Without thinking twice of such low matters, the maiden was now in great trouble of the heart, by reason of sundry rumours. Paddy from Cork had brought home word from Maidstone only yesterday, that a desperate fight had been fought in Spain, and almost everybody had been blown up. Both armies had made up their minds to die, so that, with the drums beating and the colours flying, they marched into a powder-magazine, and tossed up a pin which should be the one to fire it, and blow up the others. And the English had lost the toss, and no one survived to tell the story.
Mabel doubted most of this, though Paddy vowed that he had known the like, “when wars was wars, and the boys had spirit;” still she felt sure that there had been something, and she longed most sadly to know all about it. Her brother Gregory was in London, keeping his Hilary term, and slaving at his wretched law-books; and she had begged him, if he loved her, to send down all the latest news by John Shorne every market-day—for the post would not carry newspapers. And now, having mixed her batter, she waited, sleepy after sleepless nights, unable to leave her post and go to meet the van, as she longed to do, the while the fire was clearing.
Pensively sitting thus, and longing for somebody to look at her, she glanced at the face of the clock, which was the only face regarding her. And she won from it but the stern frown of time—she must set to at her pancakes. Batter is all the better for standing ready-made for an hour or so, the weaker particles expire, while the good stuff grows the more fit to be fried, and to turn over in the pan properly. With a gentle sigh, the “flower of Kent” put her frying-pan on, just to warm the bottom. No lard for her, but the best fresh-butter—at any rate for the first half-dozen, to be set aside for her father and mother; after that she would be more frugal perhaps.
But just as the butter began to oose on the bottom of the pan, she heard, or thought that she heard, a sweet distant tinkle coming through the frosty air; and running to the window she caught beyond doubt the sound of the bells at the corner of the lane, the bells that the horses always wore, when the nights were dark and long; and a throb of eager hope and fear went to her heart at every tinkle.
“I cannot wait; how can I wait?” she cried, with flushing cheeks and eyes twice-laden between smiles and tears; “father’s pancakes can wait much better. There, go back,” she spoke to the frying-pan, as, with the prudent care of a fine young housewife, she lifted it off and laid it on the hob, for fear of the butter burning; and then, with quick steps, out she went, not even stopping to find a hat, in her hurry to meet the van, and know the best or the worst of the news of the war. For “Crusty John,” who would go through fire and water to please Miss Mabel, had orders not to come home without the very latest tidings. There was nothing to go to market now; but the van had been up, with a load of straw, to some mews where the Grower had taken a contract; and, of course, it came loaded back with litter.
While Mabel was all impatience and fright, John Shorne, in the most deliberate manner, descended from the driving-box, and purposely shunning her eager glance, began to unfasten the leader’s traces, and pass them through his horny hands, and coil them into elegant spirals, like horns of Jupiter Ammon. Mabel’s fear grew worse and worse, because he would not look at her.
“Oh, John, you never could have the heart to keep me waiting like this, unless——”
“What! you there, Missie? Lor’ now, what can have brought ’ee out this weather?”
“As if you did not see me, John! Why you must have seen me all along.”
“This here be such a dreadful horse to smoke,” said John, who always shunned downright fibs, “that railly I never knows what I do see, when I be longside of un. Ever since us come out of Sennoaks, he have a been confusing of me. Not that I blames un, for what a can’t help. Now there, now! The watter be frozen in trough. Go to the bucket, jackanapes!”