, she did.
JOAN. [_Looking disdainfully round on the room_.] Such a strange room.
So very common.
LUKE. Nay, you mustn’t judge of the house by this. Don’t you recollect
the parlour yonder, with the stuffed birds and the chiney cupboard?
JOAN. [_Looking round again_.] Such an old-fashioned place as this I
never did see. ’Tis a low sort of room too, no carpet on the boards nor
cloth to the table, nor nothing elegant.
MILES. Ah, we find the mansions in town very different to a country farm
house, don’t we Miss?
JOAN. I should think we did, Mister Hooper. Why, look at that great old
wooden chair by the hearth? Don’t it look un-stylish, upon my word, with
no cushions to it nor nothing.
JESSIE. [_Coming quite close to_ JOAN _and looking straight into her
face_.] That’s great gran’ma’s chair, what Dad said you’d be best
pleased for to see.
[JOAN _looks very confused and begins to fan herself hastily_.
JESSIE. And th’ old clock’s another thing what Dad did say as you’d look
upon.
JOAN. O the old clock’s well enough, to be sure.
JESSIE. I did want to gather a nosegay of flowers to set in your
bedroom, Aunt, but Mother, she said, no.
JOAN. [_Languidly_.] I must say I don’t see any flowers blooming here
that I should particular care about having in my apartment.
JESSIE. And Father said as how you’d like to smell the blossoms in the
garden. And Georgie told as how you did use to gather the clover blooms
when you was a little girl and set them by you where you did sleep.
JOAN. [_Crossly_.] O run away, child, I’m tired to death with all this
chatter. How would you like to be so pestered after such a travel over
the rough country roads as I have had?
LUKE. Now, my little maid, off you go. Take back the tray to Mother,
and be careful as you don’t break the glasses on it.
JESSIE. [_Taking up the tray_.] I’m off to play in the hayfield along
of Robin, then.
[LUKE _opens the back kitchen door for her and she goes out_.
_Meanwhile_ MILES _has taken up the fan and is fanning_ JOAN, _who leans
back in her chair with closed eyes and exhausted look_.
LUKE. [_Coming to her side and sitting down_.] ’Twill seem more
homelike when Thomas do come up from the field.
JOAN. [_Raising herself and looking at him_.] You mustn’t trouble about
me, Mister Jenner. I shall be quite comfortable presently.
[_The back door opens and_ MAGGIE _comes hurriedly in_.
MAGGIE. Please, mistress, there be a young person a-coming through the
rick yard.
JOAN. [_Nervously_.] A young person?
MAGGIE. Mistress be at the gooseberries a-gathering of them, and the
children be gone off to th’ hay field.
MILES. ’Tis very likely your serving maid, dear Miss. Shall I fetch the
young woman in to you?
JOAN. My maid, did you say? My maid?
LUKE. Ah, depend on it, ’tis she.
MAGGIE. The young person do have all the looks of a serving wench,
mistress. She be tramping over the yard with naught but a white
handkerchief over the head of she and a poking into most of the styes and
a-calling of the geese and poultry.
LUKE. That’s her, right enough. Bring her in, Mag.
JOAN. [_Agitatedly_.] No, no—I mean—I want to see her particular—and
alone. I’ll go to meet her. You—gentlemen—[MAGGIE _goes slowly into the
back kitchen_.
MILES. [_Placing a chair for_ JOAN.] Delicate ladies should not venture
out into the heat at this time of day.
JOAN. [_With sudden resolution ignoring the chair and going to the
window_.] Then, do you two kind gentlemen take a stroll in the garden.
I have need of the services of my—my young woman. But when she has put
me in order after the dusty journey, I shall ask you to be good enough to
come back and while away an hour for me in this sad place.
MILES. [_Fervently_.] Anything to oblige a lady, miss.
LUKE. That’s right. Us’ll wait while you do lay aside your bonnet.
[MILES _and_ LUKE _go out through the garden door_. MILES, _turning to
bow low before he disappears_. JOAN _stands as though distraught in the
middle of the room_. _Through the open door of the back kitchen the
voices of_ CLARA _and_ MAGGIE _are distinctly heard_.
CLARA. Is no one at home then?
MAGGIE. Ah, go you straight on into the kitchen, you’ll find whom you be
searching for in there. I’d take and shew you in myself only I’m wanted
down to th’ hayfield now.
CLARA. Don’t put yourself to any trouble about me. I know my way.
[CLARA _comes into the kitchen_. _She has tied a white handkerchief over
her head_, _and carries a bunch of wildflowers in her hands_.
CLARA. Still in your cloak and bonnet! Why, I thought by now you would
have unpacked our things and made yourself at home.
JOAN. [_Joining her hands supplicatingly and coming towards_ CLARA,
_speaking almost in a whisper_.] O mistress, you’ll never guess what
I’ve been and done. But ’twasn’t all my fault at the commencement.
CLARA. [_Looking her over searchingly_.] You do look very disturbed,
Joan, what has happened?
JOAN. ’Twas the fine bonnet and cloak, mam. ’Twas they as did it.
CLARA. Did what?
JOAN. Put the thought into my head, like.
CLARA. What thought?
JOAN. As how ’twould feel to be a real grand lady, like you, mistress.
CLARA. What then, Joan?
JOAN. So I began to pretend all to myself as how that I was one,
mistress.
CLARA. Come, tell me all.
JOAN. And whilst I was sat down upon that fallen tree, and sort of
pretending to myself, the two gentlemen came along.
CLARA. What gentlemen?
JOAN. Gentlemen as was after courting you, mistress.
CLARA. Courting me?
JOAN. Yes, and they commenced speaking so nice and respectful like.
CLARA. Go on, Joan, don’t be afraid.
JOAN. It did seem to fall in with the game I was a-playing with myself.
And then, before I did know how, ’twas they was both of them a-taking me
for you, mam.
CLARA. And did you not un-deceive them, Joan?
JOAN. [_Very ashamedly_.] No, mam.
CLARA. You should have told them the truth about yourself at once.
JOAN. O I know I should have, mistress. But there was something as held
me back when I would have spoke the words.
CLARA. I wonder what that could have been?
JOAN. ’Twas them being such very nice and kind gentlemen. And, O
mistress, you’ll not understand it, because you’ve told me many times as
the heart within you have never been touched by love.
CLARA. [_Suddenly sitting down_.] And has yours been touched to-day,
Joan, by love?
JOAN. That it have, mistress. Love have struck at it heavily.
CLARA. Through which of the gentlemen did it strike, Joan?
JOAN. Through both. Leastways, ’tis Mister Jenner that my feelings do
go out most quickly to, mistress. But ’tis Mister Hooper who do court
the hardest and who has the greatest riches like.
CLARA. Well, and what do you want me to do or to say now, Joan?
JOAN. See here, mistress, I want you to give me a chance. They’ll never
stoop to wed me if they knows as I’m but a poor serving maid.
CLARA. Your dressing up as a fine lady won’t make you other than what
you are, Joan.
JOAN. Once let me get the fish in my net, mistress.
CLARA. Are you proposing to catch the two, Joan?
JOAN. I shall take the one as do offer first, mistress.
CLARA. That’ll be Mister Hooper, I should think.
JOAN. I should go riding in my own chaise, mistress, if ’twas him.
CLARA. But, Joan, either of these men would have to know the truth
before there could be any marriage.
JOAN. I knows that full well, mistress. But let one of them just offer
hisself. By that time my heart and his would be so closely twined
together like, ’twould take more nor such a little thing as my station
being low to part us.
[CLARA _sits very still for a few moments_, _looking straight before
her_, _lost in thought_. JOAN _sinks on to a chair by the table as
though suddenly tired out_, _and she begins to cry gently_.
CLARA. Listen, Joan. I’m one for the straight paths. I like to walk in
open fields and over the bare heath. Only times come when one is driven
to take to the ways which are set with bushes and with briars.
JOAN. [_Lifting her head and drying her eyes_.] O mistress, I feel to
be asking summat as is too heavy for you to give.
CLARA. But for a certain thing, I could never have lent myself to this
acting game of yours, Joan.
JOAN. No, mistress?
CLARA. Only that, to-day, my heart too has gone from my own keeping.
JOAN. O mistress, you don’t mean to say as his lordship have followed us
down already.
CLARA. [_Scornfully_.] His lordship! As if I should be stirred by him!
JOAN. [_Humbly_.] Who might it be, mistress, if I may ask?
CLARA. ’Tis one who would never look upon me with thoughts of love if I
went to him as I am now, Joan.
JOAN. I can’t rightly understand you, mam.
CLARA. My case is just the same as yours, Joan. You say that your fine
gentlemen would not look upon a serving maid.
JOAN. I’m certain of it, mistress.
CLARA. And the man I—I love will never let his heart go out to mine with
the heaviness of all these riches lying between us.
JOAN. I count that gold do pave the way for most of us, mistress.
CLARA. So for this once, I will leave the clear high road, Joan. And
you and I will take a path that is set with thorns. Pray God they do not
wound us past healing at the end of our travel.
JOAN. O mistress, ’twill be a lightsome journey for me.
CLARA. But the moment that you reach happiness, Joan, remember to
confess.
JOAN. There won’t be nothing to fear then, mistress.
CLARA. Make him love you for yourself, Joan. O we must each tie the
heart of our true love so tightly to our own that naught shall ever be
able to cut the bonds.
JOAN. Yes, mistress, and I’m sure I’m very much obliged to you.
CLARA. Ah, I am lending myself to all this, because I, too, have
something to win or lose.
JOAN. Where did you meet him, mistress?
CLARA. I did not meet him. I stood on the high ground, and he passed
below. His face was raised to the light, and I saw its look. I think my
love for him has always lain asleep in my heart, Joan. But when he
passed beneath me in the meadow, it awoke.
JOAN. O mistress, what sort of an appearance has the gentleman?
CLARA. I don’t know how to answer you, Joan.
JOAN. I count as it would take a rare, grand looking man for to put his
lordship into the shadow, like.
CLARA. You are right there, Joan. But now we must talk of your affairs.
Your fine courtiers will be coming in presently and you must know how to
receive them in a good way.
