“Yes,” returned Bessy’s mother innocently. “Such a gentleman, isn’t he?”
“There’s one thing I forgot,” the old man said suddenly. “I might ha’ asked ’em to take a drop o’ beer ’fore they went.”
“They had some while they was waitin’ for tea. An’—an’ I don’t think there’s much left.” She dragged a large tapped jar from under the breeding-box at the window, and it was empty.
“Ah!” was all the old man’s comment, as he surveyed the jar thoughtfully.
Presently he turned into the back-house and emerged with a tin pot and a brush. “I’m a goin’ treaclin’ a bit,” he said. “Come, Johnny?”
The boy pulled his cap from his pocket, fetched a lantern, and was straightway ready, while Bessy sat to her belated tea.
The last pale light lay in the west, and the evening offered up an oblation of sweet smells. All things that feed by night were out, and nests were silent save for once and again a sleepy twitter. Every moment another star peeped, and then one more. The boy and the old man walked up the slope among the trees, pausing now at one, now at another, to daub the bark with the mixture of rum and treacle that was in the pot.
“It’s always best to be careful where you treacle when there’s holiday folk about,” said Johnny’s grandfather. “They don’t understand it. Often I’ve treacled a log or a stump and found a couple sittin’ on it when I came back—with new dresses, and sich. It’s no good explainin’—they think it’s all done for practical jokin’. It’s best to go on an’ take no notice. I’ve heard ’em say:—’Don’t the country smell lovely?’—meanin’ the smell o’ the rum an’ treacle they was a-sittin’ on. But when they find it—lor, the language I have heard! Awful! . . . ”
The boy was quiet almost all the round. Presently he said, “Gran’dad, do you really like that likeness I made of mother?”
“Like it, my boy? Why o’ course. It’s a nobby picture!”