In a Quiet Village

by S. Baring-Gould

Both were fine men, and both had good characters; the first was somewhat too heavy, the latter somewhat too lively. But where is perfection to be found? In woman, perhaps—nay, certainly—not in man.

There was this advantage to whichsoever she cast the kerchief, that he would not require her to give up the shop. To the shop she was attached. The shop made her a power in the parish, brought her into relation with all, gave her consequence, and drew to her a good deal of money. This, then, was a sine quâ non—that she should keep the shop after marriage as before. Besides, she did not desire to have a husband always hanging about her, like a fly in hot weather, that will not be driven away. She was accustomed to independence. A man on the premises all day implied interference, and that she was determined not to tolerate.

Lydia French sat in her shop; no business was doing this day. She had made up her account to midsummer, and the balance was good; it made her feel good—like a bracing sermon or a melting hymn. She had taken stock—roughly. Everything was satisfactory. The little house was in excellent condition, she owned it; that is to say, on three lives, and she had paid Newbold’s bill for putting it in thorough repair. The chimney had smoked; that was cured by the new revolving cowl. The drain from the sink had emitted smells; that was rectified—Newbold had put down a stink-trap. Newbold was a useful man when any masoning work was required. Could she put up with him for always—for better, for worse?

She looked up, and looked out at her little window between the bottles of pink and pallid drops, and the withered oranges that would no longer sell, and the stay-laces, and the ginger-beer bottles, and the can of mustard, and the tin of biscuits. And she saw that which was to her a constant worry—the weathercock on the church spire.

In the great gale of the preceding November the cock had been blown on one side, the spindle on which for many years it had revolved had been bent over, so that now the poor bird lay on his back in mid-air, and could neither right himself nor turn with the wind.

Mrs. French, neat in herself, orderly in her house, above all, in the shop, could not endure to see what was out of place, inverted, useless. She had liked to know from which direction the wind blew. It had provided her with conversation with her customers. It had satisfied her sense of the fitness of things that the spindle on the spire should be upright, and that the vane should fulfil the object for which it was ordained.

Now more than six months had passed, and the cock was still reversed. She had remonstrated with the parson.

“My dear Mrs. French,” he had replied, “that is the affair of the churchwardens. I have badgered all my friends, and impoverished myself over the restoration of the church—I can do no more.”

She complained to the churchwardens. “Lor’ bless y’,” said they, “there be no levying o’ church-rates now, what can we do?”

“It really is a scandal,” said Lydia. “And now the village feast is coming on, and the Oddfellows will march about, and the cock will——”