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CHAPTER VI
NECESSARY PRACTICE
About the rest of all that winter I remember very
little, being only a young boy then, and missing my
father most out of doors, as when it came to the
bird-catching, or the tracking of hares in the snow, or
the training of a sheep-dog. Oftentimes I looked at
his gun, an ancient piece found in the sea, a little
below Glenthorne, and of which he was mighty proud,
although it was only a match-lock; and I thought of the
times I had held the fuse, while he got his aim at a
rabbit, and once even at a red deer rubbing among the
hazels. But nothing came of my looking at it, so far
as I remember, save foolish tears of my own perhaps,
till John Fry took it down one day from the hooks where
father's hand had laid it; and it hurt me to see how
John handled it, as if he had no memory.
'Bad job for he as her had not got thiccy the naight as
her coom acrass them Doones. Rackon Varmer Jan 'ood
a-zhown them the wai to kingdom come, 'stead of gooin'
herzel zo aisy. And a maight have been gooin' to
market now, 'stead of laying banked up over yanner.
Maister Jan, thee can zee the grave if thee look alang
this here goon-barryel. Buy now, whutt be blubberin'
at? Wish I had never told thee.'
'John Fry, I am not blubbering; you make a great
mistake, John. You are thinking of little Annie. I
cough sometimes in the winter-weather, and father gives
me lickerish--I mean--I mean--he used to. Now let me
have the gun, John.'
'Thee have the goon, Jan! Thee isn't fit to putt un to
thy zhoulder. What a weight her be, for sure!'
'Me not hold it, John! That shows how much you know
about it. Get out of the way, John; you are opposite
the mouth of it, and likely it is loaded.'
John Fry jumped in a livelier manner than when he was
doing day-work; and I rested the mouth on a cross
rack-piece, and felt a warm sort of surety that I could
hit the door over opposite, or, at least, the cobwall
alongside of it, and do no harm in the orchard. But
John would not give me link or fuse, and, on the whole,
I was glad of it, though carrying on as boys do,
because I had heard my father say that the Spanish gun
kicked like a horse, and because the load in it came
from his hand, and I did not like to undo it. But I
never found it kick very hard, and firmly set to the
shoulder, unless it was badly loaded. In truth, the
thickness of the metal was enough almost to astonish
one; and what our people said about it may have been
true enough, although most of them are such liars--at
least, I mean, they make mistakes, as all mankind must
do. Perchance it was no mistake at all to say that
this ancient gun had belonged to a noble Spaniard, the
captain of a fine large ship in the 'Invincible
Armada,' which we of England managed to conquer, with
God and the weather helping us, a hundred years ago or
more--I can't say to a month or so.
After a little while, when John had fired away at a rat
the charge I held so sacred, it came to me as a natural
thing to practise shooting with that great gun, instead
of John Fry's blunderbuss, which looked like a bell
with a stalk to it. Perhaps for a boy there is nothing
better than a good windmill to shoot at, as I have seen
them in flat countries; but we have no windmills upon
the great moorland, yet here and there a few
barn-doors, where shelter is, and a way up the hollows.
And up those hollows you can shoot, with the help of
the sides to lead your aim, and there is a fair chance
of hitting the door, if you lay your cheek to the
barrel, and try not to be afraid of it.
Gradually I won such skill, that I sent nearly all the
lead gutter from the north porch of our little church
through our best barn-door, a thing which has often
repented me since, especially as churchwarden, and made
me pardon many bad boys; but father was not buried on
that side of the church.
But all this time, while I was roving over the hills or
about the farm, and even listening to John Fry, my
mother, being so much older and feeling trouble longer,
went about inside the house, or among the maids and
fowls, not caring to talk to the best of them, except
when she broke out sometimes about the good master they
had lost, all and every one of us. But the fowls would
take no notice of it, except to cluck for barley; and
the maidens, though they had liked him well, were
thinking of their sweethearts as the spring came on.
Mother thought it wrong of them, selfish and
ungrateful; and yet sometimes she was proud that none
had such call as herself to grieve for him. Only Annie
seemed to go softly in and out, and cry, with nobody
along of her, chiefly in the corner where the bees are
and the grindstone. But somehow she would never let
anybody behold her; being set, as you may say, to think
it over by herself, and season it with weeping. Many
times I caught her, and many times she turned upon me,
and then I could not look at her, but asked how long to
dinner-time.
