“Ought I to have cut it off?” laughed Jinny happily.
“ ‘D’ye see that, Pegs,’ says Oi, ‘blood’s thicker than water. Will you come along o’ your gran’fer, liddle maid?’ says Oi.”
“And what did I say?” asked Jinny breathlessly.
“You dedn’t say naught—you bust into tears, bein’ as you thought Oi was the auctioneerer and you’d been sold with everything else, poor liddle ole orphan, and then Pegs catches hold o’ you and says you was clinging to her. But Oi soon stopped that lob-loll, for Oi holds you over the rail and shows you Methusalem all prancin’ in his pride, and ‘Won’t you go with your gran’fer’s hoss, liddle maid?’ says Oi.”
“And what did I say then?”
“You dedn’t say naught, but in a twinklin’ you jumps out o’ Susannah’s arms, scrambles down the accommodation ladder, and was rubbin’ noses with Methusalem. And Oi count his was as damp as yourn, bein’ as he’d come without a stop.”
“Dear old Methusalem!” And nothing would content Jinny but she must jump down and rub noses with him now, and again both noses were damp. But as Methusalem had seized the opportunity to come to a standstill, and Jinny, lost in shadowy memories, continued the caress ten seconds too long, the old carrier declared with sudden querulousness that he hadn’t got time for foolishness, and that since he had burdened himself with Jinny his business had gone “to rack and ruination.”
“Peculiar, Pegs warned me, Oi’d have to bring you up,” he added, as Jinny hastily clambered back to his side. “And Peculiar’s the word for your gooin’s on. Not that Methusalem’s got more sense nor you. Oi count ef there was churches for cattle, he’d a-stoyled hisself Brother Methusalem and kicked over his drench.”
It was the Gaffer’s instinctive conviction that faith went with the father. In thus yielding to Emma’s dying breath he may, apart from the pressure of death-bed wishes, have found vent for a lingering resentment against the seductive Boldero. Or was it that he had a lurking apprehension that the one child of Emma’s which had at least survived prayer, might really be a testimony to the teaching, and as such entitled to share it? Jinny at any rate had absolute faith in the doctrine. It rested on the fifth chapter of James as clearly as the big Bible containing that chapter rested on the chest of drawers. Once indeed when the Gaffer was unbearably mocking, she had been goaded to read him the basal verses:
“Is any sick among you? let him call for the elders of the church; and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord: