CHAPTER VIII: THEY DANCE MORE WILDLY
Dick had at length secured Fancy for that most delightful of
country-dances, opening with six-hands-round.
"Before we begin," said the tranter, "my proposal is, that 'twould
be a right and proper plan for every mortal man in the dance to pull
off his jacket, considering the heat."
"Such low notions as you have, Reuben! Nothing but strip will go
down with you when you are a-dancing. Such a hot man as he is!"
"Well, now, look here, my sonnies," he argued to his wife, whom he
often addressed in the plural masculine for economy of epithet
merely; "I don't see that. You dance and get hot as fire; therefore
you lighten your clothes. Isn't that nature and reason for gentle
and simple? If I strip by myself and not necessary, 'tis rather
pot-housey I own; but if we stout chaps strip one and all, why, 'tis
the native manners of the country, which no man can gainsay? Hey--
what did you say, my sonnies?"
"Strip we will!" said the three other heavy men who were in the
dance; and their coats were accordingly taken off and hung in the
passage, whence the four sufferers from heat soon reappeared,
marching in close column, with flapping shirt-sleeves, and having,
as common to them all, a general glance of being now a match for any
man or dancer in England or Ireland. Dick, fearing to lose ground
in Fancy's good opinion, retained his coat like the rest of the
thinner men; and Mr. Shiner did the same from superior knowledge.
And now a further phase of revelry had disclosed itself. It was the
time of night when a guest may write his name in the dust upon the
tables and chairs, and a bluish mist pervades the atmosphere,
becoming a distinct halo round the candles; when people's nostrils,
wrinkles, and crevices in general, seem to be getting gradually
plastered up; when the very fiddlers as well as the dancers get red
in the face, the dancers having advanced further still towards
incandescence, and entered the cadaverous phase; the fiddlers no
longer sit down, but kick back their chairs and saw madly at the
strings, with legs firmly spread and eyes closed, regardless of the
visible world. Again and again did Dick share his Love's hand with
another man, and wheel round; then, more delightfully, promenade in
a circle with her all to himself, his arm holding her waist more
firmly each time, and his elbow getting further and further behind
her back, till the distance reached was rather noticeable; and, most
blissful, swinging to places shoulder to shoulder, her breath
curling round his neck like a summer zephyr that had strayed from
its proper date. Threading the couples one by one they reached the
bottom, when there arose in Dick's mind a minor misery lest the tune
should end before they could work their way to the top again, and
have anew the same exciting run down through. Dick's feelings on
actually reaching the top in spite of his doubts were supplemented
by a mortal fear that the fiddling might even stop at this supreme
moment; which prompted him to convey a stealthy whisper to the far-
gone musicians, to the effect that they were not to leave off till
he and his partner had reached the bottom of the dance once more,
which remark was replied to by the nearest of those convulsed and
quivering men by a private nod to the anxious young man between two
semiquavers of the tune, and a simultaneous "All right, ay, ay,"
without opening the eyes. Fancy was now held so closely that Dick
and she were practically one person. The room became to Dick like a
picture in a dream; all that he could remember of it afterwards
being the look of the fiddlers going to sleep, as humming-tops
sleep, by increasing their motion and hum, together with the figures
of grandfather James and old Simon Crumpler sitting by the chimney-
corner, talking and nodding in dumb-show, and beating the air to
their emphatic sentences like people near a threshing machine.
The dance ended. "Piph-h-h-h!" said tranter Dewy, blowing out his
breath in the very finest stream of vapour that a man's lips could
form. "A regular tightener, that one, sonnies!" He wiped his
forehead, and went to the cider and ale mugs on the table.
"Well!" said Mrs. Penny, flopping into a chair, "my heart haven't
been in such a thumping state of uproar since I used to sit up on
old Midsummer-eves to see who my husband was going to be."
"And that's getting on for a good few years ago now, from what I've
heard you tell," said the tranter, without lifting his eyes from the
cup he was filling. Being now engaged in the business of handing
round refreshments, he was warranted in keeping his coat off still,
though the other heavy men had resumed theirs.
