Emma Marshall - Under the Mendips - A Tale

Whatever Mr. Melville Falconer wanted Joyce did not stay to hear. She left the large hall by one door as her mother entered by the other, bearing in her hand a tray of delicately prepared breakfast for her son, who was wholly unworthy of her attentions, and would have been better without them.

"Thank you, mother," Melville said. "I hope the toast is not dried up. There is so much skill even in the poaching of an egg."

"There are two ways of doing everything," was Mrs. Falconer's rejoinder. "Now I must be quick, for I have a deal of work upstairs."

"Why should you have work, mother?"

"Why did you invite a fine gentleman here? You had better answer that question. The best room must be got ready, and the feather bed laid before the fire."

"A fire in this weather!" exclaimed Melville.

"No one ever sleeps in my house in an unaired bed; and never will, while I am mistress of it, that I can tell you. I hope your fine gentleman is not one to scoff at plain people."

"Arundel is far too well bred to make invidious remarks. But for all that, things may strike him as a little odd. I was going to suggest that we should dine at four o'clock while he is here, and that the boys should not sit down with us elders. It is not the custom in great houses."

"It is the custom here, and mine is not a great house: it is a comfortable English home, where there is no waste, and no extravagance, and no show. I'll warrant your grand friend never slept in a better bed nor between finer sheets than he will to-night. They are as sweet as lavender can make them, and – "

Melville shrugged his shoulders.

"Nay, spare me, mother, and let us leave the arrangements of bed-chambers to the fitting people. And, if I might suggest it, let all things wear their best appearance when Arundel arrives, including the mistress of the mansion. It is a pity when one so young and comely-looking as my mother should pay such scant heed to the little feminine ornaments which are – Phaugh! what is this? Positively a red ant crawling from the bread-trencher. What a beast! Quick! catch it, mother. I hope we shall have no red ants when Arundel is here."

Mrs. Falconer darted down upon the ant with her forefinger, and speedily despatched it, exclaiming there was a perfect plague of ants in the larder, and she did not know how to be rid of them.

"Disgusting!" said her son, carefully covering the body of the ant with a leaf which had garnished the pat of butter. "It is enough to make one sick. I must have a little brandy to settle myself, or rather, my breakfast, before I start."

Mrs. Falconer made no response to this request. But the spirit-stand was in the sideboard, and when his mother was gone Melville helped himself to a pretty strong dram, and then lounged about till it was time to mount the "four-wheel" and drive into Wells.

The squire's high "four-wheel" drew up before the door of the Swan Hotel at Wells about twelve o'clock that day. Mr. Falconer was well-known there, and there was a general rush to meet him. The landlord came briskly to the side of the vehicle to assist Miss Joyce to alight, while the ostler and stable-boy ran to the head of the mare; and in the dark entrance below the portico the landlady and a waiter with a napkin over his arm, were in readiness.

"Good-day to you," said the squire, in a cheery voice.

"We are proud to see you, sir. Nice weather for the hay. Will you please to walk in, sir? and Mrs. Maltby will receive your orders for dinner."

"Thank ye kindly. Dinner for two at one o'clock. My daughter will go up to the Liberty, to her aunt's."

"Here, you fellow," exclaimed the prototype of the first gentleman in Europe. "Here, can't you get the carriage nearer the pavement? I don't care to set my foot in that puddle."

The ostler backed the horse, and the landlord advanced to give Melville his arm, while a knot of people had assembled in Saddler Street, watching with some curiosity the movements of the smart young gentleman in the back seat.

The squire, provoked at the tone in which his son had spoken, vanished within the dark lobby of the inn, while Joyce said, laughing:

"Melville, surely you don't want to be helped from the carriage!"

"Look at 'im, now," said a poor woman, who was carrying a basket of vegetables to one of the Canon's houses; "did ye ever see the like? His shoes are made of paper; and, lor! what bows!"

"Take care; you'll be heerd," said an old man, who was leaning on his stick. "Take care. Don't 'ee chatter like a magpie. You'll be heerd, Peggy Loxley."

"Ha, ha!" laughed the woman, "I know why you are affrighted; I know. You've got your 'nephy' up to-day afore the justices, and you don't want to affront one of the justices; I see."

The old man shook his stick at the woman, and meantime Melville had accomplished his descent without splashing his shoes or the edge of his trowsers.

"I shall want a post-chaise ready, in the afternoon, after the Bath mail arrives," he said. "I expect a friend by the coach."

"Very good, sir," said the landlord, who now reappeared; "very good. The squire has ordered dinner for two at one o'clock."

"Where are you off to, Joyce?" Melville said.

"I am going to do some shopping, and to wait at Aunt Letitia's for father." Then Joyce drew a little nearer Melville. "Why can't your friend ride with you in the back seat?"

"Why? Because I don't choose to let him jog over the roads in such a rough conveyance."

Joyce's lip curled.

"It is good enough for father and for me," she said, "and ought to be good enough for you."

Melville arranged his hair, and touched the ends of his lace cravat.

"My dear child, don't make a scene before witnesses, I beseech you."

Joyce waited to hear no more, but tripped away, turning, through a quaint archway, to the Cathedral Green, where the cathedral stood before her in all its majesty.

The great west front of Wells Cathedral has few rivals, and dull indeed must be the heart that does not respond in some measure to its grandeur.

Involuntarily Joyce said, "How beautiful!" and then, leaving the road, she passed through a turnstile and pursued her way under the shadow of a row of limes, which skirted the wide expanse of turf before the cathedral.

The blue sky of the summer day over-arched the stately church, and a few white clouds sailed above the central tower. There were no jarring sounds of wheels, no tread of many feet, no traffic which could tell of trade. Although it was high noontide, the stillness was profound: the jackdaw's cry, the distant voices of children in the market-square, the rustle of the leaves in the trees, and a faint murmur of tinkling water, only seemed to make the quiet more quiet, the silence more complete.

The great west door was open, and Joyce walked towards it, and passed under it into the cool shadows of the nave. She had often done this before, going out from the north porch into the Close again, but to-day there seemed, she scarcely knew why, the stirring of a new life within her.

It was the moment, perhaps, of crossing the barrier which divides childhood from womanhood; the pause which comes in most young lives, when there is, as it were, a hush before the dawn of the coming day.

Joyce had been silent during the drive from Fair Acres; her father had invited no conversation, and a glance now and then at his profile as he sat on the high box seat at her side, had convinced Joyce that the lines of care on his forehead were not traced there without a reason.

The fop, who condescended to sit in the back seat of the cumbrous vehicle, indulged in sundry grumbles at the bad road, the dust, the slow pace of Mavis the mare, the heat, and such like trifles, which were, however, sufficient to disturb the serenity of Melville Falconer.