“He was quite agreeable about it, Lancelot—porcelain on legs, nickel-plated hot and cold, you know! I really hadn’t to hint more than twice! That led on, of course, to the Perils to Plumbers—my dear boy, how often have I told you that I never ask? He’s sending the cheque to-night. You don’t think, Miss Shaw, that your charming father——? Really, Lancelot, you needn’t bite my head off! You’re not a bit grateful about the bath, and I don’t agree with you that the old one was all right. I knew I should get a present to-day, because I put on my skirt wrong side out. That always means luck! It was rather awkward, because the wrong side of the stuff doesn’t go with the coat, and the picoted seams looked rather queer—I saw people staring, on the stand—but I’m glad I stuck to it! If I’d changed, I shouldn’t have got the bath.”

Dandy listened vaguely to the chattering voice, thinking of her father, happily mounted on his favourite hobby. He would love looking after Stubbs, and they would spend the evening forming plans for his regeneration. She had a touch of tenderness for the impossible Stubbs; he had unintentionally given her this blissful ride in the rain. When Helwise stopped for a second, she listened to the hoofs and to Lanty’s little clicks and calls of encouragement. She had heard him define horse-travelling as “company and music.” She remembered it now, and had music in her heart to match. And so, in hearing it, forgot to listen to Helwise altogether.

And for a whole week the County talked of Hamer, and went about prating of Bdelloidaceæ as if they bred them, and looked up rotiferous information on the quiet, in order to confound each other’s ignorance. The wives called at Watters and filled the card-tray, and the postman staggered under letters of invitation. Hamer became known as “sound,” “useful,” “a man at a pinch,” “a dashed good sort all round, don’t you know!” and every club in the district fought to own him. He was quite pleased about it all, and never guessed that his impulsive piece of “tramming” had worked the transformation. Somebody in a hole needing pulling out was all that Hamer wanted to make him happy, and he was seldom out of a job. He welcomed the new friends as he had welcomed the grinders and leeches, and opened to them his heart and his pocket.

That was how Hamer became “county.”

CHAPTER XIV
THE OLD ORDER

Seated at his table in the window of the “Duke,” Lancaster could see the farmers come jogging into Sandwath, rounding the dangerous corner with a loose rein, and, as often as not, a head turned in the opposite direction. There were few dreary faces among them, for the late year had been a good one, with heavy crops and the right sort of weather, and no disease to play havoc with stock. He watched them disappear into the stable-yard, and from thence drift across to the Bank, presently to drift back to the “Duke” for their receipts. It was the last of the three January rent-audits, Bluecaster, Witham and Sandwath; the last, the smallest, and far the most enjoyable. The others, where the numbers ran in each case to over a hundred, were too big, too busy, too long; but to-day there were only the marsh-men and some from nearer home, including Wild Duck, counting barely forty, all told. Here, everybody knew his neighbour, and the tenants were mostly of long holding, so that the half-yearly meeting was more like a gathering of a clan than a business convocation. He knew precisely the time-worn joke that would herald most of them, together with the equally hoary grievance; just as he knew the ancient answer that would spring to his lips of its own accord. He was not bored, even if he had ceased to be much amused. The years had not changed the audit into a mere mechanical necessity, nor stolen one whit of its humanity. These people were part of himself by now, with their shrewdness and simpleness, ignorance and intuition, pungent wit, callous exteriors and sentimental hearts. He had the key to every one of them, knew how far each was to be trusted, how far advice would carry, how much sympathy would be wise. The breaking-up of an old man hurt him, as did the downfall of a young one; just as octogenarian vigour or steady success was a matter of almost personal pride. Scarcely any life on the land but touched his own somewhere, definitely or unconsciously working its own effect.

The last three months had passed quickly, and more happily than any since his father’s death. It seemed as if, with the settling of the marsh problem, the worry of years had come to a head and ceased; as if, in playing the rôle of Fate, he had acquired something of Fate’s serenity. The old, grinding anxiety had vanished, leaving in its place a steady, uplifting consciousness of righteous power.

Outwardly, things were not altered. His employer, though rushed home for the last three days, was generally, if not always postally, at least mentally out of reach. Helwise still hampered him with her activities, like a child pettishly dragging unwieldly toys for a walk and expecting the grown-up to carry them. Harriet’s bicycle still scraped his walls; the cares of the estate changed only in detail; the county work still clamoured. But he brought to it all fresh ardour and a new sense of peace, from what source he could not have told. Perhaps it was the new interest over at Watters; perhaps the gathering of strength from a big decision over-past. Just possibly it was the long moment of calm wherewith the gods soothe a man before they strike.

He was at Watters a good deal, nowadays, more often, indeed, than he realised, unconsciously seeking the stimulation of Hamer’s vitality and courage. He still kept his difficulties to himself, after long habit, yet he often came away finding them solved. Except for his weakness for leeches, Hamer’s tram-horse philosophy was founded upon excellent common sense, and had nothing of Bluecaster’s nervous charity. He saw life pitifully, but never morbidly, and his remedies were for time and not for the moment alone. Lancaster left him braced not only to work but to feel, and to be glad of his capacity for both.