"O shame, O grief, when earth's rude toys,
An opening door, a breath, a noise,
Drive from the heart the eternal joys,
Displace the LORD of Love!"
—Lyra Innocentium
"I never heard such nonsense in my life!" said Mary's stepmother. She was standing, dressed in her best, in the rather untidy front kitchen of the farmhouse, where Mary was ironing some little pinafores. Her four younger children were playing about outside, swinging on the garden gate that opened into the steep lane leading to the village; finding what amusement they could till their mother was ready, rather to the peril of their Sunday clothes.
She was going to take them all to Carsham Fair. This grand event only happened once in three years. It was the finest pleasure fair in all the country round, and attracted crowds of people who hardly left their scattered villages and lonely commons between one fair and another.
Mrs. Alfrick was in high good humour. She had formerly lived nearer London, and often complained bitterly of the dulness of Markwood. She, like many other people of that neighbourhood, made those three-yearly fairs a date in her existence, counting up to them and down from them. This child or the other was born "a month afore last fair but one." Such an old man or woman in the village would never live to see next fair. It was just three months "afore last fair" that John Randal had picked up that child in the ditch. And it was "nigh on a year after last fair" that Mary had been such a silly as to promise to marry him.
More than two years ago that promise had been given. Mrs. Alfrick certainly did not wish to part with Mary, and would have grumbled heartily enough if John had found himself able to marry; but at the same time the delay, "wasting Polly's life," as she called it, made a fine text for her to preach upon when she wanted to tease the girl.
"No, I never did hear such nonsense!" she repeated; while Mary, who had been bustling about all the morning, helping her to get the work done, to dress the children and give them their early dinner, now bent gravely over her ironing-board, wishing the whole family would start off and leave her alone.
"There you are, thinking of nothing in the world but that child's pinners," Mrs. Alfrick went on, "while you might be going down to Carsham to enjoy yourself along with the lot of us. I do say it's a shame. If John was at home I shouldn't be surprised; but he's took a holiday and gone off to see his friends—just like his selfishness!—and left you to take care of his mother and that there foundling, as ought to have been sent to the workhouse long ago; and John, he ought to have done his duty and married you. It makes me downright sick to see the fuss you all make with that white-faced bit of a child. John thinks a sight more about her than he do about you, Polly, and you're a poor-spirited girl to stand it!"
Mary made no answer.
"There now, stupid, leave them pinners and come along. Your father'll be coming down presently, and he'd sooner see you there than not; and however am I to mind all the children by myself? It'll be the death of me. Come now, Polly, I'll wait for you ten minutes, that I will, with pleasure, and we'll call for Lily and take her down too. The children said she was crying 'cause she mightn't go. Mrs. Randal won't mind if she's with you, and serve John right, with his fidgets; he'll have to get over it. Come, Polly, you ain't bound to obey the fellow yet, any way."
"Now then," said Mary, suddenly standing upright with a very decided frown; "you know you're only wasting your breath. It's John's business whether Lily goes to the fair, and he told me to mind she didn't. So don't stop for me, if you please, for I ain't coming, and would rather stop away."