Now in the depth of the winter month, such as we call
December, father being dead and quiet in his grave a
fortnight, it happened me to be out of powder for
practice against his enemies. I had never fired a shot
without thinking, 'This for father's murderer'; and
John Fry said that I made such faces it was a wonder
the gun went off. But though I could hardly hold the
gun, unless with my back against a bar, it did me good
to hear it go off, and hope to have hitten his enemies.
'Oh, mother, mother,' I said that day, directly after
dinner, while she was sitting looking at me, and almost
ready to say (as now she did seven times in a week),
'How like your father you are growing! Jack, come here
and kiss me'--'oh, mother, if you only knew how much I
want a shilling!'
'Jack, you shall never want a shilling while I am alive
to give thee one. But what is it for, dear heart, dear
heart?'
'To buy something over at Porlock, mother. Perhaps I
will tell you afterwards. If I tell not it will be for
your good, and for the sake of the children.'
'Bless the boy, one would think he was threescore years
of age at least. Give me a little kiss, you Jack, and
you shall have the shilling.'
For I hated to kiss or be kissed in those days: and so
all honest boys must do, when God puts any strength in
them. But now I wanted the powder so much that I went
and kissed mother very shyly, looking round the corner
first, for Betty not to see me.
But mother gave me half a dozen, and only one shilling
for all of them; and I could not find it in my heart to
ask her for another, although I would have taken it.
In very quick time I ran away with the shilling in my
pocket, and got Peggy out on the Porlock road without
my mother knowing it. For mother was frightened of
that road now, as if all the trees were murderers, and
would never let me go alone so much as a hundred yards
on it. And, to tell the truth, I was touched with fear
for many years about it; and even now, when I ride at
dark there, a man by a peat-rick makes me shiver, until
I go and collar him. But this time I was very bold,
having John Fry's blunderbuss, and keeping a sharp
look-out wherever any lurking place was. However, I
saw only sheep and small red cattle, and the common
deer of the forest, until I was nigh to Porlock town,
and then rode straight to Mr. Pooke's, at the sign of
the Spit and Gridiron.
Mr. Pooke was asleep, as it happened, not having much
to do that day; and so I fastened Peggy by the handle
of a warming-pan, at which she had no better manners
than to snort and blow her breath; and in I walked with
a manful style, bearing John Fry's blunderbuss. Now
Timothy Pooke was a peaceful man, glad to live without
any enjoyment of mind at danger, and I was tall and
large already as most lads of a riper age. Mr. Pooke,
as soon as he opened his eyes, dropped suddenly under
the counting-board, and drew a great frying-pan over
his head, as if the Doones were come to rob him, as
their custom was, mostly after the fair-time. It made
me feel rather hot and queer to be taken for a robber;
and yet methinks I was proud of it.
'Gadzooks, Master Pooke,' said I, having learned fine
words at Tiverton; 'do you suppose that I know not then
the way to carry firearms? An it were the old Spanish
match-lock in the lieu of this good flint-engine, which
may be borne ten miles or more and never once go off,
scarcely couldst thou seem more scared. I might point
at thee muzzle on--just so as I do now--even for an
hour or more, and like enough it would never shoot
thee, unless I pulled the trigger hard, with a crock
upon my finger; so you see; just so, Master Pooke, only
a trifle harder.'
'God sake, John Ridd, God sake, dear boy,' cried Pooke,
knowing me by this time; 'don't 'e, for good love now,
don't 'e show it to me, boy, as if I was to suck it.
Put 'un down, for good, now; and thee shall have the
very best of all is in the shop.'
'Ho!' I replied with much contempt, and swinging round
the gun so that it fetched his hoop of candles down,
all unkindled as they were: 'Ho! as if I had not
attained to the handling of a gun yet! My hands are
cold coming over the moors, else would I go bail to
point the mouth at you for an hour, sir, and no cause
for uneasiness.'
But in spite of all assurances, he showed himself
desirous only to see the last of my gun and me. I dare
say 'villainous saltpetre,' as the great playwright
calls it, was never so cheap before nor since. For my
shilling Master Pooke afforded me two great packages
over-large to go into my pockets, as well as a mighty
chunk of lead, which I bound upon Peggy's withers. And
as if all this had not been enough, he presented me
with a roll of comfits for my sister Annie, whose
gentle face and pretty manners won the love of
everybody.
