"Now you go about your business, my son," said his master, and then, wearying of the beans, he stretched himself and looked out of doors. The day was mild and still. Mr. Stockman went into his kitchen and called Susan.
"Get on with they beans, there's a dear; I've been at 'em till my fingers ache; and we'll have a dish to-night for supper if you please. Such things be never so nice as when fresh and soft—far better than boughten beans. And I'll poke round and see if I can pick up a wood-pigeon to go with 'em. 'Tis soft by the feel of it this morning and a little exercise won't do me no harm."
She nodded, and getting a gun, Joe disappeared with his dogs. He skirted an outlying field, where Maynard and Palk were pulling mangel-wurzel. Bending low they plodded along, with the rhythmic swing and harmonious action proper to their work. Simultaneously with each hand they pulled up two roots from the earth, then jerked their wrists, so that the great turnips fell shorn of their foliage. The roots dropped on one side, the leaves were thrown down on the other, and behind each labourer extended long, regular lines—one of mangel awaiting the cart, one of heavy leaves. Mr. Stockman praised the roots, put a task or two upon Lawrence and Thomas for later in the day, and proceeded into the woods. It was Saturday, and when first they came, there had been a general understanding that on the afternoon of that day leisure might be enjoyed at Falcon Farm as far as possible; but slowly—so slowly that Lawrence had hardly remarked it—the farmer appeared to forget this vague arrangement; indeed, he exhibited a marked ingenuity in finding minor tasks for the later hours of that day. Thomas Palk, who had less to occupy his mind than his fellow labourer, was conscious of this fact, and when Joe had proceeded after the wood-pigeons he pointed it out.
"His hand tightens," he said. "You may have marked it, or you may not, and it don't matter to you seemingly, because you've got nothing to do of a Saturday afternoon; but I have."
Lawrence conceded the fact.
"He likes his pound of flesh. But you haven't got anything to quarrel with, Tom."
"I don't say I have."
"Best way is to tell him clear at the beginning of a week that you want next Saturday afternoon off—then he knows and it goes through all right."
"You might think it was the best way," answered Palk; "but it ain't, because I've tried it. If you do that, he'll run you off your legs all the week, and hit upon a thousand jobs, and always remind you about Saturday, and say he knows as you'll be wanting to put in a bit extra, owing to the holiday coming. Then he'll offer to do your work o' Saturday afternoon, though of course there ain't none, and make a great upstore about putting off a bit of pleasuring he'd planned for himself."
Maynard laughed and stood up for a moment to rest the muscles of his back.