"So he is. But he has made a compromise with his Maker—whom he disapproves of strongly otherwise—on the score of music. He is a tremendous addition to the village choir. I fancy he was always musical, but his blindness has developed the faculty."
"Well—it must be water in the desert for poor Jim. Here we are, I suppose?"
A dog came down the path of worn bricks, set on edge, that leads to the well. He is Jim's dog, and very important, for he conducts Jim to the well and back daily, in Lizarann's absence. But the actual importance of this dog, though great, is as nothing compared to his conviction of it. This, if it does not amount to a belief that he turns the well-handle, lays claim to reserved powers of veto over, or permission conceded to, Jim's interference with the water-supply. He smells every applicant for water carefully, to see that all is right, and he glances into every bucket before it leaves the well-head, and occasionally tastes the contents, as though in search of microbes. In his opinion it is entirely owing to him that the well has not been poisoned by bicyclists, who are afraid to stop and effect their wicked purposes because of the promptitude with which he runs out and barks at them. He appears to sanction Challis and the Hector, and to explain them, obligingly, to his principal—or perhaps we should say employee.
"I caught the sound of ye, coming down the road, master," says Jim. "You're a glad hearing to a man, a marning like this. A sight for sore eyes, as the saying is." Which was said with such a serene, unconscious confidence that it almost imposed on his hearers. Jim didn't let the Rector's hand go at once. "Nothing further, I lay?" said he anxiously.
"Not since yesterday, Jim. I thought the letter a good one. I've brought it back in my pocket.... We're talking about his little girl, Challis, down at Chalk Cliff.... This is Sir Alfred Challis, Jim, a friend of Lizarann's."
Jim seemed puzzled for a few seconds, perhaps not recalling the name in its present form; then experienced illumination. "Ay, sure, sir!... I lost my bearings for the moment.... The little lassie, she's talked of you many's the time. But that'll be a while back?"
"Over a twelvemonth, Jim," says Challis, and his inner soul adds, "And what a twelvemonth!" But he has to talk about the child. "I'm sorry she's not here, Jim," he says, and means it. "We made great friends, your little lassie and I did. She said she liked me better than she did her aunt."
Jim laughed delightedly. "There never was love lost between the lass and her Aunt Priscilla. They weren't cut out for berth-mates." Nevertheless, he didn't want to leave his sister quite out in the cold. "Priscilla's a good-hearted woman, ye know, too, when all's told. But she's had some bad times ... a bad husband...." He hesitated on his condemnation, and went for palliation instead. "Well!—perhaps that's too hard a word. Poor Bob Steptoe!—he'd have made a better end but for his drawback. He took a good rating as a cobbler." Jim paused, perplexed by some reminiscence. "I don't hear much nowadays of my sister Priscilla; not since I come down here. I make out she's in service with a lady at Wimbledon." The fact is, Jim and Aunt Stingy were drifting apart by tacit consent.
Challis ought to have been able to contrive a reminder that Aunt Stingy was his cook. He began by saying: "Of course—with my wife. She's our cook at the Hermitage." That wouldn't do, clearly. Try again! "She's our cook at home." He wasn't at all sure this wasn't worse. He decided on, "She cooks for me, you know, when I'm in London," but threw up entrenchments against possible surprises by changing the subject. "So your little maid's gone to the seaside?"
Jim forgot Aunt Stingy with avidity. "Ah! for sure she has!" said he. "My little lass! But she's coming back early next month. Ask the master!"