"That's sound sense, an' my view to a hair," he declared. "The chap's got strength for five men—then let him do the work, since he's so blessed fond of it. He's a very fine man, an' my master any day of the week, though he don't get much better money. For my part I think he ought to, and I told him so; an' he was so blessed pleased to hear me say it, that he shifted two tons of muck, which was my job, while I looked on, like a gentleman, till master come into the yard!"
Agg roared with laughter. His laugh echoed against the stone walls of the farm, and Hilary Woodrow liked to hear it.
"Right you are, fatty! Dan's a very good sort, and long may be bide here."
"You be lazy hounds, and not worth a pin, the pair of you," answered the little man with the goat's beard. "But I'll not stand none of his high-handedness. Next time I orders him about and he pretends he don't hear, I'll have him up afore Mr. Woodrow."
"More fool you, Joe," replied Agg.
But Mr. Tapson's intention was not fulfilled, for the matter took a sensational turn, and when he did carry his tribulations to head-quarters, they were of a colour more grave than he expected.
On a day in late November Tapson was leading a cart piled with giant swedes through one of the lowest meadows of the farm. The mighty roots faded from white to purple, and drooping, glaucous foliage hung about their crowns. Following the cart, or straggling behind it to gnaw the turnips as he scattered them, came fifty breeding ewes. There was a crisp sound of fat roots being munched by the sheep. The air hung heavy, and the day was grey and mild. Looking up, the labourer saw Daniel Brendon approaching.
"Now for it!" thought Mr. Tapson, and his lips framed an order. "I'll tell the man to go and fetch me a fork from the byre."
He was about to do so, when Brendon himself shouted from a distance of fifty yards, and, to Tapson's amazement, he found himself commanded.
"Get down out of thic cart an' lend a hand here, Joe. I want 'e!"