AT THE GREEN DRAGON III
BY BEATRICE HARRADEN
THE PRIMARY GLORY
The next day at the Green Dragon was a busy one. Mrs. and Mr. Benbow were up betimes, banging casks about in the cellar. When Hieronymus Howard came down to breakfast, he found that they had brought three barrels into the kitchen, and that one was already half full of some horrible brown liquid, undergoing the process of fermentation. He felt himself much aggrieved that he was unable to contribute his share of work to the proceedings. It was but little comfort to him that he was again allowed to attend to the customers. The pouring out of the beer had lost its charm for him.
“It is a secondary glory to pour out the beer,” he grumbled. “I aspire to the primary glory of helping to make the beer.”
Mrs. Benbow was heaping on the coal in the furnace. She turned round and looked at the disconsolate figure.
“There is one thing you might do,” she said. “I’ve not half enough barm. There are two or three places where you might call for some; and between them all perhaps you’ll get enough.”
She then mentioned three houses, Farmer Hammond’s being among the number.
“Very likely the Hammonds would oblige us,” she said. “They are neighborly folk. They live at the Malt-House Farm, two miles off. You can’t carry the jar, but you can take the perambulator and wheel it back. I’ve often done that when I had much to carry.”
Hieronymus Howard looked doubtfully at the perambulator.
“Very well,” he said submissively. “I suppose I shall only look like an ordinary tramp. It seems to be the fashion to tramp on this road!”
It never entered his head to rebel. The great jar was lifted into the perambulator, and Hieronymus wheeled it away, still keeping up his dignity, though under somewhat trying circumstances.
“I rather wish I had not mentioned anything about primary glory,” he remarked to himself. “However, I will not faint by the wayside; Mrs. Benbow is a person not lightly to be disobeyed. In this respect she reminds me distinctly of Queen Elizabeth, or Margaret of Anjou, with just a dash of Napoleon Bonaparte!”
So he walked on along the highroad. Two or three tramps passed him, wheeling similar perambulators, some heaped up with rags and old tins and umbrellas, and occasionally a baby; representing the sum total of their respective possessions in the world. They looked at him with curiosity, but no pleasantry passed their lips. There was nothing to laugh at in Hieronymus’ appearance; there was a quiet dignity about him which was never lost on any one. His bearing tallied with his character, the character of a mellowed human being. There was a restfulness about him which had soothed more than one tired person; not the restfulness of stupidity, but the repose only gained by those who have struggled through a great fever to a great calm. His was a clean-shaven face; his hair was iron-gray. There was a kind but firm expression about his mouth, and a suspicion of humor lingering in the corners. His eyes looked at you frankly. There seemed to be no self-consciousness in his manner; long ago, perhaps, he had managed to get away from himself. He enjoyed the country, and stopped more than once to pick some richly tinted leaf, or some tiny flower nestling in the hedge. He confided all his treasures to the care of the perambulator. It was a beautiful morning, and the sun lit up the hills, which were girt with a belt of many gems: a belt of trees, each rivaling the other in colored luxuriance. Hieronymus sang. Then he turned down a lane to the left and found some nuts. He ate these, and went on his way again, and at last found himself outside a farm of large and important aspect. A man was stacking a hayrick. Hieronymus watched him keenly.
“Good gracious!” he exclaimed; “I wish I could do that. How on earth do you manage it? And did it take you long to learn?”
The man smiled in the usual yokel fashion, and went on with his work. Hieronymus plainly did not interest him.
“Is this the Malt-House Farm?” cried Hieronymus lustily.
“What else should it be?” answered the man.
“These rural characters are inclined to be one-sided,” thought Hieronymus, as he opened the gate and wheeled the perambulator into the pretty garden. “It seems to me that they are almost as narrow-minded as the people who live in cities and pride themselves on their breadth of view. Almost–but on reflection, not quite!”
He knocked at the door of the porch, and a great bustling woman opened it. He explained his mission to her, and pointed to the jar for the barm.
“You would oblige Mrs. Benbow greatly, ma’am,” he said. “In fact, we cannot get on with our beer unless you come to our assistance.”
“Step into the parlor, sir,” she said, smiling, “and I’ll see how much we’ve got. I think you are the gentleman who fought the gypsies. You’ve hurt your arm, I see.”
“Yes, a great nuisance,” he answered cheerily; “and that reminds me of my other request. I want some one to write for me an hour or two every day. Mrs. Benbow mentioned your daughter, the young lady who came to us on the white horse yesterday.”
He was going to add: “The young lady who wishes to go out into the world;” but he checked himself, guessing by instinct that the young lady and her mother had probably very little in common.
“Perhaps, though,” he said, “I take a liberty in making the suggestion. If so, you have only to reprove me, and that is the end of it.”
“Oh, I daresay she’d like to write for you,” said Mrs. Hammond, “if she can be spared from the butter and the fowls. She likes books and pen and paper. They’re things as I don’t favor.”