"And a thing I never expected would come to pass, if you'll believe
me, came to pass then," continued Mrs. Penny. "Ah, the first spirit
ever I see on a Midsummer-eve was a puzzle to me when he appeared, a
hard puzzle, so say I!"
"So I should have fancied," said Elias Spinks.
"Yes," said Mrs. Penny, throwing her glance into past times, and
talking on in a running tone of complacent abstraction, as if a
listener were not a necessity. "Yes; never was I in such a taking
as on that Midsummer-eve! I sat up, quite determined to see if John
Wildway was going to marry me or no. I put the bread-and-cheese and
beer quite ready, as the witch's book ordered, and I opened the
door, and I waited till the clock struck twelve, my nerves all alive
and so strained that I could feel every one of 'em twitching like
bell-wires. Yes, sure! and when the clock had struck, ho and
behold, I could see through the door a LITTLE SMALL man in the lane
wi' a shoemaker's apron on."
Here Mr. Penny stealthily enlarged himself half an inch.
"Now, John Wildway," Mrs. Penny continued, "who courted me at that
time, was a shoemaker, you see, but he was a very fair-sized man,
and I couldn't believe that any such a little small man had anything
to do wi' me, as anybody might. But on he came, and crossed the
threshold--not John, but actually the same little small man in the
shoemaker's apron--"
"You needn't be so mighty particular about little and small!" said
her husband.
"In he walks, and down he sits, and O my goodness me, didn't I flee
upstairs, body and soul hardly hanging together! Well, to cut a
long story short, by-long and by-late. John Wildway and I had a
miff and parted; and lo and behold, the coming man came! Penny
asked me if I'd go snacks with him, and afore I knew what I was
about a'most, the thing was done."
"I've fancied you never knew better in your life; but I mid be
mistaken," said Mr. Penny in a murmur.
After Mrs. Penny had spoken, there being no new occupation for her
eyes, she still let them stay idling on the past scenes just
related, which were apparently visible to her in the centre of the
room Mr. Penny's remark received no reply.
During this discourse the tranter and his wife might have been
observed standing in an unobtrusive corner, in mysterious closeness
to each other, a just perceptible current of intelligence passing
from each to each, which had apparently no relation whatever to the
conversation of their guests, but much to their sustenance. A
conclusion of some kind having at length been drawn, the palpable
confederacy of man and wife was once more obliterated, the tranter
marching off into the pantry, humming a tune that he couldn't quite
recollect, and then breaking into the words of a song of which he
could remember about one line and a quarter. Mrs. Dewy spoke a few
words about preparations for a bit of supper.
That elder portion of the company which loved eating and drinking
put on a look to signify that till this moment they had quite
forgotten that it was customary to expect suppers on these
occasions; going even further than this politeness of feature, and
starting irrelevant subjects, the exceeding flatness and forced tone
of which rather betrayed their object. The younger members said
they were quite hungry, and that supper would be delightful though
it was so late.
Good luck attended Dick's love-passes during the meal. He sat next
Fancy, and had the thrilling pleasure of using permanently a glass
which had been taken by Fancy in mistake; of letting the outer edge
of the sole of his boot touch the lower verge of her skirt; and to
add to these delights the cat, which had lain unobserved in her lap
for several minutes, crept across into his own, touching him with
fur that had touched her hand a moment before. There were, besides,
some little pleasures in the shape of helping her to vegetable she
didn't want, and when it had nearly alighted on her plate taking it
across for his own use, on the plea of waste not, want not. He
also, from time to time, sipped sweet sly glances at her profile;
noticing the set of her head, the curve of her throat, and other
artistic properties of the lively goddess, who the while kept up a
rather free, not to say too free, conversation with Mr. Shiner
sitting opposite; which, after some uneasy criticism, and much
shifting of argument backwards and forwards in Dick's mind, he
decided not to consider of alarming significance.