There was still some daylight here and there as I rose
the hill above Porlock, wondering whether my mother
would be in a fright, or would not know it. The two
great packages of powder, slung behind my back, knocked
so hard against one another that I feared they must
either spill or blow up, and hurry me over Peggy's ears
from the woollen cloth I rode upon. For father always
liked a horse to have some wool upon his loins whenever
he went far from home, and had to stand about, where
one pleased, hot, and wet, and panting. And father
always said that saddles were meant for men full-grown
and heavy, and losing their activity; and no boy or
young man on our farm durst ever get into a saddle,
because they all knew that the master would chuck them
out pretty quickly. As for me, I had tried it once,
from a kind of curiosity; and I could not walk for two
or three days, the leather galled my knees so. But
now, as Peggy bore me bravely, snorting every now and
then into a cloud of air, for the night was growing
frosty, presently the moon arose over the shoulder of a
hill, and the pony and I were half glad to see her, and
half afraid of the shadows she threw, and the images
all around us. I was ready at any moment to shoot at
anybody, having great faith in my blunderbuss, but
hoping not to prove it. And as I passed the narrow
place where the Doones had killed my father, such a
fear broke out upon me that I leaned upon the neck of
Peggy, and shut my eyes, and was cold all over.
However, there was not a soul to be seen, until we came
home to the old farmyard, and there was my mother
crying sadly, and Betty Muxworthy scolding.
'Come along, now,' I whispered to Annie, the moment
supper was over; 'and if you can hold your tongue,
Annie, I will show you something.'
She lifted herself on the bench so quickly, and flushed
so rich with pleasure, that I was obliged to stare hard
away, and make Betty look beyond us. Betty thought I
had something hid in the closet beyond the clock-case,
and she was the more convinced of it by reason of my
denial. Not that Betty Muxworthy, or any one else, for
that matter, ever found me in a falsehood, because I
never told one, not even to my mother--or, which is
still a stronger thing, not even to my sweetheart (when
I grew up to have one)--but that Betty being wronged in
the matter of marriage, a generation or two agone, by a
man who came hedging and ditching, had now no mercy,
except to believe that men from cradle to grave are
liars, and women fools to look at them.
When Betty could find no crime of mine, she knocked me
out of the way in a minute, as if I had been nobody;
and then she began to coax 'Mistress Annie,' as she
always called her, and draw the soft hair down her
hands, and whisper into the little ears. Meanwhile,
dear mother was falling asleep, having been troubled so
much about me; and Watch, my father's pet dog, was
nodding closer and closer up into her lap.
'Now, Annie, will you come?' I said, for I wanted her
to hold the ladle for melting of the lead; 'will you
come at once, Annie? or must I go for Lizzie, and let
her see the whole of it?'
'Indeed, then, you won't do that,' said Annie; 'Lizzie
to come before me, John; and she can't stir a pot of
brewis, and scarce knows a tongue from a ham, John, and
says it makes no difference, because both are good to
eat! Oh, Betty, what do you think of that to come of
all her book-learning?'
'Thank God he can't say that of me,' Betty answered
shortly, for she never cared about argument, except on
her own side; 'thank he, I says, every marning a'most,
never to lead me astray so. Men is desaving and so is
galanies; but the most desaving of all is books, with
their heads and tails, and the speckots in 'em, lik a
peg as have taken the maisles. Some folk purtends to
laugh and cry over them. God forgive them for liars!'
It was part of Betty's obstinacy that she never would
believe in reading or the possibility of it, but
stoutly maintained to the very last that people first
learned things by heart, and then pretended to make
them out from patterns done upon paper, for the sake of
astonishing honest folk just as do the conjurers. And
even to see the parson and clerk was not enough to
convince her; all she said was, 'It made no odds, they
were all the same as the rest of us.' And now that she
had been on the farm nigh upon forty years, and had
nursed my father, and made his clothes, and all that he
had to eat, and then put him in his coffin, she was
come to such authority, that it was not worth the wages
of the best man on the place to say a word in answer to
Betty, even if he would face the risk to have ten for
one, or twenty.
Annie was her love and joy. For Annie she would do
anything, even so far as to try to smile, when the
little maid laughed and danced to her. And in truth I
know not how it was, but every one was taken with Annie
at the very first time of seeing her. She had such
pretty ways and manners, and such a look of kindness,
and a sweet soft light in her long blue eyes full of
trustful gladness. Everybody who looked at her seemed
to grow the better for it, because she knew no evil.
And then the turn she had for cooking, you never would
have expected it; and how it was her richest mirth to
see that she had pleased you. I have been out on the
world a vast deal as you will own hereafter, and yet
have I never seen Annie's equal for making a weary man
comfortable.
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