JOAN. That’s what do hamper me dreadful, my speech and other things.
How would it be if you was to help me a little bit, like?
CLARA. With all my heart.
JOAN. How should I act so not to be found out, mistress?
CLARA. You must speak little, and low. Do not show haste in your goings
and comings. Put great care into your way of eating and drinking.
JOAN. O that will be a fearsome hard task. What else?
CLARA. You must be sisterly with Thomas.
JOAN. I’d clean forgot him. I don’t doubt but what he’ll ferret out the
truth in no time.
CLARA. I don’t think so. I was but a little child when I left him. He
will not remember how I looked. And our colouring is alike, Joan.
JOAN. ’Tis the eating and drinking as do play most heavily upon my mind,
mistress.
CLARA. Then think of these words as you sit at table. Eat as though you
were not hungry and drink as though there were no such thing as thirst.
Let your hands move about your plate as if they were too tired to lift
the knife and fork.
[JOAN, _darts to the dresser_—_seizes up a plate with a knife and fork_,
_places them on the table and sits down before them_, _pretending to cut
up meat_. CLARA _watches her smilingly_.
JOAN. [_Absently_, _raising the knife to her mouth_.] How’s that,
mistress?
CLARA. Not so, not so, Joan. That might betray you.
JOAN. What, mistress?
CLARA. ’Tis the fork which journeys to the mouth, and the knife stops at
home on the plate.
JOAN. [_Dispiritedly_.] ’Tis almost more than I did reckon for when I
started.
CLARA. Well, we mustn’t think of that now. We must hold up our spirits,
you and I.
JOAN. [_Getting up and putting away the crockery_.] I’d best take off
the bonnet and the cloak, mistress, hadn’t I?
CLARA. Yes, that you had. We will go upstairs together and I will help
you change into another gown. Come quickly so that we may have plenty of
time.
[_They go towards the staircase door_, CLARA _leading the way_. _With
her hand on the latch of the door she gives one look round the kitchen_.
_Then with a sudden movement she goes up to the wooden armchair at the
hearth and bends her head till her lips touch it_, _she then runs
upstairs_, _followed by_ JOAN.
ACT II.—Scene 2.
_After a few moments_ MILES HOOPER _and_ LUKE JENNER _come into the
kitchen_. _They both look round the room enquiringly_.
LUKE. Ah, she be still up above with that there serving wench what’s
come.
MILES. My good man, you didn’t expect our fair miss to have finished her
toilet under an hour, did you?
LUKE. I don’t see what there was to begin on myself, let alone finish.
MILES. ’Tis clear you know little of the ways of our town beauties,
Luke.
LUKE. Still, I mean to have my try with her, Miles Hooper.
MILES. [_Sarcastically_.] I’m quite agreeable, Mister Jenner.
[THOMAS _and_ GEORGE _come in_. GEORGE _carries a bucket of water_.
THOMAS. Where’s the little maid got to? George and me be come up from
the field on purpose for to bid her welcome home.
MILES. Miss is still at her toilet, farmer.
[JOAN, _in a flowered silk gown_, _comes slowly and carefully into the
room_, _followed by_ CLARA, _who carries a lace shawl over one arm_.
_She has put on a large white apron_, _but wears nothing on her head but
the narrow blue ribbon_. _During the following scene she stands
quietly_, _half hidden by the door_.
[JOAN _looks nervously round the room_, _then she draws herself up very
haughtily_. MILES _comes forward and bows low_.
THOMAS. [_Looking_ JOAN _up and down_.] Well, bless my soul, who’d have
guessed at the change it do make in a wench?
JOAN. [_Holding out her hand_, _very coldly_.] A good afternoon to you,
sir.
THOMAS. [_Taking her hand slowly_.] Upon my word, but you might knock
me over.
MILES. Miss has grown into a very superb young lady, Thomas.
THOMAS. [_Still looking at her_.] That may be so, yet ’twasn’t as such
I had figured she in the eye of my mind, like. [_There is a moment’s
silence_.
THOMAS. George, my boy, you and sister Clara used to be up to rare games
one with t’other once on a time. [_Turning to_ JOAN.] There, my wench,
I count you’ve not forgotten Georgie?
JOAN. I’m afeared I’ve not much of a memory.
THOMAS. Shake hands, my maid, and very like as the memory will come back
to roost same as the fowls do.
JOAN. [_Bowing coldly_.] Good afternoon, George.
MILES. [_Aside to Luke_.] Now that’s what I call a bit of stylish
breeding.
[GEORGE _has made no answer to_ JOAN’S _bow_. _He quietly ignores it_,
_and takes up his pail of water_. _As he does so he catches sight of_
CLARA, _who has been watching the whole scene from the corner where she
is partly concealed_. _He looks at her for one moment_, _and then sets
the bucket down again_.
THOMAS. Why, George—I guess as it’s took you as it took me, us didn’t
think how ’twould appear when Miss Clara was growed up.
GEORGE. [_Quietly_.] No, us did not, master.
[_He carries his pail into the back kitchen as_ EMILY _and the children
come in_.
EMILY. What’s all this to-do in my kitchen, I should like to know?
THOMAS. Us did but come up for to—to give a handshake to sister Clara,
like.
EMILY. Well, now you can go off back to work again. And you—[_turning
to_ JOAN]—now that you’ve finished curling of your hair and dressing of
yourself up, you can go and sit down in the best parlour along with your
fancy gentlemen.
MILES. [_Offering his arm to_ JOAN.] It will be my sweet pleasure to
conduct Missy to the parlour.
[LUKE _offers his arm on the other side_, _and_ JOAN _moves off with both
the young men_.
JOAN. [_As she goes_.] Indeed, I shall be glad to rest on a comfortable
couch. I’m dead tired of the country air already.
ROBIN. [_Calling after her_.] You’ll not go off to sleep afore the
chicken and sparrow grass is ate, will you, Aunt?
[MILES, LUKE _and_ JOAN _having gone out_, EMILY _begins to bang the
chairs back in their places and to arrange the room_, _watched by the two
children_. CLARA, _who has remained half hidden by the door_, _now goes
quietly upstairs_.
EMILY. [_Calling_.] Here, George, Mag.
[GEORGE _comes in_.
EMILY. Well, George, ’tisn’t much worse nor I expected.
JESSIE. I don’t like Aunt Clara.
ROBIN. I hates her very much.
GEORGE. [_Slowly_.] And I don’t seem to fancy her neither.
[_Curtain_.]
ACT III.—Scene 1.
_Two days have passed by_.
_It is morning_. CLARA, _wearing an apron and a muslin cap on her head_,
_sits by the kitchen table mending a lace handkerchief_. MAGGIE, _who is
dusting the plates on the dressers_, _pauses to watch her_.
MAGGIE. I’d sooner sweep the cow sheds out and that I would, nor have to
set at such a niggly piece of sewing work as you.
CLARA. I cannot do it quickly, it is so fine.
MAGGIE. I count ’tis very nigh as bad as the treadmills, serving a young
miss such as yourn be.
CLARA. What makes you say that, Maggie?
MAGGIE. Missis be very high in her ways and powerful sharp in the
tongue, but I declare as your young lady will be worser nor missis when
she do come to that age.
CLARA. Why do you think this, Mag?
MAGGIE. O she do look at any one as though they was lower nor the very
worms in the ground. And her speaks as though each word did cost she
more nor a shilling to bring it out. And see how destructive she be with
her fine clothing. A laced petticoat tore to ribbons last night, and
to-day yon handkerchief.
CLARA. These things are soon mended.
[MAGGIE _continues to dust for a few moments_.
MAGGIE. The day you comed here, ’twas a bit of ribbon as you did have
around of your hair.
CLARA. [_After a moment’s hesitation_.] I put it on to keep my hair
neat on the journeying.
MAGGIE. [_Coming nearer_.] I count as you’ve not missed it, have you?
CLARA. Indeed I have, and I think I must have lost it in the hayfield.
MAGGIE. ’Tain’t lost.
CLARA. Where is it then?
MAGGIE. Look here, I could tell you, but I shan’t.
CLARA. If you have found it, Maggie, you may keep it.
MAGGIE. ’Twould be a fine thing to be a grand serving maid as you be,
and to give away ribbons, so ’twould.
[CLARA _takes no notice of her and goes on sewing_.
MAGGIE. [_More insistently_.] ’Twasn’t me as found the ribbon.
CLARA. Who was it then?
MAGGIE. I daresay you’d like for to know, but I’m not going to say
nothing more about it.
[MAGGIE _leans against the table watching_ CLARA _as she sews_.
[EMILY _with both the children now come in_. EMILY _carries a basket of
potatoes_, _and_ JESSIE _a large bowl_.
EMILY. [_Setting down the basket_.] Maggie, you idle, bad girl,
whatever are you doing here when master expects you down in the meadow to
help with the raking?
MAGGIE. I be just a-going off yonder, mistress.
EMILY. I’d thank other folk not to bring dressed up fine young serving
minxes down here—you was bad enough afore, Maggie, but you’ll be a
hundred times worser now.
MAGGIE. I’ll be off and help master. I’ve been and put the meat on to
boil as you said, missis.
[MAGGIE _goes off_.
[CLARA _continues to sew_, _quietly_. JESSIE _has put her bowl down on
the table_, _and now comes to her side_. ROBIN _also comes close to
her_. EMILY _flings herself into a chair for a moment and contemptuously
watches them_.
JESSIE. We don’t care much about our new aunt, Joan.
ROBIN. Dad said as how Aunt would be sure to bring us sommat good from
London town in them great boxes.
JESSIE. And Aunt has been here two days and more, and she hasn’t brought
us nothing.
EMILY. Your fine aunt have been too much took up with her fancy
gentlemen to think of what would be suitable behaviour towards you
children.
JESSIE. Will Aunt Clara get married soon?
EMILY. ’Tis to be hoped as she will be. Such a set out in the house I
have never seen afore in all my days. Young women as is hale and hearty
having their victuals took up to their rooms and a-lying in bed till ’tis
noon or later.
JESSIE. ’Tis only one of them as lies in bed.
