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CHAPTER XI
TOM DESERVES HIS SUPPER
'Well done, lad,' Mr. Faggus said good naturedly; for
all were now gathered round me, as I rose from the
ground, somewhat tottering, and miry, and crest-fallen,
but otherwise none the worse (having fallen upon my
head, which is of uncommon substance); nevertheless
John Fry was laughing, so that I longed to clout his
ears for him; 'Not at all bad work, my boy; we may
teach you to ride by-and-by, I see; I thought not to
see you stick on so long--'
'I should have stuck on much longer, sir, if her sides
had not been wet. She was so slippery--'-
'Boy, thou art right. She hath given many the slip.
Ha, ha! Vex not, Jack, that I laugh at thee. She is
like a sweetheart to me, and better, than any of them
be. It would have gone to my heart if thou hadst
conquered. None but I can ride my Winnie mare.'
'Foul shame to thee then, Tom Faggus,' cried mother,
coming up suddenly, and speaking so that all were
amazed, having never seen her wrathful; 'to put my boy,
my boy, across her, as if his life were no more than
thine! The only son of his father, an honest man, and a
quiet man, not a roystering drunken robber! A man would
have taken thy mad horse and thee, and flung them both
into horse-pond--ay, and what's more, I'll have it done
now, if a hair of his head is injured. Oh, my boy, my
boy! What could I do without thee? Put up the other
arm, Johnny.' All the time mother was scolding so, she
was feeling me, and wiping me; while Faggus tried to
look greatly ashamed, having sense of the ways of
women.
'Only look at his jacket, mother!' cried Annie; 'and a
shillingsworth gone from his small-clothes!'
'What care I for his clothes, thou goose? Take that,
and heed thine own a bit.' And mother gave Annie a slap
which sent her swinging up against Mr. Faggus, and he
caught her, and kissed and protected her, and she
looked at him very nicely, with great tears in her soft
blue eyes. 'Oh, fie upon thee, fie upon thee!' cried
mother (being yet more vexed with him, because she had
beaten Annie); 'after all we have done for thee, and
saved thy worthless neck--and to try to kill my son for
me! Never more shall horse of thine enter stable here,
since these be thy returns to me. Small thanks to you,
John Fry, I say, and you Bill Dadds, and you Jem
Slocomb, and all the rest of your coward lot; much you
care for your master's son! Afraid of that ugly beast
yourselves, and you put a boy just breeched upon him!'
'Wull, missus, what could us do?' began John; 'Jan wudd
goo, now wudd't her, Jem? And how was us--'
'Jan indeed! Master John, if you please, to a lad of
his years and stature. And now, Tom Faggus, be off, if
you please, and think yourself lucky to go so; and if
ever that horse comes into our yard, I'll hamstring him
myself if none of my cowards dare do it.'
Everybody looked at mother, to hear her talk like that,
knowing how quiet she was day by day and how pleasant
to be cheated. And the men began to shoulder their
shovels, both so as to be away from her, and to go and
tell their wives of it. Winnie too was looking at her,
being pointed at so much, and wondering if she had done
amiss. And then she came to me, and trembled, and
stooped her head, and asked my pardon, if she had been
too proud with me.
'Winnie shall stop here to-night,' said I, for Tom
Faggus still said never a word all the while; but began
to buckle his things on, for he knew that women are to
be met with wool, as the cannon-balls were at the
siege of Tiverton Castle; 'mother, I tell you, Winnie
shall stop; else I will go away with her, I never knew
what it was, till now, to ride a horse worth riding.'
'Young man,' said Tom Faggus, still preparing sternly
to depart, 'you know more about a horse than any man on
Exmoor. Your mother may well be proud of you, but she
need have had no fear. As if I, Tom Faggus, your
father's cousin--and the only thing I am proud
of--would ever have let you mount my mare, which dukes
and princes have vainly sought, except for the courage
in your eyes, and the look of your father about you. I
knew you could ride when I saw you, and rarely you have
conquered. But women don't understand us. Good-bye,
John; I am proud of you, and I hoped to have done you
pleasure. And indeed I came full of some courtly
tales, that would have made your hair stand up. But
though not a crust have I tasted since this time
yesterday, having given my meat to a widow, I will go
and starve on the moor far sooner than eat the best
supper that ever was cooked, in a place that has
forgotten me.' With that he fetched a heavy sigh, as
if it had been for my father; and feebly got upon
Winnie's back, and she came to say farewell to me. He
lifted his hat to my mother, with a glance of sorrow,
but never a word; and to me he said, 'Open the gate,
Cousin John, if you please. You have beaten her so,
that she cannot leap it, poor thing.'
