XXV. FESTUS SHOWS HIS LOVE
Festus Derriman had remained in the Royal watering-place all that
day, his horse being sick at stables; but, wishing to coax or bully
from his uncle a remount for the coming summer, he set off on foot
for Oxwell early in the evening. When he drew near to the village,
or rather to the hall, which was a mile from the village, he
overtook a slim, quick-eyed woman, sauntering along at a leisurely
pace. She was fashionably dressed in a green spencer, with
'Mameluke' sleeves, and wore a velvet Spanish hat and feather.
'Good afternoon t'ye, ma'am,' said Festus, throwing a
sword-and-pistol air into his greeting. 'You are out for a walk?'
'I AM out for a walk, captain,' said the lady, who had criticized
him from the crevice of her eye, without seeming to do much more
than continue her demure look forward, and gave the title as a sop
to his apparent character.
'From the town?--I'd swear it, ma'am; 'pon my honour I would!'
'Yes, I am from the town, sir,' said she.
'Ah, you are a visitor! I know every one of the regular
inhabitants; we soldiers are in and out there continually. Festus
Derriman, Yeomanry Cavalry, you know. The fact is, the
watering-place is under our charge; the folks will be quite
dependent upon us for their deliverance in the coming struggle. We
hold our lives in our hands, and theirs, I may say, in our pockets.
What made you come here, ma'am, at such a critical time?'
'I don't see that it is such a critical time?'
'But it is, though; and so you'd say if you was as much mixed up
with the military affairs of the nation as some of us.'
The lady smiled. 'The King is coming this year, anyhow,' said she.
'Never!' said Festus firmly. 'Ah, you are one of the attendants at
court perhaps, come on ahead to get the King's chambers ready, in
case Boney should not land?'
'No,' she said; 'I am connected with the theatre, though not just at
the present moment. I have been out of luck for the last year or
two; but I have fetched up again. I join the company when they
arrive for the season.'
Festus surveyed her with interest. 'Faith! and is it so? Well,
ma'am, what part do you play?'
'I am mostly the leading lady--the heroine,' she said, drawing
herself up with dignity.
'I'll come and have a look at ye if all's well, and the landing is
put off--hang me if I don't!--Hullo, hullo, what do I see?'
His eyes were stretched towards a distant field, which Anne Garland
was at that moment hastily crossing, on her way from the hall to
Overcombe.
'I must be off. Good-day to ye, dear creature!' he exclaimed,
hurrying forward.
The lady said, 'O, you droll monster!' as she smiled and watched him
stride ahead.
Festus bounded on over the hedge, across the intervening patch of
green, and into the field which Anne was still crossing. In a
moment or two she looked back, and seeing the well-known Herculean
figure of the yeoman behind her felt rather alarmed, though she
determined to show no difference in her outward carriage. But to
maintain her natural gait was beyond her powers. She spasmodically
quickened her pace; fruitlessly, however, for he gained upon her,
and when within a few strides of her exclaimed, 'Well, my darling!'
Anne started off at a run.
Festus was already out of breath, and soon found that he was not
likely to overtake her. On she went, without turning her head, till
an unusual noise behind compelled her to look round. His face was
in the act of falling back; he swerved on one side, and dropped like
a log upon a convenient hedgerow-bank which bordered the path.
There he lay quite still.
Anne was somewhat alarmed; and after standing at gaze for two or
three minutes, drew nearer to him, a step and a half at a time,
wondering and doubting, as a meek ewe draws near to some strolling
vagabond who flings himself on the grass near the flock.
'He is in a swoon!' she murmured.
Her heart beat quickly, and she looked around. Nobody was in sight;
she advanced a step nearer still and observed him again. Apparently
his face was turning to a livid hue, and his breathing had become
obstructed.
''Tis not a swoon; 'tis apoplexy!' she said, in deep distress. 'I
ought to untie his neck.' But she was afraid to do this, and only
drew a little closer still.
Miss Garland was now within three feet of him, whereupon the
senseless man, who could hold his breath no longer, sprang to his
feet and darted at her, saying, 'Ha! ha! a scheme for a kiss!'
She felt his arm slipping round her neck; but, twirling about with
amazing dexterity, she wriggled from his embrace and ran away along
the field. The force with which she had extricated herself was
sufficient to throw Festus upon the grass, and by the time that he
got upon his legs again she was many yards off. Uttering a word
which was not exactly a blessing, he immediately gave chase; and
thus they ran till Anne entered a meadow divided down the middle by
a brook about six feet wide. A narrow plank was thrown loosely
across at the point where the path traversed this stream, and when
Anne reached it she at once scampered over. At the other side she
turned her head to gather the probabilities of the situation, which
were that Festus Derriman would overtake her even now. By a sudden
forethought she stooped, seized the end of the plank, and
endeavoured to drag it away from the opposite bank. But the weight
was too great for her to do more than slightly move it, and with a
desperate sigh she ran on again, having lost many valuable seconds.