ROBIN. [_To_ CLARA.] Do you think Aunt has got sommat for us upstairs,
Joan?
CLARA. [_Rising and putting down her work_.] I know she has, Robin.
EMILY. Don’t let me catch you speaking to Master Spring as though you
and he was of the same station, young person.
CLARA. Master Robin, and Miss Jessie, I will go upstairs and fetch the
gifts that your aunt has brought for you.
[_She goes leisurely towards the staircase door_, _smiling at the
children_.
EMILY. Ah, and you may tell your young madam that ’tis high time as she
was out of bed and abroad. Hear that? [CLARA _goes out_.
JESSIE. I like her. She speaks so gentle. Not like Aunt.
EMILY. She’s a stuck up sort of fine lady herself like. Look at the
hands of her, ’tis not a day’s hard work as they have done in her life,
I’ll warrant.
ROBIN. What will she bring us from out of the great boxes, do you think?
EMILY. Sommat what you don’t need, I warrant. ’Tis always so. When
folks take it into their heads to give you aught, ’tis very nigh always
sommat which you could do better without.
[EMILY _gets up and begins settling the pots on the fire_, _and fetching
a jug of cold water from the back kitchen and a knife which she lays on
the table_.
[CLARA _enters carrying some parcels_. _She brings them to the table_.
_Both the children run to her_.
CLARA. [_Holding out a long parcel to_ EMILY _and speaking to the
children_.] The first is for your mother, children.
EMILY. [_With an angry exclamation_.] Now, you mark my words, ’twill be
sommat as I shall want to fling over the hedge for all the use ’twill be.
[_She comes near_, _opens the parcel and perceives it to be a length of
rich black silk_.
CLARA. My mistress thought it might be suitable.
EMILY. Suitable? I’ll suitable her. When shall my two hands find time
to sew me a gown out of it, I’d like to know? And if ’twas sewn, when
would my limbs find time to sit down within of it? [_Flinging it down on
the table_.] Suitable? You can tell your mistress from me as she can
keep her gifts to herself if she can’t do better nor this.
JESSIE. [_Stroking the silk_.] O Mother, the feel of it be softer nor a
dove’s feather.
ROBIN. [_Feeling it too_.] ’Tis better nor the new kittens’ fur.
EMILY. Let us see if your aunt have done more handsomely towards you
children.
CLARA. I am afraid not. These coral beads are for Miss Jessie, with her
aunt’s dear love. And this book of pictures is for Master Robin.
JESSIE. [_Seizing the beads with delight_.] I love a string of beads.
[_Putting them on_.] How do they look on me?
EMILY. Off with them this moment. I’ll learn her to give strings of
rubbish to my child.
JESSIE. [_Beginning to cry_.] O do let me wear it just a little while,
just till dinner, Mother.
EMILY. Have done with that noise. Off with it at once, do you hear.
JESSIE. [_Taking the necklace off_.] I love the feel of it—might I keep
it in my hand then?
EMILY. [_Seizing it_.] ’Twill be put by with the silk dress. So there.
’Tis not a suitable thing for a little girl like you.
ROBIN. [_Looking up from the pages of his book_.] No one shan’t take my
book from me. There be pictures of great horses and sheep and cows in
it—and no one shan’t hide it from me.
EMILY. [_Putting the silk dress and necklace on another table_.] Next
time your aunt wants to throw her money into the gutter I hope as she’ll
ask me to come and see her a-doing of it.
JESSIE. [_Coming up to_ CLARA _very tearfully_.] And was there naught
for Dad in the great box?
CLARA. Perhaps there may be.
ROBIN. And did Aunt Clara bring naught for Georgie?
CLARA. I don’t know.
JESSIE. Poor Georgie. He never has nothing gived him.
ROBIN. And Mother puts the worst of the bits on his plate at dinner.
EMILY. [_Sharply_.] Look you here, young woman. Suppose you was to
take and do something useful with that idle pair of hands as you’ve got.
CLARA. Yes, mistress, I should like to help you in something.
EMILY. Us knows what fine promises lead to.
CLARA. But I mean it. Do let me help a little.
EMILY. See them taters?
CLARA. Yes.
EMILY. Take and peel and wash them and get them ready against when I
wants to cook them.
CLARA. [_A little doubtfully_.] Yes—I’ll—I’ll try—
EMILY. Ah, ’tis just as I thought. You’re one of them who would stir
the fire with a silver spoon rather nor black their hands with the poker.
CLARA. [_Eagerly_.] No, no—it isn’t that. I’ll gladly do them. Come,
Miss Jessie, you will shew me if I do them wrongly, won’t you?
JESSIE. O yes, I’ll help you because I like you, Joan.
ROBIN. I’ll help too, when I have finished looking at my book.
[EMILY _goes out_. CLARA _sits down by the table and takes up a potato
and the knife and slowly and awkwardly sets to work_. JESSIE _stands by
her watching_.
JESSIE. You mustn’t take no account of Mother when she speaks so sharp.
’Tis only her way.
ROBIN. Could you come and be our serving maid when Maggie’s sent off?
CLARA. O I should be too slow and awkward at the work, I think.
JESSIE. Yes, you don’t do them taters very nice.
ROBIN. That don’t matter, I like you, and you can tell me fine things
about other parts.
JESSIE. Georgie can tell of fine things too. See, there he comes with
the vegetables from the garden.
[GEORGE _comes in with a large basket of vegetables_, _which he sets down
in the back kitchen_. _Then he stands at the door_, _silently watching
the group near the table_.
JESSIE. Come here, Georgie, and let Joan hear some of the tales out of
what you do sing.
GEORGE. What would mistress say if she was to catch me at my songs this
time of day?
JESSIE. Mother’s gone upstairs, she won’t know nothing.
ROBIN. Come you here, George, and look at my fine book what Aunt have
brought me.
GEORGE. [_Slowly approaching the table_.] That be a brave, fine book of
pictures, Master Robin.
ROBIN. [_Holding up the open book_.] I don’t fancy Aunt Clara much, but
I likes her better nor I did because of this book.
[GEORGE’S _eyes wander from the book to_ CLARA _as she bends over her
work_.
JESSIE. Joan doesn’t know how to do them very nicely, does she George!
GEORGE. ’Tis the first time you’ve been set down to such work, may be,
mistress.
JESSIE. You mustn’t say “mistress” to Joan, you know. Why, Mother would
be ever so angry if she was to hear you. Joan’s only a servant.
CLARA. [_Looking up_.] Like you, George.
GEORGE. [_Steadily_.] What I was saying is—’Tis the first time as you
have been set afore a bowl of taters like this.
CLARA. You are right, George. It is the first time since—since I was
quite a little child. And I think I’m very clumsy at my work.
GEORGE. No one could work with them laces a-falling down all over their
fingers.
JESSIE. You should turn back your sleeves for kitchen work, Joan, same
as Maggie does.
GEORGE. Yes, you should turn back your sleeves, Miss Joan.
[JOAN _puts aside the knife and basket_, _turns back her sleeves_, _and
then resumes her work_. GEORGE’S _eyes are rivetted on her hands and
arms for a moment_. _Then he turns as though to go away_.
JESSIE. Don’t go away, Georgie. Come and tell us how you like Aunt
Clara now that she’s growed into such a grand lady.
GEORGE. [_Coming back to the table_.] I don’t like nothing about her,
Miss Jessie.
JESSIE. Is Aunt very much changed from when she did use to ride the big
horses to the trough, Georgie?
ROBIN. And from the time when th’ old gander did take a big piece right
out of her arm, Georgie?
GEORGE. [_His eyes on_ CLARA’S _bent head_.] I count her be wonderful
changed, like.
JESSIE. So that you would scarce know her?
GEORGE. So that I should scarce know she.
JESSIE. She have brought Mother a silken gown and me a string of coral
beads. But naught for you, Georgie.
GEORGE. I reckon as Miss Clara have not kept me in her remembrance like.
CLARA. [_With sudden earnestness_.] O that she has, George.
JESSIE. She didn’t seem to know him by her looks.
CLARA. Looks often speak but poorly for the heart.
ROBIN. [_Who has been watching_ CLARA.] See there, Joan. You’ve been
and cut that big tater right in half. Mother will be cross.
CLARA. O dear, I am thoughtless. One cannot work and talk at the same
time.
GEORGE. [_Taking basket and knife from her and seating himself on the
edge of the table_.] Here,—give them all to me. I understand such work,
and ’tis clear that you do not. I’ll finish them off in a few minutes,
and mistress will never be the wiser.
CLARA. O thank you, George, but am I to go idle?
GEORGE. You can take up with that there white sewing if you have a mind.
’Tis more suited to your hands nor this rough job.
[CLARA _puts down her sleeves and takes up her needlework_.
JESSIE. Sing us a song, George, whilst you do the taters.
GEORGE. No, Miss Jessie. My mood is not a singing mood this day.
JESSIE. You ask him, Joan.
CLARA. Will not you sing one little verse, George?
GEORGE. Nay—strangers from London town would have no liking for the
songs we sing down here among the fields.
CLARA. There was a song I once heard in the country that pleased me very
well.
JESSIE. What was it called?
CLARA. I cannot remember the name—but there was something of bushes and
of briars in it.
JESSIE. I know which that is. ’Tis a pretty song. Sing it, Georgie.
GEORGE. Nay—sing it yourself, Miss Jessie.
JESSIE. ’Tis like this at the beginning.—[_she sings or repeats_]—
“Through bushes and through briars
I lately took my way,
All for to hear the small birds sing
And the lambs to skip and play.”
CLARA. That is the song I was thinking of, Jessie.
GEORGE. Can you go on with it, Miss Jessie.
JESSIE. I can’t say any more.
CLARA. [_Gently singing or speaking_.]
I overheard my own true love,
Her voice it was so clear.
“Long time I have been waiting for
The coming of my dear.”
GEORGE. [_Heaving a sigh_.] That’s it.
JESSIE. Go on, Joan, I do like the sound of it.
CLARA. Shall I go on with the song, George?
GEORGE. As you please.
CLARA.
“Sometimes I am uneasy
And troubled in my mind,
Sometimes I think I’ll go to my love
And tell to him my mind.”
“And if I would go to my love
My love he will say nay
If I show to him my boldness
He’ll ne’er love me again.”
JESSIE. When her love was hid a-hind of the bushes and did hear her
a-singing so pitiful, what did he do then?
CLARA. I don’t know, Jessie.
JESSIE. I reckon as he did come out to show her as he knowed all what
she did keep in her mind.
CLARA. Very likely the briars were so thick between them, Jess, that he
never got to the other side for her to tell him.
GEORGE. Yes, that’s how ’twas, I count.
JESSIE. [_Running up to_ ROBIN.] I’m going to look at your book along
of you, Robin.
ROBIN. But I’m the one to turn the leaves, remember. [_The children sit
side by side looking at the picture book_. CLARA _sews_. GEORGE _goes
on with the potatoes_. _As the last one is finished and tossed into the
water_, _he looks at_ CLARA _for the first time_. _A long silence_.
GEORGE. Miss Clara and me was good friends once on a time.
CLARA. Tell me how it was then, George.
GEORGE. I did used to put her on the horse’s back, and we would go down
to the water trough in the evening time and—
CLARA. What else did you and Miss Clara do together, George?
GEORGE. Us would walk in the woods aside of one another—And I would lift
she to a high branch in a tree—and pretend for to leave her there.
CLARA. And then?
GEORGE. Her would call upon me pitiful—and I would come back from where
I was hid.
CLARA. And did her crying cease?
GEORGE. She would take and spring as though her was one of they little
wild squirrels as do dance about in the trees.
CLARA. Where would she spring to, George?
GEORGE. I would hold out my two arms wide to her, and catch she.
CLARA. And did she never fall, whilst springing from the tree, George?
GEORGE. I never let she fall, nor get hurted by naught so long as her
was in the care of me.
CLARA. [_Slowly_, _after a short pause_.] I do not think she can have
forgotten those days, George.
GEORGE. [_Getting up and speaking harshly_.] They’re best forgot. Put
them away. There be briars and brambles and thorns and sommat of all
which do hurt the flesh of man atween that time and this’n.
[CLARA _turns her head away and furtively presses her handkerchief to her
eyes_. GEORGE _looks gloomily on the floor_. EMILY _enters_.
EMILY. George, what are you at sitting at the kitchen table I’d like to
know?
[GEORGE _gets hastily off_. _Both children look up from their book_.
EMILY. [_Looking freezingly at_ CLARA.] ’Tis plain as a turnpike what
you’ve been after, young person. If you was my serving wench, ’tis neck
and crop as you should be thrown from the door.
CLARA. What for, mistress?
EMILY. What for? You have the impudence to ask what for? I’ll soon
tell you. For making a fool of George and setting your cap at him and
scandalising of my innocent children in their own kitchen.
GEORGE. This be going a bit too far, missis. I’ll not have things said
like that.
EMILY. Then you may turn out on to the roads where you were took from—a
grizzling little roadsters varmint. You do cost more’n what you eats nor
what we get of work from out of your body, you great hulk.
CLARA. [_Springing up angrily_.] O I’ll not hear such things said.
I’ll not.
EMILY. Who asked you to speak? Get you upstairs and pull your mistress
out of bed—and curl the ringlets of her hair and dust the flour on to her
face. ’Tis about all you be fit for.
CLARA. [_Angrily going to the stair door_.] Very well. ’Tis best that
I should go. I might say something you would not like.
GEORGE. [_Advancing towards_ EMILY.] Look you here, mistress. I’ve put
up with it going on for fifteen years. But sometimes ’tis almost more
nor I can bear. If ’twasn’t for Master Thomas I’d have cleared out this
long time ago.
EMILY. Don’t flatter yourself as Thomas needs you, my man.
GEORGE. We has always been good friends, farmer and me. ’Tis not for
what I gets from he nor for what he do get out of I as we do hold
together. But ’tis this—as he and I do understand one another.
EMILY. We’ll see what master has to say when I tell him how you was
found sitting on the kitchen table and love-making with that saucy piece
of London trash.
GEORGE. I’m off. I’ve no patience to listen any longer. You called me
roadster varmint. Well, let it be so. On the road I was born and on the
road I was picked from my dead mother’s side, and I count as ’tis on the
road as I shall breathe my last. But for all that, I’ll not have road
dirt flung on me by no one. For, roadsters varmint though I be, there be
things which I do hold brighter nor silver and cleaner nor new opened
leaves, and I’ll not have defilement throwed upon them.
EMILY. [_Seizing the arms of_ JESSIE _and_ ROBIN.] The lad’s raving.
’Tis plain as he’s been getting at the cider. Come you off with me to
the haymaking, Robin and Jess.
ROBIN. May I take my book along of me?
EMILY. [_Flinging the book down violently_.] I’ll book you! What next?
JESSIE. Poor Georgie. He was not courting Joan, mother. He was only
doing the taters for her.
EMILY. [_As they go out_.] The lazy good-for-nothing cat. I’ll get her
packed off from here afore another sun has set, see if I don’t.
[GEORGE _is left alone in the kitchen_. _When all sounds of_ EMILY _and
the children have died away_, _he sighs_. _Then_, _looking furtively
round the room_, _he draws a blue ribbon slowly from his pocket_. _He
spreads it out on one hand and stands looking down on it_, _sadly and
longingly_. _Then he slowly raises it to his lips and kisses it_. _Just
as he is doing this_ THOMAS _comes into the room_.
THOMAS. Why, George, my lad.
GEORGE. [_Confusedly putting the ribbon back into his pocket_.] Yes,
Master Thomas.
THOMAS. [_Looking meaningly at_ GEORGE.] ’Tis a pretty enough young
maid, George.
GEORGE. What did you say, Master?
THOMAS. That one with the bit of blue round the head of her.
GEORGE. Blue?
THOMAS. Ah, George. I was a young man myself once on a time.
GEORGE. Yes, master.
THOMAS. ’Twasn’t a piece of blue ribbon as I did find one day, but ’twas
a blossom dropped from her gown.
GEORGE. Whose gown, master? I’ll warrant ’twasn’t missus’s.
THOMAS. Bless my soul, no. No, no, George. ’Twasn’t the mistress then.
GEORGE. Ah, I count as it could not have been she.
THOMAS. First love, ’tis best, George.
GEORGE. Ah, upon my word, that ’tis.
THOMAS. But my maid went and got her married to another.
GEORGE. More’s the pity, Master Thomas.
THOMAS. [_Sighing_.] Ah, I often thinks of how it might have been—with
her and me, like.
GEORGE. Had that one a soft tongue to her mouth, master?
THOMAS. Soft and sweet as the field lark, George.
GEORGE. Then that had been the one for you to have wed, Master Thomas.
THOMAS. Ah, George, don’t you never run into the trap, no matter whether
’tis baited with the choicest thing you ever did dream on. Once in,
never out. There ’tis.
GEORGE. No one would trouble to set a snare for me, master. I baint
worth trapping.
THOMAS. You be a brave, fine country lad, George, what a pretty baggage
from London town might give a year of her life to catch, so be it her had
the fortune.
GEORGE. No, no, Master Thomas. Nothing of that. There baint nothing.
THOMAS. There be a piece of blue ribbon, George.
GEORGE. They be coming down and into the room now, master. [_Steps are
heard in the staircase_.
THOMAS. We’ll off to the meadow then, George.
[GEORGE _and_ THOMAS _go out_.
[JOAN, _dressed as a lady of fashion_, _and followed by_ CLARA, _comes
into the kitchen_.
CLARA. Now, Joan, if I were you, I should go out into the garden, and
let the gentlemen find you in the arbour. Your ways are more easy and
natural when you are in the air.
JOAN. O I’m very nigh dead with fright when I’m within doors. ’Tis so
hard to move about without knocking myself against sommat. But at table
’tis worst of all.
CLARA. You’ve stopped up in your room two breakfasts with the headache,
and yesterday we took our dinner to the wood.
JOAN. But to-night ’twill be something cruel, for Farmer Thomas have
asked them both to supper again.
CLARA. Luke Jenner and the other man?
JOAN. I beg you to practise me in my ways, a little, afore the time,
mistress.
CLARA. That I will. We will find out what is to be upon the table, and
then I will shew you how it is to be eaten.
JOAN. And other things as well as eating. When I be sitting in the
parlour, Miss Clara, and Hooper, he comes up and asks my pleasure, what
have I got to say to him?
CLARA. O, I shouldn’t trouble about that. I’d open my fan and take no
notice if I were you.
JOAN. I do feel so awkward like in speech with Farmer Thomas, mistress.
And with the children, too.
CLARA. Come, you must take heart and throw yourself into the acting.
Try to be as a sister would with Thomas. Be lively, and kind in your way
with the children.
JOAN. I tries to be like old Madam Lovel was, when I talks with them.
CLARA. That cross, rough mode of hers sits badly on any one young, Joan.
Be more of yourself, but make little changes in your manner here and
there.
JOAN. [_With a heavy sigh_.] ’Tis the here and the there as I finds it
so hard to manage.
JESSIE. [_Running in breathlessly_.] A letter, a letter for Aunt Clara.
[CLARA _involuntarily puts out her hand_.] No, Joan. I was to give it
to Aunt Clara herself. I’ve run all the way.
[JOAN _slowly takes the letter_, _looking confused_.
JESSIE. Will you read it now, Aunt?
JOAN. Run away, little girl, I don’t want no children worriting round me
now. [_Suddenly recollecting herself and forcing herself to speak
brightly_.] I mean—no, my dear little girl, I’d rather wait to read it
till I’m by myself; but thank you very kindly all the same, my pet.
JESSIE. O, but I should like to hear the letter read, so much.
JOAN. Never mind. Run along back to mother, there’s a sweet little
maid.
JESSIE. I’d sooner stop with you now, you look so much kinder, like.
CLARA. [_Taking_ JESSIE’S _hand and leading her to the door_.] Now,
Miss Jessie, your aunt must read her letter in quiet, but if you will
come back presently I will have a game with you outside.
