The Trumpet-Major

  VIII. ANNE MAKES A CIRCUIT OF THE CAMP

  When Anne was crossing the last field, she saw approaching her an oldwoman with wrinkled cheeks, who surveyed the earth and its inhabitantsthrough the medium of brass-rimmed spectacles. Shaking her head at Annetill the glasses shone like two moons, she said, 'Ah, ah; I zeed ye! IfI had only kept on my short ones that I use for reading the Collect andGospel I shouldn't have zeed ye; but thinks I, I be going out o' doors,and I'll put on my long ones, little thinking what they'd show me. Ay, Ican tell folk at any distance with these--'tis a beautiful pair for outo' doors; though my short ones be best for close work, such as darning,and catching fleas, that's true.'

  'What have you seen, Granny Seamore?' said Anne.

  'Fie, fie, Miss Nancy! you know,' said Granny Seamore, shaking her headstill. 'But he's a fine young feller, and will have all his uncle'smoney when 'a's gone.' Anne said nothing to this, and looking ahead witha smile passed Granny Seamore by.

  Festus, the subject of the remark, was at this time aboutthree-and-twenty, a fine fellow as to feet and inches, and of aremarkably warm tone in skin and hair. Symptoms of beard and whiskershad appeared upon him at a very early age, owing to his persistent use ofthe razor before there was any necessity for its operation. The braveboy had scraped unseen in the out-house, in the cellar, in the wood-shed,in the stable, in the unused parlour, in the cow-stalls, in the barn, andwherever he could set up his triangular bit of looking-glass withoutobservation, or extemporize a mirror by sticking up his hat on theoutside of a window-pane. The result now was that, did he neglect to usethe instrument he once had trifled with, a fine rust broke out upon hiscountenance on the first day, a golden lichen on the second, and a fierystubble on the third to a degree which admitted of no furtherpostponement.

  His disposition divided naturally into two, the boastful and thecantankerous. When Festus put on the big pot, as it is classicallycalled, he was quite blinded ipso facto to the diverting effect of thatmood and manner upon others; but when disposed to be envious orquarrelsome he was rather shrewd than otherwise, and could do some prettystrokes of satire. He was both liked and abused by the girls who knewhim, and though they were pleased by his attentions, they never failed toridicule him behind his back. In his cups (he knew those vessels, thoughonly twenty-three) he first became noisy, then excessively friendly, andthen invariably nagging. During childhood he had made himself renownedfor his pleasant habit of pouncing down upon boys smaller and poorer thanhimself, and knocking their birds' nests out of their hands, oroverturning their little carts of apples, or pouring water down theirbacks; but his conduct became singularly the reverse of aggressive themoment the little boys' mothers ran out to him, brandishing brooms,frying-pans, skimmers, and whatever else they could lay hands on by wayof weapons. He then fled and hid behind bushes, under faggots, or inpits till they had gone away; and on one such occasion was known to creepinto a badger's hole quite out of sight, maintaining that post with greatfirmness and resolution for two or three hours. He had brought morevulgar exclamations upon the tongues of respectable parents in his nativeparish than any other boy of his time. When other youngsters snowballedhim he ran into a place of shelter, where he kneaded snowballs of hisown, with a stone inside, and used these formidable missiles in returningtheir pleasantry. Sometimes he got fearfully beaten by boys his own age,when he would roar most lustily, but fight on in the midst of his tears,blood, and cries.

  He was early in love, and had at the time of the story suffered from theravages of that passion thirteen distinct times. He could not lovelightly and gaily; his love was earnest, cross-tempered, and even savage.It was a positive agony to him to be ridiculed by the object of hisaffections, and such conduct drove him into a frenzy if persisted in. Hewas a torment to those who behaved humbly towards him, cynical with thosewho denied his superiority, and a very nice fellow towards those who hadthe courage to ill-use him.

  This stalwart gentleman and Anne Garland did not cross each other's pathsagain for a week. Then her mother began as before about the newspaper,and, though Anne did not much like the errand, she agreed to go for it onMrs. Garland pressing her with unusual anxiety. Why her mother was sopersistent on so small a matter quite puzzled the girl; but she put onher hat and started.

  As she had expected, Festus appeared at a stile over which she sometimeswent for shortness' sake, and showed by his manner that he awaited her.When she saw this she kept straight on, as if she would not enter thepark at all.

  'Surely this is your way?' said Festus.

