A FRUGAL SUPPER.
Mrs. Ogden was sitting up for her son Jacob that night, and she had prepared him a little supper of toasted cheese. She had no positive knowledge of the object of his journey to Sootythorn. She was aware that Wenderholme would be sold by auction one of these days, but she did not know exactly whether her son intended to bid for it. There was not much talk generally between the two about the great financial matters—their money-talk ran chiefly upon minutiæ, such as the wages of a servant or the purchase of a cow.
Notwithstanding the great increase of their riches, the mother and son still lived at Milend in their old simple manner. Mrs. Ogden still made all Jacob's shirts and stockings, and still did a great deal of the cooking. The habits of her life had been formed many years before, and she could not endure to depart from them, even when the departure would have been an increase to her comfort. Thus she continued to keep only one girl as a servant, and did most of the work of the house with her own hands. Her happiness depended upon abundance and regularity of occupation; and she acted much more wisely in keeping up the activity of her habits, even though these habits may have been in themselves somewhat inconsistent with her pecuniary position, than she would have done if she had exposed herself to the certain ennui of attempting to play the fine lady.
The girl was gone to bed when Jacob Ogden came back from Sootythorn, and his mother was seated by the kitchen-fire, darning one of his stockings and superintending the toasted cheese. The kitchen at Milend was a clean and spacious room, with stone floor nicely sanded, and plenty of hams and oat-cakes hanging from the ceiling. There was a great clock too in one corner, with shining case, and a rubicund figure above the dial, by which were represented the phases of the moon.
The old lady had laid out a small supper-table in the kitchen, and when Jacob came back she told him he was to have his supper there, "for th' fire 'ad gone out i' th' parlor."
So he sat down to eat his toasted cheese, which was a favorite supper of his, and whilst he was eating, his mother took a little oatmeal-porridge with treacle. She rather feared the effects of toasted cheese, believing porridge to be more easily digested.
Neither one nor the other said any thing about the object of the journey to Sootythorn during supper, and there was nothing in Jacob's face to indicate either extraordinary news or unusual elation. In fact, so accustomed was Jacob Ogden to purchasing estates, that he had little of the feeling of elation which attends the young beginner; and after that momentary triumph at Garley's Hotel, any excitement which he may have felt had subsided, and left in his mind no other feeling than the old spirit of calculation. It was the very first time in his life that he had gone beyond the principle of investment, and paid something over and above for the mere gratification of his fancy or his pride, and his reflections were not of unmixed self-congratulation. "Anyhow," he said to himself, "it'll be Ogden of Wendrum, J.P."
However late Jacob Ogden took his supper, he must necessarily smoke his pipe after it (one pipe), and drink his glass of grog. His mother usually went to bed as soon as the water boiled, but this evening she kept moving about in the kitchen, first finding one little thing to set to rights, and then another. At last she stood still in the middle of the floor, and said,—
"Our Jacob!"
"What, mother?"
"Wherestabeen?"[21]
"Why, you knoan that weel enough, I reckon. I'n been Sootythorn road."
"And what 'as ta been doin'?"
"Nowt nobbut what's reet."[22]
"What 'as there been at Sootythorn?"
"There's been a sale."
"'An[23] they been sellin' a mill?"
"Noah."
"And what 'an they been sellin'?"
"Wendrum 'All."
"And who's bout it?"
"I have."
"And what 'an ye gin for't?"
"Fifty thousand."
"Why, it's ta mich by th' 'auve!"
"'Appen."
Notwithstanding the laconic form of the conversation, Mrs. Ogden felt a strong desire to talk over the matter rather more fully, and to that end seated herself on the other side the kitchen-fire.
"Jacob," she said, as she looked him steadily in the face, "I never knew thee part wi' thy brass b'out five pussent. How will ta get five pussent out o' Wendrum 'All for the fifty thousand?"
"Why, mother, there's investments for brass, and there's investments for pasition. I dunnot reckon to get so much interest out o' Wendrum, but it'll be Ogden o' Wendrum, J.P."
"Well, now, Jacob, that's what I call spendin' your money for pride!" Mrs. Ogden said this solemnly, and in as pure English as she could command.
"Why, and what if it is? There's plenty more where that coom from. What signifies?"
"And shall you be going to live at Wendrum 'All, Jacob? I willn't go there—indeed I willn't; I'll stop at Milend. Why, you'll require ever so many servants. They tell me there's twenty fires to light! And what will become o' the mill when you're over at Wendrum?"
Mrs. Ogden's face wore an expression of trouble and dissatisfaction. Her eyebrows rose higher than usual, and her forehead displayed more wrinkles. But Jacob knew that this was her way, and that in her inmost soul she was not a little gratified at the idea of being the Lady of Wenderholme. For as an ambitious ecclesiastic, promoted to the episcopal throne, rejoices not openly, but affects a decent unwillingness and an overwhelming sense of the responsibilities of his office, so Mrs. Ogden, at every advance in her fortunes, sang her own little nolumus episcopari.
"Why, it's thirty miles off, is Wendrum," she went on, complainingly; "and there's no railway; and you'll never get there and back in a day. One thing's plain, you'll never manage the mill and the estate too."
"All the land between this 'ere mill and Wendrum 'All is mine," said Jacob, with conscious dignity; "and I mean to make a road, mother, across the hill from the mill to Wendrum 'All. It'll be nine mile exactly. And I'll have a telegraph from th' countin'-house to my sittin'-room at Wendrum. And I shall take little Jacob into partnership, and when one Jacob's i' one spot t'other Jacob 'll be i' t'other spot. Recklect there's two Jacobs, mother."
"Well, I reckon you'll do as you like, whatever I say. But I'll go non to Wendrum. I'll stop 'ere at Shayton while I live (it 'appen willn't be for long)—I'm a Shayton woman bred and born."
"Nonsense, mother. You'll go to Wendrum, and ride over to Milend in your carriage!"
Mrs. Ogden's face assumed an expression of unfeigned amazement.
"A cayridge! a cayridge! Why, what is th' lad thinkin' about now! I think we shall soon be ridin' into prison. Did ever anybody hear the like?"
There is a curious superstition about carriage-keeping which Mrs. Ogden fully shared. It is thought to be the most extravagant, though the most respectable, way of spending money; and an annual outlay which, if dissipated in eating and drinking, or Continental tours, would excite no remark, is considered extravagance if spent on a comfortable vehicle to drive about in one's own neighborhood. Thus Mrs. Ogden considered her son's proposition as revolutionary—as an act of secession from the simplicity of faith and practice which had been their rule of life and the tradition of their family. In short, it produced much the same effect upon her mind as if the Shayton parson had proposed to buy a gilded dalmatic and chasuble.
"There's folk," said Mrs. Ogden, with the air of an oracle—"there's folk as are foolish when they are young, and grow wiser as they advance in years. But there's other folk that is wise in their youth, to be foolish and extravagant at an age when they ought to know better." She evidently was losing her faith in the prudence of her son Jacob. When they had parted for the night, and Mrs. Ogden got into her bed, the last thing she uttered as she stood with her night-cap on, in her long white night-gown, was the following brief ejaculation:—
"A cayridge! a cayridge! What are we comin' to now!"
But the last thing uncle Jacob thought, as he settled his head on his lonely pillow, was, "It'll be Ogden of Wendrum, J.P."