JESSIE. [_As she runs off_.] Mother won’t let me talk with you any
more, alone. She says as you’ve made a fool of Georgie and you’ll do the
same by us all.
JOAN. [_When_ JESSIE _has run off_.] There now, how did I do that,
mistress?
CLARA. Better, much better.
JOAN. ’Tis the feeling of one thing and the speaking of another, with
you ladies and gentlemen. So it appears to me.
CLARA. [_After a moment’s thought_.] No. It is not quite like that.
But ’tis, perhaps, the dressing up of an ugly feeling in better garments.
JOAN. [_Handing the letter to_ CLARA.] There, mistress, ’tis yours, not
mine.
CLARA. [_Glancing at it_.] Lord Lovel’s writing. [CLARA _opens the
letter and reads it through_.] He will not wait longer for my answer.
And he is coming here as fast as horses can bring him.
JOAN. O, mistress, whatever shall we do?
CLARA. We had better own to everything at once. It will save trouble in
the end.
JOAN. Own to everything now, and lose all just as my hand was closing
upon it, like!
CLARA. Poor Joan, it will not make any difference in the end, if the man
loves you truly.
JOAN. Be kind and patient just to the evening, mistress. Hooper is
coming up to see me now. I’d bring him to offer his self, if I was but
left quiet along of him for a ten minutes or so.
CLARA. And then, Joan?
JOAN. And then, when was all fixed up comfortable between us, mistress,
maybe as you could break it gently to him so as he wouldn’t think no
worse of me.
[CLARA _gets up and goes to the window_, _where she looks out for a few
minutes in silence_. JOAN _cries softly meanwhile_.
CLARA. [_Turning towards_ JOAN.] As you will, Joan. Very likely ’twill
be to-morrow morning before my lord reaches this place.
JOAN. O bless you for your goodness, mistress. And I do pray as all may
go as well with you as ’tis with me.
CLARA. [_Sadly_.] That is not likely, Joan.
JOAN. What is it stands in the way, mistress?
CLARA. Briars, Joan. Thorns of pride, and many another sharp and
hurting thing.
JOAN. Then take you my counsel, mistress, and have his lordship when he
do offer next.
CLARA. I’ll think of what you say, Joan. There comes a moment when the
heart is tired of being spurned, and it would fain get into shelter. [_A
slight pause_.
JOAN. [_Looking through the window_.] Look up quickly, mistress.
There’s Hooper.
CLARA. [_Getting up_.] Then I’ll run away. May all be well with you,
dear Joan. [CLARA _goes out_.
[JOAN _seats herself in a high-backed chair and opens her fan_. MILES
_enters_, _carrying a small box_.
MILES. Already astir, Miss Clara. ’Tis early hours to be sure for one
of our London beauties.
[_He advances towards her_, _and she stretches out her hand without
rising_. _He takes it ceremoniously_.
JOAN. You may sit down, if you like, Mister Hooper.
[MILES _places a chair in front of_ JOAN, _and sits down on it_.
MILES. [_Untying the parcel_.] I’ve been so bold as to bring you a
little keepsake from my place in town, Missy.
JOAN. How kind you are, Mister Miles.
MILES. You’ll be able to fancy yourself in Bond Street when you see it,
Miss Clara.
JOAN. Now, you do excite me, Mister Hooper.
MILES. [_Opening the box and taking out a handsome spray of bright
artificial flowers_.] There, what do you say to that, Miss? And we can
do you the same in all the leading tints.
JOAN. O, ’tis wonderful modish. I declare I never did see anything to
beat it up in town.
MILES. Now I thought as much. I flatter myself that we can hold our own
with the best of them in Painswick High Street.
JOAN. I seem to smell the very scent of the blossoms, Mister Hooper.
[_She puts out her hand shyly and takes the spray from_ MILES,
_pretending to smell it_.
MILES. Well—and what’s the next pleasure, Madam?
[JOAN _drops the spray and begins to fan herself violently_.
MILES. [_Very gently_.] What’s Missy’s next pleasure?
JOAN. I’m sure I don’t know, Mr. Miles.
MILES. Miles Hooper would like Missy to ask for all that is his.
JOAN. O, Mister Hooper, how kind you are.
MILES. Ladies never like the sound of business, so we’ll set that aside
for a moment and discuss the music of the heart in place of it.
JOAN. Ah, that’s a thing I do well understand, Mister Hooper.
MILES. I loved you from the first, Miss. There’s the true, high born
lady for you, says I to myself. There’s beauty and style, elegance and
refinement.
JOAN. Now, did you really think all that, Mister Hooper?
MILES. Do not keep me in suspense, Miss Clara.
JOAN. What about, sir?
MILES. The answer to my question, Missy.
JOAN. And what was that, I wonder?
MILES. I want my pretty Miss to take the name of Hooper. Will she
oblige her Miles?
JOAN. O that I will. With all my heart.
MILES. [_Standing up_.] I would not spoil this moment, but by and bye
my sweet Missy shall tell me all the particulars of her income, and such
trifles.
JOAN. [_Agitatedly_.] O let us not destroy to-day by thoughts of
anything but our dear affection one for t’other.
MILES. Why, my pretty town Miss is already becoming countrified in her
speech.
JOAN. ’Tis from hearing all the family. But, dear Miles, promise there
shan’t be nothing but—but love talk between you and me this day. I could
not bear it if we was to speak of, of other things, like.
MILES. [_Getting up and walking about the room_.] As you will—as you
will. Anything to oblige a lady.
[_He stops before the table_, _on which is laid_ EMILY’S _silk dress_,
_and begins to finger it_.
JOAN. What’s that you’re looking at?
MILES. Ten or fifteen shillings the yard, and not a penny under, I’ll be
bound.
JOAN. O do come and talk to me again and leave off messing with the old
silk.
MILES. No, no, Missy, I’m a man of business habits, and ’tis my duty to
go straight off to the meadow and seek out brother Thomas. He and I have
got to talk things over a bit, you know.
JOAN. Off so soon! O you have saddened me.
MILES. Nay, what is it to lose a few minutes of sweet company, when life
is in front of us, Miss Clara?
[_He raises her hand_, _kisses it_, _and leaves her_. _As he goes out by
the door_ CLARA _enters_.
JOAN. O, Mistress—stop him going down to Farmer Thomas at the meadow!
CLARA. Why, Joan, what has happened?
JOAN. All has happened. But stop him going to the farmer to talk about
the—the wedding and the money.
CLARA. The money?
JOAN. The income which he thinks I have.
CLARA. I’ll run, but all this time I’ve been keeping Master Luke Jenner
quiet in the parlour.
JOAN. O what does he want now?
CLARA. Much the same as the other one wanted.
JOAN. Must I see him?
CLARA. Yes, indeed he will wait no longer for his answer. He’s at
boiling point already.
JOAN. Then send him in. But do you run quickly, Miss Clara, and keep
Miles Hooper from the farmer.
CLARA. I’ll run my best, never fear. [_She goes out_.
[LUKE JENNER _comes in_, _a bunch of homely flowers in his hand_.
JOAN. [_Seating herself_.] You are early this morning, Mister Jenner.
LUKE. [_Sitting opposite to her_.] I have that to say which would not
bide till sunset, Miss Clara.
JOAN. Indeed, Mister Jenner. I wonder what that can be.
LUKE. ’Tis just like this, Miss Clara. The day I first heard as you was
coming down here—“I could do with a rich wife if so be as I could win
her,” I did tell myself.
JOAN. O, Mister Jenner, now did you really?
LUKE. But when I met you in the wood—saw you sitting there, so still and
yet so bright, so fine and yet so homely. “That’s the maid for me,” I
says to myself.
JOAN. [_Tearfully_.] O, Mister Jenner!
LUKE. And if it had been beggar’s rags upon her in the place of satin,
I’d have said the same.
JOAN. [_Very much stirred_.] O, Mister Jenner, and did you really think
like that?
LUKE. If all the gold that do lie atween me and you was sunk in the deep
ocean, ’twould be the best as could happen. There!
JOAN. [_Faintly_.] O, Mister Jenner, why?
LUKE. Because, very like ’twould shew to you as ’tis yourself I’m after
and not the fortune what you’ve got.
JOAN. Mister Jenner, I’m mighty sorry.
LUKE. Don’t say I’m come too late, Miss Clara.
JOAN. You are. Mister Hooper was before you. And now, ’tis he and I
who are like to be wed.
LUKE. I might have known I had no chance.
JOAN. [_Rising and trying to hide her emotion_.] I wouldn’t have had it
happen so for the world, Mr. Jenner.
LUKE. [_Laying his bunch of flowers on the table_, _his head bent_, _and
his eyes on the ground_.] ’Twas none of your doing, Miss Clara. You’ve
naught to blame yourself for. ’Tis not your fault as you’re made so—so
beautiful, and yet so homely.
[JOAN _looks at him irresolutely for a moment and then precipitately
leaves the room_.
[LUKE _folds his arms on the table and rests his head on them in an
attitude of deepest despondency_. _After a few moments_ CLARA _enters_.
CLARA. O, Mister Jenner, what has happened to you?
LUKE. [_Raising his head and pointing to the window_.] There she goes,
through the garden with her lover.
CLARA. I wish that you were in his place.
LUKE. [_Bitterly_.] I’ve no house with golden rails to offer her. Nor
any horse and chaise.
CLARA. But you carry a heart within you that is full of true love.
LUKE. What use is the love which be fastened up in a man’s heart and can
spend itself on naught, I’d like to know. [_He rises as though to go and
take up the bunch of flowers which has been lying on the table_.
_Brokenly_.] I brought them for her. But I count as he’ll have given
her something better nor these.
[CLARA _takes the flowers gently from his hand_, _and as she does so_,
EMILY _enters_.
EMILY. What now if you please! First with George and then with Luke.
’Twould be Thomas next if he wasn’t an old sheep of a man as wouldn’t
know if an eye was cast on him or no. But I’ll soon put a stop to all
this. Shame on you, Luke Jenner. And you, you fine piece of London
vanity, I wants my kitchen to myself, do you hear, so off with you
upstairs.
