Cripps, the Carrier: A Woodland Tale

by R. D. Blackmore

"Come, come, Joan, not so very many," exclaimed the truthful Squire; "about five, or say six, at the utmost. You were born on the 25th of June, A.D.——"

"Worth, I was not asking you for statistics. Mr. Hardenow, you will excuse my brother. He has always had a rude style of interruption; he learned it, I believe, in the army, and we always make allowance for it. But to go back to what I was saying—my good and ever to be lamented husband, being, let us say, ten years my senior—Worth, will that content you?—left every farthing of his property to me; and a good husband always does the same thing, I am told, and I believe they are ordered in the Bible; and, of course, I have no one to leave it to but Grace; and being so extraordinarily advanced in years, as my dear brother has impressed upon you, they could not have any very long time to wait; and my desire is to do my duty; and perhaps that lies at the bottom of it all."

After relieving her mind in this succinct yet copious manner, the good lady went into her chair again, carefully directing, in whatever state of mind, the gathering and the falling of her dress aright. And though it might be fancied that her colour had been high, anybody now could see that her dignity had conquered it.

"Now, the whole of this goes for next to nothing," said the Squire, while the young men looked at one another, and longed to be out of the way of it. "As we have got into the subject, let us go right down to the bottom of it. What are filthy pence and halfpence, or a cellar, like Balak's, of silver and gold, when compared with the life of one pure dear soul? I may not express myself theologically, but you can see what I mean exactly. I mean that I would kick old Port-wine's dross to the bottom of the Red Sea, where Pharaoh lies, if it turns out that that has killed my child, or made her this long time dead to me."

Having justified his feelings thus, the old man stood up, and went to the window, to look for his horse. The very last thing he desired always was to let out what he felt too much. But to hear that old thief of a "Port-wine Fermitage" praised, and his lucre put forward, quite as if it were an equivalent for Grace, and to think that he owed to that filthy cause the loss of the liveliest, loveliest darling, without whom he had neither life nor love—such things were enough to break the balance of his patience; and the rest might think them out amongst them.

Now, this might have made a very serious to-do between Mr. Oglander and his sister Joan, both of them being of the stiff-necked order, if he had been allowed to ride away like this. Mrs. Fermitage had her great carriage in the yard, and two black horses with wide valleys down their backs, rattling rings of the brightest brass, while they stood in the stable with a bail between them, and gently deigned to blow the chaff off from the oats of Shotover. This goodly pair made a great rush now into the mind of their mistress—the only sort of rush they ever made—and seeing her brother in that state of mind to get away from her, she became inspired with an equal desire to get away from him.

"Will you kindly ring the bell," she said, "and order my horses to be put to? I think I have quite said every word I had to say. And being the only lady present, of course I labour under some—well, some little disadvantages. Not, of course, that I mean for a moment——"

"To be sure not, Joan! You never do know what you mean. You would be a very nasty woman if you did. Now, do let us turn our minds the pleasant way to everything. If any word has come from me to lead to strong kind of argument, I beg pardon of everybody; and then there ought to be an end of it."

Mrs. Fermitage scarcely knew what to say, but in a relenting way looked round for some one to take it up for her. And she was not long without somebody.

"Mr. Oglander," said Russel Overshute, "you really ought to give us time to think. You are growing so hasty, sir, since you came back to your seat in the saddle, and your cross-country ways, that you want to ride over every one of us—ladies and gentlemen, all alike."