But before he was truly gone out of our yard, my mother
came softly after him, with her afternoon apron across
her eyes, and one hand ready to offer him.
Nevertheless, he made as if he had not seen her, though
he let his horse go slowly.
'Stop, Cousin Tom,' my mother said, 'a word with you,
before you go.'
'Why, bless my heart!' Tom Faggus cried, with the form
of his countenance so changed, that I verily thought
another man must have leaped into his clothes--'do I
see my Cousin Sarah? I thought every one was ashamed
of me, and afraid to offer me shelter, since I lost my
best cousin, John Ridd. 'Come here,' he used to say,
'Tom, come here, when you are worried, and my wife
shall take good care of you.' 'Yes, dear John,' I used
to answer, 'I know she promised my mother so; but
people have taken to think against me, and so might
Cousin Sarah.' Ah, he was a man, a man! If you only
heard how he answered me. But let that go, I am
nothing now, since the day I lost Cousin Ridd.' And
with that he began to push on again; but mother would
not have it so.
'Oh, Tom, that was a loss indeed. And I am nothing
either. And you should try to allow for me; though I
never found any one that did.' And mother began to cry,
though father had been dead so long; and I looked on
with a stupid surprise, having stopped from crying long
ago.
'I can tell you one that will,' cried Tom, jumping off
Winnie, in a trice, and looking kindly at mother; 'I
can allow for you, Cousin Sarah, in everything but one.
I am in some ways a bad man myself; but I know the
value of a good one; and if you gave me orders, by
God--' And he shook his fists towards Bagworthy Wood,
just heaving up black in the sundown.
'Hush, Tom, hush, for God's sake!' And mother meant
me, without pointing at me; at least I thought she did.
For she ever had weaned me from thoughts of revenge,
and even from longings for judgment. 'God knows best,
boy,' she used to say, 'let us wait His time, without
wishing it.' And so, to tell the truth, I did; partly
through her teaching, and partly through my own mild
temper, and my knowledge that father, after all, was
killed because he had thrashed them.
'Good-night, Cousin Sarah, good-night, Cousin Jack,'
cried Tom, taking to the mare again; 'many a mile I
have to ride, and not a bit inside of me. No food or
shelter this side of Exeford, and the night will be
black as pitch, I trow. But it serves me right for
indulging the lad, being taken with his looks so.'
'Cousin Tom,' said mother, and trying to get so that
Annie and I could not hear her; 'it would be a sad and
unkinlike thing for you to despise our dwelling-house.
We cannot entertain you, as the lordly inns on the road
do; and we have small change of victuals. But the men
will go home, being Saturday; and so you will have the
fireside all to yourself and the children. There are
some few collops of red deer's flesh, and a ham just
down from the chimney, and some dried salmon from
Lynmouth weir, and cold roast-pig, and some oysters.
And if none of those be to your liking, we could roast
two woodcocks in half an hour, and Annie would make the
toast for them. And the good folk made some mistake
last week, going up the country, and left a keg of old
Holland cordial in the coving of the wood-rick, having
borrowed our Smiler, without asking leave. I fear
there is something unrighteous about it. But what can
a poor widow do? John Fry would have taken it, but for
our Jack. Our Jack was a little too sharp for him.'
Ay, that I was; John Fry had got it, like a billet
under his apron, going away in the gray of the morning,
as if to kindle his fireplace. 'Why, John,' I said,
'what a heavy log! Let me have one end of it.'
'Thank'e, Jan, no need of thiccy,' he answered, turning
his back to me; 'waife wanteth a log as will last all
day, to kape the crock a zimmerin.' And he banged his
gate upon my heels to make me stop and rub them. 'Why,
John,' said I, 'you'm got a log with round holes in the
end of it. Who has been cutting gun-wads? Just lift
your apron, or I will.'
But, to return to Tom Faggus--he stopped to sup that
night with us, and took a little of everything; a few
oysters first, and then dried salmon, and then ham and
eggs, done in small curled rashers, and then a few
collops of venison toasted, and next to that a little
cold roast-pig, and a woodcock on toast to finish with,
before the Scheidam and hot water. And having changed
his wet things first, he seemed to be in fair appetite,
and praised Annie's cooking mightily, with a kind of
noise like a smack of his lips, and a rubbing of his
hands together, whenever he could spare them.
He had gotten John Fry's best small-clothes on, for he
said he was not good enough to go into my father's
(which mother kept to look at), nor man enough to fill
them. And in truth my mother was very glad that he
refused, when I offered them. But John was over-proud
to have it in his power to say that such a famous man
had ever dwelt in any clothes of his; and afterwards he
made show of them. For Mr. Faggus's glory, then,
though not so great as now it is, was spreading very
fast indeed all about our neighbourhood, and even as
far as Bridgewater.