[_She begins to move violently about the kitchen as the curtain falls_.
ACT IV.—Scene 1.
_The kitchen is decorated with bunches of flowers_. _A long table is
spread with silver_, _china and food_. CLARA _is setting mugs to each
place_. MAGGIE _comes in from the back kitchen with a large dish of
salad_.
MAGGIE. When folks do come down to the countryside they likes to enjoy
themselves among the vegetables.
CLARA. [_Placing the last mug_.] There—Now all is ready for them.
MAGGIE. [_Bending over a place at the end of the table_.] Come you and
look at this great old bumble-dore, Joan, what have flyed in through the
window.
CLARA. [_Goes to_ MAGGIE’S _side and bends down over the table_.] O
what a beautiful thing. Look at the gold on him, and his legs are like
feathers.
MAGGIE. [_Taking the bee carefully up in a duster and letting it fly
through the window_.] The sign of a stranger, so they do say.
CLARA. A stranger, Maggie?
MAGGIE. You mind my words, ’tis a stranger as’ll sit where yon was
stuck, afore the eating be finished.
CLARA. I don’t believe in such signs, myself.
MAGGIE. I never knowed it not come true.
[THOMAS _comes in_. _He is wearing his best clothes and looks pleased_,
_yet nervous_.
THOMAS. Well, maids. Upon my word ’tis a spread. Never saw so many
different vituals brought together all at a time afore in this house.
MAGGIE. ’Tis in honour of Miss Clara’s going to be married like, master.
THOMAS. So ’tis, so ’tis. Well—A single rose upon the bush. Bound to
be plucked, you know. Couldn’t be left to fade in the sun, eh, girls?
CLARA. Where shall Maggie and me stop whilst the supper is going on,
master? Mistress has not told us yet.
THOMAS. [_Nervously_.] Mistress haven’t told you—haven’t she?
Well—well—at such a time we must all—all rejoice one with t’other, like.
No difference made t’wixt master and man. Nor t’wixt maid and missus.
Down at the far end of the table you can sit yourselves, my wenches. Up
against George—How’s that?
CLARA. That will do very well for us, Master.
MAGGIE. I don’t expect as missus will let we bide there long.
THOMAS. Look here, my wench, I be master in my own house, and at the
asking in marriage of my only sister like, ’tis me as shall say what
shall sit down with who. And there’s an end of it. That’s all.
MAGGIE. I hear them a coming in, master.
[EMILY, _holding the hands of_ JESSIE _and_ ROBIN, _comes into the room_.
_Her eyes fall on_ THOMAS _who is standing between_ CLARA _and_ MAGGIE,
_looking suddenly sheepish and nervous_.
EMILY. [_In a voice of suppressed anger_.] Thomas! O, if I catch any
more of these goings on in my kitchen.
[JOAN, _very elegantly dressed and hanging on the arm of_ MILES HOOPER,
_follows_ EMILY _into the room_.
EMILY. I’ll not have the food kept back any longer for Luke Jenner. If
folk can’t come to the time when they’re asked, they baint worth waiting
for, so sit you down, all of you.
[_She sits down at the head of the table_, _a child on either side of
her_. JOAN _languidly sinks into a chair and_ MILES _puts himself at her
right_. _A place at her left remains empty_. THOMAS _sits opposite_.
_Three places at the end of the table are left vacant_. _As they sit
down_, GEORGE, _wearing a new smock and neck handkerchief_, _comes in_.
EMILY. [_Beginning to help a dish_.] You need not think you’re to be
helped first, Clara, for all that the party is given for you, like. The
poor little children have been kept waiting a sad time for their supper,
first because you was such a while a having your head curled and puffed
out, and then ’twas Luke Jenner as didn’t come.
[CLARA _sits down at a place at the end of the table_. GEORGE _and_
MAGGIE _still remain standing_.
EMILY. [_Perceiving_ CLARA’S _movement_.] Well, I never did see
anything so forward. Who told you to sit yourself down along of your
betters, if you please, madam serving maid?
[GEORGE _comes involuntarily forward and stands behind_ CLARA’S _chair_.
CLARA _does not move_.
EMILY. Get you out of that there place this instant, do you hear?
[_Turning to_ MILES.] To see the way the young person acts one might
think as she fancied herself as something uncommon rare and high. But
you’ll not take any fool in, not you, for all that you like to play the
fine lady. Us can see through your game very clear, can’t us, Mr.
Hooper?
MILES. O certainly, to be sure, Missis Spring. No one who has the
privilege of being acquainted with a real lady of quality could be
mistook by any of the games played by this young person.
[CLARA _looks him gravely in the face without moving_.
EMILY. Get up, do you hear, and help Maggie pass the dishes!
THOMAS. [_Nervously_.] Nay, nay, ’twas my doing, Emily. I did tell the
wenches as they might sit their-selves along of we, just for th’ occasion
like.
EMILY. And who are you, if you please, giving orders and muddling about
like a lord in my kitchen?
THOMAS. [_Faintly_.] Come, Emily, I’m the master.
EMILY. And I, the mistress. Hear that, you piece of London impudence?
GEORGE. [_Comes forward_.] Master Luke be coming up the garden,
mistress.
[LUKE JENNER _enters_. _He goes straight up to_ JOAN _and holds out his
hand to her_, _and then to_ MILES.
LUKE. I do wish you happiness with all my heart, Miss Clara. Miles, my
lad, ’tis rare—rare pleased as I be to shake your hand this day.
EMILY. Come, come, Luke Jenner, you’ve been and kept us waiting more nor
half an hour. Can’t you sit yourself down and give other folk a chance
of eating their victuals quiet? There’s naught to make all this
giddle-gaddle about as I can see.
LUKE. [_Sitting down in the empty place by_ JOAN’S _side_.] Beg pardon,
mistress, I know I’m a bit late. But the victuals as are waited for do
have a better flavour to them nor those which be ate straight from the
pot like.
THOMAS. That’s true ’tis. And ’tis hunger as do make the best sauce.
[GEORGE _and_ MAGGIE _quietly seat themselves on either side of_ CLARA.
EMILY _is too busy dispensing the food to take any notice_. GEORGE
_hands plates and dishes to_ CLARA, _and silently cares for her comfort
throughout the meal_.
THOMAS. Well, Emily; well, Luke. I didn’t think to lose my little
sister afore she’d stopped a three days in the place. That I did not.
But I don’t grudge her to a fine prospering young man like friend Hooper,
no, I don’t.
EMILY. No one called upon you for a speech, Thomas. See if you can’t
make yourself of some use in passing the green stuff. [_Turning to_
LUKE.] We have two serving maids and a man, Mister Jenner, but they’re
to be allowed to act the quality to-day, so we’ve got to wait upon
ourselves.
LUKE. A man is never so well served as by his own two hands, mistress.
That’s my saying at home.
THOMAS. And a good one too, Luke, my boy, for most folk, but with me
’tis otherwise. I’ve got another pair of hands in the place as do for me
as well, nor better than my own.
EMILY. Yes, Thomas, I often wonders where you’d be without mine.
THOMAS. I wasn’t thinking of yourn, Emily. ’Tis George’s hands as I was
speaking of.
EMILY. [_Contemptuously_.] George! You’ll all find out your mistake
one day, Thomas.
MILES. [_To_ JOAN, _who has been nervously handling her knife and fork
and watching_ CLARA’S _movements furtively_.] My sweet Miss is not
shewing any appetite.
JOAN. I’m—I’m not used to country fare.
EMILY. O, I hear you, Clara. Thomas, this is very fine. Clara can’t
feed ’cause she’s not used to country fare! What next, I’d like to know!
ROBIN. [_Who has been watching_ JOAN.] Why does Aunt sometimes put her
knife in her mouth, Mother?
MILES. My good boy, ’tis plain you’ve never mixed among the quality or
you would know that each London season has its own new fashion of acting.
This summer ’tis the stylish thing to put on a countryfied mode at table.
JESSIE. Joan don’t eat like that, Mister Hooper.
MILES. Joan’s only a maid servant, Miss Jessie. You should learn to
distinguish between such people and fine ladles like your aunt.
JOAN. [_Forcing herself to be more animated_.] Give me some fruit,
Miles—I have no appetite to-day for heavy food. ’Tis far too warm.
MILES. As for me, the only food I require is the sweet honey of my
Missy’s voice.
THOMAS. Ah, ’tis a grand thing to be a young man, Miles Hooper. There
was a day when such things did come handy to my tongue, like.
EMILY. [_Sharply_.] I don’t seem to remember that day, Thomas.
THOMAS. [_Sheepishly_, _his look falling_.] Ah—’twas afore—afore our
courting time, Emily.
LUKE. [_Energetically_.] Prime weather for the hay, farmer. I count as
this dry will last until the whole of it be carried. [_A knock is heard
at the door_.
THOMAS. Now who’ll that be? Did you see anyone a-coming up the path,
Mother?
EMILY. Do you expect me to be carving of the fowls and a-looking out of
the window the same time, Thomas?
THOMAS. George, my lad, do you open the door and see who ’tis.
[JOAN _looks anxiously across the table at_ CLARA. _Then she drops her
spoon and fork and takes up her fan_, _using it violently whilst_ GEORGE
_slowly gets up and opens the door_. LORD LOVEL _is seen standing on the
threshold_.
LORD LOVEL. [_To_ GEORGE.] Kindly tell me, my man, is this the farm
they call Ox Lease?
GEORGE. Ah, that’s right enough.
LORD LOVEL. I’m sorry to break in upon a party like this, but I want to
see Miss Clara Spring if she is here.
THOMAS. [_Standing up_.] You’ve come at the very moment, master. This
be a giving in marriage supper. And ’tis Miss Clara, what’s only sister
to me, as is to be wed.
LORD LOVEL. Impossible, my good sir!
THOMAS. Ah, that’s it. Miles Hooper, he’s the happy man. If you be
come by Painswick High Street you’ll have seen his name up over the shop
door.
LORD LOVEL. Miss Clara—Miles Hooper—No, I can’t believe it.