  'I was thinking of going round by the road,' she said.

  'Why is that?'

  She paused, as if she were not inclined to say. 'I go that way when thegrass is wet,' she returned at last.

  'It is not wet now,' he persisted; 'the sun has been shining on it thesenine hours.' The fact was that the way by the path was less open than bythe road, and Festus wished to walk with her uninterrupted. 'But, ofcourse, it is nothing to me what you do.' He flung himself from thestile and walked away towards the house.

  Anne, supposing him really indifferent, took the same way, upon which heturned his head and waited for her with a proud smile.

  'I cannot go with you,' she said decisively.

  'Nonsense, you foolish girl! I must walk along with you down to thecorner.'

  'No, please, Mr. Derriman; we might be seen.'

  'Now, now--that's shyness!' he said jocosely.

  'No; you know I cannot let you.'

  'But I must.'

  'But I do not allow it.'

  'Allow it or not, I will.'

  'Then you are unkind, and I must submit,' she said, her eyes brimmingwith tears.

  'Ho, ho; what a shame of me! My wig, I won't do any such thing for theworld,' said the repentant yeoman. 'Haw, haw; why, I thought your "goaway" meant "come on," as it does with so many of the women I meet,especially in these clothes. Who was to know you were so confoundedlyserious?'

  As he did not go Anne stood still and said nothing.

  'I see you have a deal more caution and a deal less good-nature than Iever thought you had,' he continued emphatically.

  'No, sir; it is not any planned manner of mine at all,' she saidearnestly. 'But you will see, I am sure, that I could not go down to thehall with you without putting myself in a wrong light.'

  'Yes; that's it, that's it. I am only a fellow in the yeomanry cavalry--aplain soldier, I may say; and we know what women think of such: that theyare a bad lot--men you mustn't speak to for fear of losing yourcharacter--chaps you avoid in the roads--chaps that come into a houselike oxen, daub the stairs wi' their boots, stain the furniture wi' theirdrink, talk rubbish to the servants, abuse all that's holy and righteous,and are only saved from being carried off by Old Nick because they arewanted for Boney.'

  'Indeed, I didn't know you were thought so bad of as that,' said shesimply.

  'What! don't my uncle complain to you of me? You are a favourite of thathandsome, nice old gaffer's, I know.'

  'Never.'

  'Well, what do we think of our nice trumpet-major, hey?'

  Anne closed her mouth up tight, built it up, in fact, to show that noanswer was coming to that question.

  'O now, come, seriously, Loveday is a good fellow, and so is his father.'

  'I don't know.'

  'What a close little rogue you are! There is no getting anything out ofyou. I believe you would say "I don't know," to every mortal question,so very discreet as you are. Upon my heart, there are some women whowould say "I don't know," to "Will ye marry me?"'

  The brightness upon Anne's cheek and in her eyes during this remarkshowed that there was a fair quantity of life and warmth beneath thediscretion he complained of. Having spoken thus, he drew aside that shemight pass, and bowed very low. Anne formally inclined herself and wenton.

  She had been at vexation point all the time that he was present, from ahaunting sense that he would not have spoken to her so freely had shebeen a youn
g woman with thriving male relatives to keep forward admirersin check. But she had been struck, now as at their previous meeting,with the power she possessed of working him up either to irritation or tocomplacency at will; and this consciousness of being able to play uponhim as upon an instrument disposed her to a humorous considerateness, andmade her tolerate even while she rebuffed him.

  When Anne got to the hall the farmer, as usual, insisted upon her readingwhat he had been unable to get through, and held the paper tightly in hisskinny hand till she had agreed. He sent her to a hard chair that shecould not possibly injure to the extent of a pennyworth by sitting in ita twelvemonth, and watched her from the outer angle of his near eye whileshe bent over the paper. His look might have been suggested by the sightthat he had witnessed from his window on the last occasion of her visit,for it partook of the nature of concern. The old man was afraid of hisnephew, physically and morally, and he began to regard Anne as a fellow-sufferer under the same despot. After this sly and curious gaze at herhe withdrew his eye again, so that when she casually lifted her own therewas nothing visible but his keen bluish profile as before.

  When the reading was about half-way through, the door behind them opened,and footsteps crossed the threshold. The farmer diminished perceptiblyin his chair, and looked fearful, but pretended to be absorbed in thereading, and quite unconscious of an intruder. Anne felt the presence ofthe swashing Festus, and stopped her reading.

  'Please go on, Miss Anne,' he said, 'I am not going to speak a word.' Hewithdrew to the mantelpiece and leaned against it at his ease.

  'Go on, do ye, maidy Anne,' said Uncle Benjy, keeping down his tremblingsby a great effort to half their natural extent.

  Anne's voice became much lower now that there were two listeners, and hermodesty shrank somewhat from exposing to Festus the appreciativemodulations which an intelligent interest in the subject drew from herwhen unembarrassed. But she still went on that he might not suppose herto be disconcerted, though the ensuing ten minutes was one ofdisquietude. She knew that the bothering yeoman's eyes were travellingover her from his position behind, creeping over her shoulders, up to herhead, and across her arms and hands. Old Benjy on his part knew the samething, and after sundry endeavours to peep at his nephew from the cornerof his eye, he could bear the situation no longer.

  'Do ye want to say anything to me, nephew?' he quaked.

  'No, uncle, thank ye,' said Festus heartily. 'I like to stay here,thinking of you and looking at your back hair.'

  The nervous old man writhed under this vivisection, and Anne read on;till, to the relief of both, the gallant fellow grew tired of hisamusement and went out of the room. Anne soon finished her paragraph androse to go, determined never to come again as long as Festus haunted theprecincts. Her face grew warmer as she thought that he would be sure towaylay her on her journey home to-day.

  On this account, when she left the house, instead of going in thecustomary direction, she bolted round to the further side, through thebushes, along under the kitchen-garden wall, and through a door leadinginto a rutted cart-track, which had been a pleasant gravelled drive whenthe fine old hall was in its prosperity. Once out of sight of thewindows she ran with all her might till she had quitted the park by aroute directly opposite to that towards her home. Why she was soseriously bent upon doing this she could hardly tell but the instinct torun was irresistible.

  It was necessary now to clamber over the down to the left of the camp,and make a complete circuit round the latter--infantry, cavalry, sutlers,and all--descending to her house on the other side. This tremendous walkshe performed at a rapid rate, never once turning her head, and avoidingevery beaten track to keep clear of the knots of soldiers taking a walk.When she at last got down to the levels again she paused to fetch breath,and murmured, 'Why did I take so much trouble? He would not, after all,have hurt me.'

  As she neared the mill an erect figure with a blue body and white thighsdescended before her from the down towards the village, and went past themill to a stile beyond, over which she usually returned to her house.Here he lingered. On coming nearer Anne discovered this person to beTrumpet-major Loveday; and not wishing to meet anybody just now Annepassed quickly on, and entered the house by the garden door.

  'My dear Anne, what a time you have been gone!' said her mother.

  'Yes, I have been round by another road.'

  'Why did you do that?'

  Anne looked thoughtful and reticent, for her reason was almost too sillya one to confess. 'Well, I wanted to avoid a person who is very busytrying to meet me--that's all,' she said.

  Her mother glanced out of the window. 'And there he is, I suppose,' shesaid, as John Loveday, tired of looking for Anne at the stile, passed thehouse on his way to his father's door. He could not help casting hiseyes towards their window, and, seeing them, he smiled.

  Anne's reluctance to mention Festus was such that she did not correct hermother's error, and the dame went on: 'Well, you are quite right, mydear. Be friendly with him, but no more at present. I have heard ofyour other affair, and think it is a very wise choice. I am sure youhave my best wishes in it, and I only hope it will come to a point.'

  'What's that?' said the astonished Anne.

  'You and Mr. Festus Derriman, dear. You need not mind me; I have knownit for several days. Old Granny Seamore called here Saturday, and toldme she saw him coming home with you across Park Close last week, when youwent for the newspaper; so I thought I'd send you again to-day, and giveyou another chance.'

  'Then you didn't want the paper--and it was only for that!'

  'He's a very fine young fellow; he looks a thorough woman's protector.'

  'He may look it,' said Anne.

  'He has given up the freehold farm his father held at Pitstock, and livesin independence on what the land brings him. And when Farmer Derrimandies, he'll have all the old man's, for certain. He'll be worth tenthousand pounds, if a penny, in money, besides sixteen horses, cart andhack, a fifty-cow dairy, and at least five hundred sheep.'

  Anne turned away, and instead of informing her mother that she had beenrunning like a doe to escape the interesting heir-presumptive alluded to,merely said 'Mother, I don't like this at all.'