Tom Faggus was a jovial soul, if ever there has been
one, not making bones of little things, nor caring to
seek evil. There was about him such a love of genuine
human nature, that if a traveller said a good thing, he
would give him back his purse again. It is true that
he took people's money more by force than fraud; and
the law (being used to the inverse method) was bitterly
moved against him, although he could quote precedent.
These things I do not understand; having seen so much
of robbery (some legal, some illegal), that I scarcely
know, as here we say, one crow's foot from the other.
It is beyond me and above me, to discuss these
subjects; and in truth I love the law right well, when
it doth support me, and when I can lay it down to my
liking, with prejudice to nobody. Loyal, too, to the
King am I, as behoves churchwarden; and ready to make
the best of him, as he generally requires. But after
all, I could not see (until I grew much older, and came
to have some property) why Tom Faggus, working hard,
was called a robber and felon of great; while the King,
doing nothing at all (as became his dignity), was
liege-lord, and paramount owner; with everybody to
thank him kindly for accepting tribute.
For the present, however, I learned nothing more as to
what our cousin's profession was; only that mother
seemed frightened, and whispered to him now and then
not to talk of something, because of the children being
there; whereupon he always nodded with a sage
expression, and applied himself to hollands.
'Now let us go and see Winnie, Jack,' he said to me
after supper; 'for the most part I feed her before
myself; but she was so hot from the way you drove her.
Now she must be grieving for me, and I never let her
grieve long.'
I was too glad to go with him, and Annie came slyly
after us. The filly was walking to and fro on the
naked floor of the stable (for he would not let her
have any straw, until he should make a bed for her),
and without so much as a headstall on, for he would not
have her fastened. 'Do you take my mare for a dog?' he
had said when John Fry brought him a halter. And now
she ran to him like a child, and her great eyes shone
at the lanthorn.
'Hit me, Jack, and see what she will do. I will not
let her hurt thee.' He was rubbing her ears all the
time he spoke, and she was leaning against him. Then I
made believe to strike him, and in a moment she caught
me by the waistband, and lifted me clean from the
ground, and was casting me down to trample upon me,
when he stopped her suddenly.
'What think you of that, boy? Have you horse or dog
that would do that for you? Ay, and more than that she
will do. If I were to whistle, by-and-by, in the tone
that tells my danger, she would break this stable-door
down, and rush into the room to me. Nothing will keep
her from me then, stone-wal1 or church-tower. Ah,
Winnie, Winnie, you little witch, we shall die
together.'
Then he turned away with a joke, and began to feed her
nicely, for she was very dainty. Not a husk of oat
would she touch that had been under the breath of
another horse, however hungry she might be. And with
her oats he mixed some powder, fetching it from his
saddle-bags. What this was I could not guess, neither
would he tell me, but laughed and called it
'star-shavings.' He watched her eat every morsel of it,
with two or three drinks of pure water, ministered
between whiles; and then he made her bed in a form I
had never seen before, and so we said 'Good-night' to
her.
Afterwards by the fireside he kept us very merry,
sitting in the great chimney-corner, and making us play
games with him. And all the while he was smoking
tobacco in a manner I never had seen before, not using
any pipe for it, but having it rolled in little sticks
about as long as my finger, blunt at one end and sharp
at the other. The sharp end he would put in his mouth,
and lay a brand of wood to the other, and then draw a
white cloud of curling smoke, and we never tired of
watching him. I wanted him to let me do it, but he
said, 'No, my son; it is not meant for boys.' Then
Annie put up her lips and asked, with both hands on his
knees (for she had taken to him wonderfully), 'Is it
meant for girls then cousin Tom?' But she had better
not have asked, for he gave it her to try, and she shut
both eyes, and sucked at it. One breath, however, was
quite enough, for it made her cough so violently that
Lizzie and I must thump her back until she was almost
crying. To atone for that, cousin Tom set to, and told
us whole pages of stories, not about his own doings at
all, but strangely enough they seemed to concern almost
every one else we had ever heard of. Without halting
once for a word or a deed, his tales flowed onward as
freely and brightly as the flames of the wood up the
chimney, and with no smaller variety. For he spoke
with the voices of twenty people, giving each person
the proper manner, and the proper place to speak from;
so that Annie and Lizzie ran all about, and searched
the clock and the linen-press. And he changed his face
every moment so, and with such power of mimicry that
without so much as a smile of his own, he made even
mother laugh so that she broke her new tenpenny
waistband; and as for us children, we rolled on the
floor, and Betty Muxworthy roared in the wash-up.
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