"A new music greets our ears now," said Miss Fancy, alluding, with
the sharpness that her position as village sharpener demanded, to
the contrast between the rattle of knives and forks and the late
notes of the fiddlers.
"Ay; and I don't know but what 'tis sweeter in tone when you get
above forty," said the tranter; "except, in faith, as regards father
there. Never such a mortal man as he for tunes. They do move his
soul; don't 'em, father?"
The eldest Dewy smiled across from his distant chair an assent to
Reuben's remark.
"Spaking of being moved in soul," said Mr. Penny, "I shall never
forget the first time I heard the "Dead March." 'Twas at poor
Corp'l Nineman's funeral at Casterbridge. It fairly made my hair
creep and fidget about like a vlock of sheep--ah, it did, souls!
And when they had done, and the last trump had sounded, and the guns
was fired over the dead hero's grave, a' icy-cold drop o' moist
sweat hung upon my forehead, and another upon my jawbone. Ah, 'tis
a very solemn thing!"
"Well, as to father in the corner there," the tranter said, pointing
to old William, who was in the act of filling his mouth; "he'd
starve to death for music's sake now, as much as when he was a boy-
chap of fifteen."
"Truly, now," said Michael Mail, clearing the corner of his throat
in the manner of a man who meant to be convincing; 'there's a
friendly tie of some sort between music and eating." He lifted the
cup to his mouth, and drank himself gradually backwards from a
perpendicular position to a slanting one, during which time his
looks performed a circuit from the wall opposite him to the ceiling
overhead. Then clearing the other corner of his throat: 'Once I
was a-setting in the little kitchen of the Dree Mariners at
Casterbridge, having a bit of dinner, and a brass band struck up in
the street. Such a beautiful band as that were! I was setting
eating fried liver and lights, I well can mind--ah, I was! and to
save my life, I couldn't help chawing to the tune. Band played six-
eight time; six-eight chaws I, willynilly. Band plays common;
common time went my teeth among the liver and lights as true as a
hair. Beautiful 'twere! Ah, I shall never forget that there band!"
"That's as tuneful a thing as ever I heard of," said grandfather
James, with the absent gaze which accompanies profound criticism.
"I don't like Michael's tuneful stories then," said Mrs. Dewy.
"They are quite coarse to a person o' decent taste."
Old Michael's mouth twitched here and there, as if he wanted to
smile but didn't know where to begin, which gradually settled to an
expression that it was not displeasing for a nice woman like the
tranter's wife to correct him.
"Well, now," said Reuben, with decisive earnestness, "that sort o'
coarse touch that's so upsetting to Ann's feelings is to my mind a
recommendation; for it do always prove a story to be true. And for
the same reason, I like a story with a bad moral. My sonnies, all
true stories have a coarse touch or a bad moral, depend upon't. If
the story-tellers could ha' got decency and good morals from true
stories, who'd ha' troubled to invent parables?" Saying this the
tranter arose to fetch a new stock of cider, ale, mead, and home-
made wines.
Mrs. Dewy sighed, and appended a remark (ostensibly behind her
husband's back, though that the words should reach his ears
distinctly was understood by both): "Such a man as Dewy is! Nobody
do know the trouble I have to keep that man barely respectable. And
did you ever hear too--just now at supper-time--talking about
"taties" with Michael in such a work-folk way. Well, 'tis what I
was never brought up to! With our family 'twas never less than
"taters," and very often "pertatoes" outright; mother was so
particular and nice with us girls there was no family in the parish
that kept them selves up more than we."
The hour of parting came. Fancy could not remain for the night,
because she had engaged a woman to wait up for her. She disappeared
temporarily from the flagging party of dancers, and then came
downstairs wrapped up and looking altogether a different person from
whom she had been hitherto, in fact (to Dick's sadness and
disappointment), a woman somewhat reserved and of a phlegmatic
temperament--nothing left in her of the romping girl that she had
seemed but a short quarter-hour before, who had not minded the
weight of Dick's hand upon her waist, nor shirked the purlieus of
the mistletoe.
"What a difference!" thought the young man--hoary cynic pro tem.
"What a miserable deceiving difference between the manners of a
maid's life at dancing times and at others! Look at this lovely
Fancy! Through the whole past evening touchable, squeezeable--even
kissable! For whole half-hours I held her so chose to me that not a
sheet of paper could have been shipped between us; and I could feel
her heart only just outside my own, her life beating on so close to
mine, that I was aware of every breath in it. A flit is made
upstairs--a hat and a cloak put on--and I no more dare to touch her
than--" Thought failed him, and he returned to realities.
But this was an endurable misery in comparison with what followed.
Mr. Shiner and his watch-chain, taking the intrusive advantage that
ardent bachelors who are going homeward along the same road as a
pretty young woman always do take of that circumstance, came forward
to assure Fancy--with a total disregard of Dick's emotions, and in
tones which were certainly not frigid--that he (Shiner) was not the
man to go to bed before seeing his Lady Fair safe within her own
door--not he, nobody should say he was that;--and that he would not
leave her side an inch till the thing was done--drown him if he
would. The proposal was assented to by Miss Day, in Dick's
foreboding judgment, with one degree--or at any rate, an appreciable
fraction of a degree--of warmth beyond that required by a
disinterested desire for protection from the dangers of the night.
All was over; and Dick surveyed the chair she had last occupied,
looking now like a setting from which the gem has been torn. There
stood her glass, and the romantic teaspoonful of elder wine at the
bottom that she couldn't drink by trying ever so hard, in obedience
to the mighty arguments of the tranter (his hand coming down upon
her shoulder the while, like a Nasmyth hammer); but the drinker was
there no longer. There were the nine or ten pretty little crumbs
she had left on her plate; but the eater was no more seen.
There seemed a disagreeable closeness of relationship between
himself and the members of his family, now that they were left alone
again face to face. His father seemed quite offensive for appearing
to be in just as high spirits as when the guests were there; and as
for grandfather James (who had not yet left), he was quite fiendish
in being rather glad they were gone.
"Really," said the tranter, in a tone of placid satisfaction, "I've
had so little time to attend to myself all the evenen, that I mean
to enjoy a quiet meal now! A slice of this here ham--neither too
fat nor too lean--so; and then a drop of this vinegar and pickles--
there, that's it--and I shall be as fresh as a lark again! And to
tell the truth, my sonny, my inside has been as dry as a lime-basket
all night."
"I like a party very well once in a while," said Mrs. Dewy, leaving
off the adorned tones she had been bound to use throughout the
evening, and returning to the natural marriage voice; "but, Lord,
'tis such a sight of heavy work next day! What with the dirty
plates, and knives and forks, and dust and smother, and bits kicked
off your furniture, and I don't know what all, why a body could
a'most wish there were no such things as Christmases . . . Ah-h
dear!" she yawned, till the clock in the corner had ticked several
beats. She cast her eyes round upon the displaced, dust-laden
furniture, and sank down overpowered at the sight.
"Well, I be getting all right by degrees, thank the Lord for't!"
said the tranter cheerfully through a mangled mass of ham and bread,
without lifting his eyes from his plate, and chopping away with his
knife and fork as if he were felling trees. "Ann, you may as well
go on to bed at once, and not bide there making such sleepy faces;
you look as long-favoured as a fiddle, upon my life, Ann. There,
you must be wearied out, 'tis true. I'll do the doors and draw up
the clock; and you go on, or you'll be as white as a sheet to-
morrow."
"Ay; I don't know whether I shan't or no." The matron passed her
hand across her eyes to brush away the film of sleep till she got
upstairs.
Dick wondered how it was that when people were married they could be
so blind to romance; and was quite certain that if he ever took to
wife that dear impossible Fancy, he and she would never be so
dreadfully practical and undemonstrative of the Passion as his
father and mother were. The most extraordinary thing was, that all
the fathers and mothers he knew were just as undemonstrative as his
own.
