Caleb looked pained. “You dedn’t ought to talk o’ your feyther like that. And him pinchin’ hisself and maybe injurin’ his spinal collar to keep you at school till you was a large buoy-oy!”
III
Bundock’s irritation at his Bœotian critic was suddenly diverted by the spectacle of a female figure bearing down upon him literally by leaps and bounds—it seemed as if the steeplechase method recommended by Caleb was already in action. The postman felt for his spectacles, discarded normally in the interests of manly fascination. “Lord!” he cried. “Has your missus joined the Jumpers?” Caleb turned his head, not unalarmed. With so skittish a theologian anything was possible. But his agitation subsided into a smile of admiration.
“She thinks of everything,” he said.
The practical Martha was in fact advancing with an improvised leaping-pole that had already carried her neatly over the brook and would obviously bring Bundock over the boglet. But why—Caleb wondered—was she risking her “bettermost” skirt? His own mother, he remembered, had not hesitated to tuck up her petticoats when winkles had to be gathered. And why was Martha’s hair massed in its black net cap with a Sunday stylishness?
“Morning, Mrs. Flynt,” cried Bundock, becoming as genial as the weather. Females, even sexagenarian, so long as not utterly uncomely, turned him from an official into a man.
“Morning, Mr. Bundock!” Martha called back across the mudhole. “I hope your father’s no worse!”
Bundock’s brow clouded. Still harping on his father.
“He’s not so active as you,” he replied a bit testily.
“Thank the Lord!” said Caleb fervently. Then, colouring under Bundock’s stare, “For the missus’s legs,” he explained.