But her attempt, though ineffectual in dragging it down, had been
enough to unsettle the little bridge; and when Derriman reached the
middle, which he did half a minute later, the plank turned over on
its edge, tilting him bodily into the river. The water was not
remarkably deep, but as the yeoman fell flat on his stomach he was
completely immersed; and it was some time before he could drag
himself out. When he arose, dripping on the bank, and looked
around, Anne had vanished from the mead. Then Festus's eyes glowed
like carbuncles, and he gave voice to fearful imprecations, shaking
his fist in the soft summer air towards Anne, in a way that was
terrible for any maiden to behold. Wading back through the stream,
he walked along its bank with a heavy tread, the water running from
his coat-tails, wrists, and the tips of his ears, in silvery
dribbles, that sparkled pleasantly in the sun. Thus he hastened
away, and went round by a by-path to the hall.
Meanwhile the author of his troubles was rapidly drawing nearer to
the mill, and soon, to her inexpressible delight, she saw Bob coming
to meet her. She had heard the flounce, and, feeling more secure
from her pursuer, had dropped her pace to a quick walk. No sooner
did she reach Bob than, overcome by the excitement of the moment,
she flung herself into his arms. Bob instantly enclosed her in an
embrace so very thorough that there was no possible danger of her
falling, whatever degree of exhaustion might have given rise to her
somewhat unexpected action; and in this attitude they silently
remained, till it was borne in upon Anne that the present was the
first time in her life that she had ever been in such a position.
Her face then burnt like a sunset, and she did not know how to look
up at him. Feeling at length quite safe, she suddenly resolved not
to give way to her first impulse to tell him the whole of what had
happened, lest there should be a dreadful quarrel and fight between
Bob and the yeoman, and great difficulties caused in the Loveday
family on her account, the miller having important wheat
transactions with the Derrimans.
'You seem frightened, dearest Anne,' said Bob tenderly.
'Yes,' she replied. 'I saw a man I did not like the look of, and he
was inclined to follow me. But, worse than that, I am troubled
about the French. O Bob! I am afraid you will be killed, and my
mother, and John, and your father, and all of us hunted down!'
'Now I have told you, dear little heart, that it cannot be. We
shall drive 'em into the sea after a battle or two, even if they
land, which I don't believe they will. We've got ninety sail of the
line, and though it is rather unfortunate that we should have
declared war against Spain at this ticklish time, there's enough for
all.' And Bob went into elaborate statistics of the navy, army,
militia, and volunteers, to prolong the time of holding her. When
he had done speaking he drew rather a heavy sigh.
'What's the matter, Bob?'
'I haven't been yet to offer myself as a sea-fencible, and I ought
to have done it long ago.'
'You are only one. Surely they can do without you?'
Bob shook his head. She arose from her restful position, her eye
catching his with a shamefaced expression of having given way at
last. Loveday drew from his pocket a paper, and said, as they
slowly walked on, 'Here's something to make us brave and patriotic.
I bought it in Budmouth. Isn't it a stirring picture?'
It was a hieroglyphic profile of Napoleon. The hat represented a
maimed French eagle; the face was ingeniously made up of human
carcases, knotted and writhing together in such directions as to
form a physiognomy; a band, or stock, shaped to resemble the English
Channel, encircled his throat, and seemed to choke him; his
epaulette was a hand tearing a cobweb that represented the treaty of
peace with England; and his ear was a woman crouching over a dying
child. *
* Vide Preface.
'It is dreadful!' said Anne. 'I don't like to see it.'
She had recovered from her emotion, and walked along beside him with
a grave, subdued face. Bob did not like to assume the privileges of
an accepted lover and draw her hand through his arm; for, conscious
that she naturally belonged to a politer grade than his own, he
feared lest her exhibition of tenderness were an impulse which
cooler moments might regret. A perfect Paul-and-Virginia life had
not absolutely set in for him as yet, and it was not to be hastened
by force. When they had passed over the bridge into the mill-front
they saw the miller standing at the door with a face of concern.
'Since you have been gone,' he said, 'a Government man has been
here, and to all the houses, taking down the numbers of the women
and children, and their ages and the number of horses and waggons
that can be mustered, in case they have to retreat inland, out of
the way of the invading army.'
The little family gathered themselves together, all feeling the
crisis more seriously than they liked to express. Mrs. Loveday
thought how ridiculous a thing social ambition was in such a
conjuncture as this, and vowed that she would leave Anne to love
where she would. Anne, too, forgot the little peculiarities of
speech and manner in Bob and his father, which sometimes jarred for
a moment upon her more refined sense, and was thankful for their
love and protection in this looming trouble.
On going upstairs she remembered the paper which Farmer Derriman had
given her, and searched in her bosom for it. She could not find it
there. 'I must have left it on the table,' she said to herself. It
did not matter; she remembered every word. She took a pen and wrote
a duplicate, which she put safely away.
But Anne was wrong. She had, after all, placed the paper where she
supposed, and there it ought to have been. But in escaping from
Festus, when he feigned apoplexy, it had fallen out upon the grass.
Five minutes after that event, when pursuer and pursued were two or
three fields ahead, the gaily-dressed woman whom the yeoman had
overtaken, peeped cautiously through the stile into the corner of
the field which had been the scene of the scramble; and seeing the
paper she climbed over, secured it, loosened the wafer without
tearing the sheet, and read the memorandum within. Unable to make
anything of its meaning, the saunterer put it in her pocket, and,
dismissing the matter from her mind, went on by the by-path which
led to the back of the mill. Here, behind the hedge, she stood and
surveyed the old building for some time, after which she
meditatively turned, and retraced her steps towards the Royal
watering-place.