THOMAS. [_Pointing towards_ JOAN _and_ MILES.] There they be—the both
of them. Turtle doves on the same branch. You’re right welcome, master,
to sit down along of we as one of the family on this occasion.
LORD LOVEL. [_Looking at_ JOAN _who has suddenly dropped her fan and is
leaning back with a look of supplication towards_ CLARA.] I must have
come to the wrong place—that’s not the Miss Clara Spring I know.
MILES. [_Bending over_ JOAN.] My sweet Missy has no acquaintance with
this gentleman, I am sure.
[LORD LOVEL _suddenly turns round and perceives_ CLARA _seated by_ MAGGIE
_at the table_. _He quickly goes towards her_, _holding out his hand_.
LORD LOVEL. Miss Clara. Tell me what is going on. [_Looking at her cap
and apron_.] Why have you dressed yourself like this?
THOMAS. Come, come. There seems to be some sort of a hitch here. The
young gentleman has very likely stopped a bit too long at the Spotted Cow
on his way up.
JOAN. [_Very faintly_, _looking at_ CLARA.] O do you stand by me now.
CLARA. [_Lays her hand on_ LORD LOVEL’S _arm_.] Come with me, my lord.
I think I can explain everything if you will only step outside with me.
Come—[_She leads him swiftly through the door which_ GEORGE _shuts behind
them_.]
[JOAN _leans back in her chair as though she were going to faint_.
THOMAS. Well, now—but that’s a smartish wench, getting him out so quiet,
like. George, you’d best step after them to see as the young man don’t
annoy her in any way.
EMILY. That young person can take good care of herself. Sit you down,
Thomas and George, and get on with your eating, if you can.
JESSIE. Why did he think Joan was our aunt, mother?
EMILY. ’Cause he was in that state when a man don’t know his right leg
from his left arm.
GEORGE. [_Who has remained standing_.] Look you here, Master Thomas—see
here mistress. ’Tis time as there was an end of this cursed play acting,
or whatever ’tis called.
EMILY. Play acting there never has been in my house, George, I’d like
for you to know.
GEORGE. O yes there have been, mistress. And ’tis time it was finished.
[_Pointing to_ JOAN.] You just take and ask that young person what she
do mean by tricking herself out in Miss Clara’s gowns and what not, and
by having herself called by Miss Clara’s own name.
MILES. [_Taking_ JOAN’S _hand in his_.] My sweet Miss must pay no
attention to the common fellow. I dare him to speak like that of my
little lady bride.
GEORGE. A jay bird in peacock’s feathers, that’s what ’tis. And she’s
took you all in, the every one of you.
JESSIE. O George, isn’t she really our aunt from London?
GEORGE. No, that she baint, Miss Jessie.
THOMAS. Come, come, my lad. I never knew you act so afore.
EMILY. ’Tis clear where he have spent his time this afternoon.
LUKE. Nay, nay, I never did see George inside of the Spotted Cow in all
the years I’ve known of him. George baint made to that shape.
ROBIN. Then who is Aunt Clara, George?
GEORGE. She who be just gone from out of the room, Master Robin, and
none other.
THOMAS. Come, George, this talk do sound so foolish.
GEORGE. I can’t help that, master. Foolish deeds do call for foolish
words, may be.
MILES. My pretty Miss is almost fainting, I declare. [_He pours out
water for_ JOAN _and bends affectionately over her_.] Put the drunken
fellow outside and let’s have an end of this.
GEORGE. [_Advancing_.] Yes, us’ll have an end to it very shortly. But
I be going to put a straight question to the maid first, and ’tis a
straight answer as her’ll have to give me in reply.
MILES. Not a word, not a word. Miss is sadly upset by your rude
manners.
GEORGE. Do you ask of the young lady but one thing, Master Hooper, and
then I’ll go when you will.
MILES. Well, my man, what’s that?
GEORGE. Do you get her to speak the name as was given she at baptism,
Mister Hooper.
MILES. This is madness. My pretty Miss shall not be teased by such a
question. Thomas, you’ll have to get this stupid fellow locked up, or
something.
GEORGE. [_Angrily_.] Her shall say it, if I stands here all night.
[JOAN _suddenly bends forward and hides her face in her hands_, _her form
shaken by violent weeping_. _The door opens and_ CLARA _enters followed
by_ LORD LOVEL. _She has taken off her cap and apron_.
JOAN. [_Raising her head and stretching out her hands to_ CLARA.] O
speak for me, mistress. Speak for me and help.
CLARA. I am Clara, she is Joan. Thomas, Emily, I pray you to forgive us
both for taking you in like this.
THOMAS. Well, I never did hear tell of such a thing.
EMILY. I’m not going to believe a word the young person says.
LORD LOVEL. She has told you but the truth, my good friends.
EMILY. And who are you, to put your tongue into the basin, I’d like to
know?
CLARA. This is the nephew of my dear godmother. Lord Lovel is his name.
EMILY. If you think I’m going to be took in with such nonsense, the more
fool you, I says.
LORD LOVEL. But all that Miss Clara tells you is true, Missis Spring.
She and her serving maid, for certain reasons of their own, agreed to
change parts for a few days.
THOMAS. [_Turning to_ JOAN.] Is this really so, my maid?
[JOAN _bows her head_, _her handkerchief still covering her face_.
THOMAS. [_To_ CLARA.] Who ever would have thought on such a thing?
CLARA. ’Twas a foolish enough thing, but no harm is done. Look up,
Joan, and do not cry so pitifully.
JOAN. [_Looking up at_ MILES.] You’ll never go and change towards me
now that we’re most as good as wed, will you, Mister Hooper?
MILES. [_Rising and speaking with cold deliberation_.] Ladies and
gentlemen, I have the honour to wish you all a very pleasant evening.
THOMAS. Come, come Miles, we be all a bit turned in the head, it seems.
But things’ll settle back to their right places if you gives them a
chance. Sit you down and take a drink of sommat.
EMILY. Don’t be so foolish, Thomas. As if a man what’s been stung by a
wasp would care to sit himself down on a hornet’s nest.
MILES. You are perfectly right, madam. This is no place for me. I have
been sported with. My good name has been treated as a jest.
JOAN. O Mister Hooper, ’twas my doing, all of it, but I did it for the
best, I did.
MILES. [_Going to the door_.] Thank you, my good woman. Next time you
want to play a little prank like this, I beg that you will select your
partner with more care. The name of Hooper is not a suitable one to toy
with, let me tell you.
ROBIN. Aren’t you going to marry her then, Mister Hooper?
MILES. I am not, Master Robin.
JESSIE. You said as you could tell a real lady by her ways, but you
couldn’t very well, could he, Mother?
[MILES, _covering his mortification with sarcastic bows made to the right
and left_, _goes out_. JOAN _leans back almost fainting in her chair_.
LUKE. [_Taking her hand_.] This is the finest hearing in all the world
for me, Miss—Miss Joan.
JOAN. O Mr. Jenner, how deep you must despise me.
LUKE. And that I’d never do, though I’m blest if I know why you did it.
CLARA. It was as much my fault as hers, Mister Jenner. There were
things that each of us wanted, and that we thought we might get, by
changing places, one with the other.
THOMAS. [_To_ CLARA.] Well, my maid, I’m blessed if I do know what you
was a hunting about for, dressed up as a serving wench.
CLARA. [_Turning a little towards_ GEORGE.] I thought to find something
which was mine when I was a little child, but which I lost.
JESSIE. O Georgie do know how to find things which is lost. ’Twas he as
brought back the yellow pullet when her had strayed off.
ROBIN. Yes. And ’twas George as did find your blue hair ribbon Aunt
Clara, when it was dropped in the hayfield.
JESSIE. I believe as Georgie knowed which of them was our aunt all the
time.
ROBIN. I believe it too.
THOMAS. Why, George, you sly dog, what put you on the scent, like?
GEORGE. ’Twas not one, but many things. And if you wants a clear proof
[_Turning to_ CLARA]—put back the laces of your sleeve, Miss Clara.
CLARA. What for, George?
GEORGE. Whilst you was a-doing of the taters, this morning, you did pull
up your sleeves. ’Twas then I held the proof. Not that ’twas needed for
me, like.
[CLARA _pushes up both her sleeves_, _and holds out her arms towards_
GEORGE.
GEORGE. [_Pointing to the scar_.] There ’tis—there’s where th’ old
gander have left his mark.
THE CHILDREN. [_Getting up_.] Where, where! O do let us see!
[_They run round to where_ CLARA _stands and look eagerly at the mark on
her arm which she shews to them_.
THOMAS. George, my lad, you baint th’ only one as can play fox.
EMILY. Don’t you be so set up as to think as you can, Thomas. For a
more foolish figure of a goose never was cut. A man might tell when
’twas his own sister, if so be as he had his full senses upon him.
THOMAS. Never you mind, Emily. What I says to George is, he baint th’
only fox. How now, my lad?
GEORGE. I don’t see what you be driving at, master.
THOMAS. [_Slyly_.] What about that bit of blue ribbon, George?
CLARA. Yes, Thomas. Ask Georgie if he will give it back to me.
GEORGE. [_Stepping forward till he is by_ CLARA’S _side_.] No, and that
I will not do. ’Tis little enough as I holds, but what little, I’ll keep
it.
CLARA. [_To_ GEORGE.] Those words are like a frail bridge on which I
can stand for a moment. Georgie, do you remember the days when you used
to lead me by the hand into the deep parts of the wood, lifting me over
the briars and the brambles so that I should not be hurt by their thorns?
GEORGE. Hark you here, Clara. This once I’ll speak. I never had but
one true love, and that was a little maid what would run through the
woods and over all the meadows, her hand in mine. I learnt she the note
of every bird. And when th’ evening was come, us would watch together
till th’ old mother badger did get from out of her hole, and start
hunting in the long grasses.
CLARA. [_Taking_ GEORGE’S _hand_.] Then, Georgie, there was no need for
the disguise that I put upon myself.
GEORGE. Do you think as the moon can hide her light when there baint no
cloud upon the sky, Clara?
CLARA. Georgie, I went in fear of what this gold and silver might raise
up between you and me.