“No,” said Hieronymus, suddenly filled with an overwhelming sense of his own littleness; “you are occupied with other more useful matters.”
“Yes, indeed,” rejoined Mrs. Hammond fervently. “Well, if you’ll be seated, I’ll send Joan to you, and I’ll see about the barm.”
Hieronymus settled down in an old chair, and took a glance at the comfortable paneled room. There was every appearance of ease about the Malt-House Farm, and yet Farmer Hammond and his wife toiled incessantly from morning to evening, exacting continual labor from their daughter too. There was a good deal of brass-work in the parlor; it was kept spotlessly bright.
In a few minutes Joan came in. She carried the jar.
“I have filled the jar with barm,” she said, without any preliminaries. “One of the men can take it back if you like.”
“Oh no, thank you,” he said cheerily, looking at her with some interest. “It came in the perambulator; it can return in the same conveyance.”
She bent over the table, leaning against the jar. She smiled at his words, and the angry look of resentfulness, which seemed to be her habitual expression, gave way to a more pleasing one. Joan was not good-looking, but her face was decidedly interesting. She was of middle stature, slight but strong; not the typical country girl with rosy cheeks, but pale, though not unhealthy. She was dark of complexion; soft brown hair, over which she seemed to have no control, was done into a confused mass at the back, untidy, but pleasing. Her forehead was not interfered with; you might see it for yourself, and note the great bumps which those rogues of phrenologists delight to finger. She carried her head proudly, and from certain determined jerks which she gave to it you might judge of her decided character. She was dressed in a dark gown, and wore an apron of coarse linen. At the most she was nineteen years of age. Hieronymus just glanced at her, and could not help comparing her with her mother.
“Well,” he said pleasantly, “and now, having settled the affairs of the Green Dragon, I proceed to my own. Will you come and be my scribbler for a few days? Or if you wish for a grander title, will you act as my amanuensis? I am sadly in need of a little help. I have found out that you can help me.”
“I don’t know whether you could read my writing,” she said shyly.
“That does not matter in the least,” he answered. “I shan’t have to read it. Some one else will.”
“My spelling is not faultless,” she said.
“Also a trifle!” he replied. “Spelling, like every other virtue, is a relative thing, depending largely on the character of the individual. Have you any other objection?”
She shook her head, and smiled brightly at him.
“I should like to write for you,” she said, “if only I could do it well enough.”
“I am sure of that,” he answered kindly. “Mrs. Benbow tells me you are a young lady who does good work. I admire that beyond everything. You fatten up the poultry well, you make butter and pastry well–shouldn’t I just like to taste it! And I am sure you have cleaned this brass-work.”
“Yes,” she said, “when I’m tired of every one and everything, I go and rub up the brasses until they are spotless. When I am utterly weary of the whole concern, and just burning to get away from this stupid little village, I polish the candlesticks and handles until my arms are worn out. I had a good turn at it yesterday.”
“Was yesterday a bad day with you, then?” he asked.
“Yes,” she answered. “When I was riding the old white horse yesterday, I just felt that I could go on riding, riding forever. But she is such a slow coach. She won’t go quickly!”
“No, I should think you could walk more quickly,” said Hieronymus. “Your legs would take you out into the world more swiftly than that old white horse. And being clear of this little village, and being out in the great world, what do you want to do?”
“To learn!” she cried; “to learn to know something about life, and to get to have other interests: something great and big, something worth wearing one’s strength away for.” Then she stopped suddenly. “What a goose I am!” she said, turning away half ashamed.
“Something great and big,” he repeated. “Cynics would tell you that you have a weary quest before you. But I think it is very easy to find something great and big. Only it all depends on the strength of your telescope. You must order the best kind, and unfortunately one can’t afford the best kind when one is very young. You have to pay for your telescope, not with money, but with years. But when at last it comes into your possession–ah, how it alters the look of things!”
He paused a moment, as though lost in thought; and then, with the brightness so characteristic of him, he added:
“Well, I must be going home to my humble duties at the Green Dragon, and you, no doubt, have to return to your task of feeding up the poultry for the market. When is market-day at Church Stretton?”
“On Friday,” she answered.
“That is the day I have to send off some of my writing,” he said; “my market-day, also, you see.”
“Are you a poet?” she asked timidly.
“No,” he answered, smiling at her; “I am that poor creature, an historian: one of those restless persons who furridge among the annals of the past.”
“Oh,” she said enthusiastically, “I have always cared more about history than anything else!”
“Well, then, if you come to-morrow to the Green Dragon at eleven o’clock,” he said kindly, “you will have the privilege of writing history instead of reading it. And now I suppose I must hasten back to the tyranny of Queen Elizabeth. Can you lift that jar into the perambulator? You see I can’t.”
She hoisted it into the perambulator, and then stood at the gate, watching him as he pushed it patiently over the rough road.