THOMAS. That’s all finished and done with now, my maid. If I’d a
hundred sisters, George should have the pick of them, he should.
EMILY. Thank you. Thomas. One of your sisters is about enough.
LUKE. [_Who has been sitting with_ JOAN’S _hand in his_.] Hark you
here, mistress. There’s many a cloudy morning turns out a sunshiny day.
Baint that a true saying, Joan?
JOAN. [_Looking up radiantly_.] O that it is, dear Luke.
LORD LOVEL. Miss Clara, it seems that there is nothing more to be said.
EMILY. And that’s the most sensible thing as has been spoke this long
while. Thomas, your sister favours you in being a poor, grizzling sort
of a muddler. She might have took up with this young man, who has a very
respectable appearance.
LORD LOVEL. [_Coming forward to_ GEORGE _and shaking his hand_.] I’m
proud to make your acquaintance, sir.
EMILY. [_Rising angrily_.] Come Thomas, come Luke, come Clara. Us
might be a barn full of broody hens the way we be set around of this here
table. ’Twill be midnight afore the things is cleared away and washed
up.
THOMAS. What if it be, Emily. ’Tisn’t very often as I gets the chance
of minding how ’twas in times gone past. Ah, I was a young man in those
days, too, I was.
EMILY. And ’tis a rare old addle head as you be got now, Thomas.
JESSIE. [_Slipping her hand into_ THOMAS’S.] O do let us sit up till
midnight, Dad.
ROBIN. I shall eat a smartish lot more if we does.
[_Curtain_.]
MY MAN JOHN
CHARACTERS
MRS. GARDNER.
WILLIAM, _her son_.
JOHN, _his farm hand_.
SUSAN, _their maid_.
JULIA, _the owner of Luther’s Farm_.
LAURA, CHRIS, NAT, TANSIE, _gipsies_.
ACT I.—Scene 1.
_The garden of the Road Farm_. _To the right an arbour covered with
roses_. MRS. GARDNER _is seated in it_, _knitting_. WILLIAM _is tying
up flowers and watering them_.
MRS. GARDNER. And you have come to a ripe age when ’tis the plain duty
of a man to turn himself towards matrimony, William.
WILLIAM. ’Tis a bit of quiet that I’m after, Mother.
MRS. GARDNER. Quiet! ’tis a good shaking up as you want, William. Why,
you have got as set in your ways as last season’s jelly.
WILLIAM. Then let me bide so. ’Tis all I ask.
MRS. GARDNER. No, William. I’m got to be an old woman now, and ’tis
time that I had someone at my side to help in the house-keeping and to
share the work.
WILLIAM. What’s Susan for, if ’tisn’t to do that?
MRS. GARDNER. Susan? As idle a piece of goods as ever was seen on a
summer’s day! No. ’Tisn’t a serving maid that I was thinking of, but
someone who should be of more account in the house. ’Tis a daughter that
I’m wanting, William, and I’ve picked out the one who is to my taste.
WILLIAM. Then you’ve done more than I have, Mother.
MRS. GARDNER. ’Tis the young person whom Luther Smith has left his farm
and all his money to. I’ve got my eye on her for you, William.
WILLIAM. Then you’ll please to put your eye somewhere else, Mother, for
I’ve seen them, and they don’t suit me.
MRS. GARDNER. Come, this is news, William. Pray where did you meet?
WILLIAM. ’Twas when I was in church last Sunday. In they came, the two
young maids from Luthers, like a couple of gallinie fowls, the way they
did step up over the stones and shake the plumes of them this way and
that. I don’t hold with fancy tricks. I never could abide them. No
foreign wenches for me. And that’s about all.
MRS. GARDNER. ’Tis true they are from town, but none the worse for that,
William. You have got sadly rude and cumbersome in your ways, or you
wouldn’t feel as you do towards a suitable young person. ’Tis from
getting about with John so much, I think.
WILLIAM. Now look you here, Mother, I’ve got used to my own ways, and
when a man’s got set in his own ways, ’tis best to leave him there. I’m
past the age for marrying, and you ought to know this better than anyone.
MRS. GARDNER. I know that ’tis a rare lot of foolishness that you do
talk, William, seeing as you’re not a year past thirty yet. But if you
can’t be got to wed for love of a maid, perhaps you’ll do so for love of
a purse, when ’tis fairly filled.
WILLIAM. There’s always been enough for you and me so far, Mother.
MRS. GARDNER. Ah, but that won’t last for ever. I’m got an old woman,
and I can’t do with the dairy nor the poultry as I was used to do. And
things have not the same prices to them as ’twas a few years gone by.
And last year’s season was the worst that I remember.
WILLIAM. So ’twas. But so long as there’s a roof over our heads and a
loaf of bread and a bit of garden for me to work on, where’s the harm,
Mother?
MRS. GARDNER. O you put me out of all patience, William. Where’s the
rent to come from if we go on like this? And the clothing, and the food?
And John’s wages, and your flower seeds, if it comes to that, for you
have got terrible wasteful over the flowers.
WILLIAM. I wish you’d take it quieter, Mother. Look at you bed of musk,
’tis a grand smell that comes up from it all around.
MRS. GARDNER. No, William. I’ve no eye for musk, nor nose to smell at
it either till you’ve spoken the word that I require.
WILLIAM. Best let things bide as they are, Mother.
MRS. GARDNER. I’ll leave you no rest till you do as I wish, William.
I’m got an old woman, and ’tis hard I should be denied in aught that I’ve
set my heart upon.
WILLIAM. Please to set it upon something different, Mother, for I’m not
a marrying man, and John he’ll tell you the same thing.
MRS. GARDNER. John! I’m sick of the very name of him. I can’t think
how ’tis that you can lower yourself by being so close with a common farm
hand, William.
WILLIAM. Ah, ’twould be a rare hard matter to find the equal to John,
Mother. ’Tis of gold all through, and every bit of him, that he is made.
You don’t see many like John these days, that’s the truth.
MRS. GARDNER. Well, then, John, won’t be here much longer, for we shan’t
have anything to give him if things go on like this.
WILLIAM. I’d wed forty wives sooner than lose John—and that I would.
MRS. GARDNER. I’m not asking you to wed forty. ’Tis only one.
WILLIAM. And that one?
MRS. GARDNER. The young person who’s got Luther’s farm. Her name is
Julia.
WILLIAM. [_Leaving his flower border and walking up and down
thoughtfully_.] Would she be the one with the cherry colour ribbons to
her gown?
MRS. GARDNER. I’m sure I don’t know. I was not at church last Sunday.
WILLIAM. Or t’other one in green?
MRS. GARDNER. You appear to have used your eyes pretty well, William.
WILLIAM. O, I can see a smartish bit about me when I choose.
MRS. GARDNER. T’other wench is but the housekeeper.
WILLIAM. Where did you get that from?
MRS. GARDNER. ’Twas Susan who told me. She got it off someone down in
the village.
WILLIAM. Well, which of the maids would have had the cherry-coloured
ribbons to her, Mother?
MRS. GARDNER. I’m sure I don’t know, but if you go up there courting
this afternoon, may happen that you’ll find out.
WILLIAM. This afternoon? O, that’s much too sudden like.
MRS. GARDNER. Not a bit of it. Recollect, your fancy has been set on
her since Sunday.
WILLIAM. Come, Mother, you can’t expect a man to jump into the river all
of a sudden like this.
MRS. GARDNER. I expect you to go up there this very day and to commence
telling her of your feelings.
WILLIAM. But I’ve got no feelings that I can tell her of, Mother.
MRS. GARDNER. Then you’ll please to find some, William.
WILLIAM. ’Tis a thing that in all my life I’ve never done as to go
visiting of a strange wench of an afternoon.
MRS. GARDNER. Then ’tis time you did begin.
WILLIAM. And what’s more, I’ll not do it, neither.
MRS. GARDNER. Then I must tell John that we have no further need of his
services, for where the money to pay him is to come from, I don’t know.
[_She rolls up her knitting and rises_.
WILLIAM. Stop a moment, Mother—stop a moment. Maybe ’twon’t be so bad
when I’ve got more used to the idea. You’ve pitched it upon me so sudden
like.
MRS. GARDNER. Rent day has pitched upon me more sudden, William.
WILLIAM. Look you, Mother, I’ll get and turn it about in my mind a bit.
And, maybe, I’ll talk it over with John. I can’t do more, can I now?
MRS. GARDNER. Talk it over with whom you please, William. But remember
’tis this very afternoon that you have to start courting. I’ve laid your
best clothes out all ready on your bed.
WILLIAM. [_Sighing heavily_.] O then I count there’s no way out of it.
But how am I to bring it off? ’Tis that I’d like to know.
MRS. GARDNER. Maybe your man will be able to give you some suitable
advice. Such things are beyond me, I’m afraid.
[_She gathers up her work things_, _and with a contemptuous look at her
son_, _she goes slowly out of the garden_.
[WILLIAM _remains on the path lost in perturbed thought_. _Suddenly he
goes to the gate and calls loudly_.
WILLIAM. John, John!
JOHN. [_From afar_.] Yes, master.
WILLIAM. [_Calling_.] Come you here, John, as quick as you can run.
JOHN. That I will, master.
[JOHN _hurries into the garden_.
WILLIAM. John, I’m powerful upset.
JOHN. Mistress’s fowls bain’t got among the flowers again, be they,
Master William?
WILLIAM. No, no, John. ’Tisn’t so bad as that. But I’m in a smartish
fix, I can tell you.
JOHN. How’s that, master?
WILLIAM. John, did you ever go a’courting?
JOHN. Well, master, that’s a thing to ask a man!
WILLIAM. ’Tis a terrible serious matter, John. Did you ever go?
JOHN. Courting?
WILLIAM. Yes.
JOHN. Why, I count as I have went a score of times, master.
WILLIAM. A score of times, John! But that was before you were got to
the age you are now?
JOHN. Before that, and now, master.
WILLIAM. And now, John?
JOHN. To be sure, master.
WILLIAM. Then you know how ’tis done?
JOHN. Ah, that I does, master.
WILLIAM. Well, John, you’re the man for
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