George Fenn - Sawn Off - A Tale of a Family Tree

There was another long pause, and then the Doctor said cheerfully, —

“And that’s why Doctor Salado went away from England. By the way, Very, I’m not a regular doctor, though I studied medicine after I left England very hard.”

“How can you say so, dear, when you know how all the poor people cried at your going away? They said no one would ever cure them of the fever again as you did. Why, they always called you the great doctor.”

“Yes, my dear: but people here would call me the great quack. There, I’m going for my walk round. But – hullo! here’s his lordship to see the burnt hoarding.”

For just at that moment Lord Pinemount’s loud, harsh voice floated in at the window.

“Disgraceful!” he cried.

Then there was a murmur of another voice, and again of another, as if two men were respectfully addressing his lordship.

“An old scoundrel!” came in at the window again.

“He means me!” cried the Doctor excitedly, rising.

“No, no, papa – please, please!” whispered Veronica, clinging to him.

“But I’m sure he does, Very.”

“I mean, don’t go out, papa dear: you would be so angry.”

“Would be? I am! – furiously angry. How dare he call me an old scoundrel!”

“Pray, pray don’t quarrel with him, dear.”

“I’m not going to, pet; but I’ll knock his head off for him.”

“No, no; you shall not go out, dear. I will not have my dear father disgrace himself like that.”

“I declare, Very, you are worse than your poor mother used to be. I must go and hit him, or I shall explode.”

“Then please explode here, papa dear, at me.”

“You’re a strange girl, Very, ’pon my soul,” cried the Doctor.

“Yes, papa dear,” she said quietly, but clinging tightly to his arm.

“How dare he come and damage my property!” floated in through the window.

“Buzz-buzz-buzz,” from another voice.

“But I will, sir. How dare he? I’ll lay the horsewhip across the scoundrel’s back!”

“Buzz-buzz – buzz-buzz.”

“Law or no law, he shall have the horsewhip first and the fine or imprisonment afterwards. These foreign rowdy ways shall not be tolerated here.”

“Let go, Very. I can’t stand it, I tell you,” said the Doctor. But Veronica threw her arms now about his neck, and laid her head close to his cheek, and clung there.

“Will you let go?”

“No, papa.”

“Do you want me to hit you?”

“Yes, papa dear.”

“Hang it, Very, it’s too bad! You’re a coward. You know I can’t.”

“Yes, papa dear; I know you’d sooner cut off your hand.”

“A blackguardly old scoundrel!” floated through the window.

“Yes? my lord.”

“Ah! I am, am I?” cried the Doctor. “Let go, Very.”

“No, papa dear: never.”

“Out, I suppose?” came, as if shouted for the inmates of the cottage to hear.

“I will be directly, you pompous, titled bully,” muttered the Doctor.

“Buzz-buzz – buzz-buzz,” in two different keys.

“Yes, I suppose so,” cried his lordship; “but if he thinks he is going to defeat me he is sadly mistaken.”

“Yes, my lord.”

“Very! will you untie those wretched little arms of yours from about my neck?”

“No, papa dear; and I’m not afraid of your hitting me.”

“Then, if you don’t let go, I’ll hit myself.”

Veronica raised her head a little, and kissed him.

“No: at home, and dare not show his face!” roared Lord Pinemount.

“There!” cried the Doctor. “Every word is a stinging blow in the face, Very.”

“Yes, papa; but I’m kissing the places to make them well,” said Veronica, suiting the action to the word.

“But I’ll let him see.”

“Buzz-buzz-buzz, – boozz-boozz-boozz,” and the sound of horse’s hoofs slowly dying away.

“Gone!” cried the Doctor passionately. “Very, you’ve made me seem like a miserable cowards that man will despise me, and insult us more than ever.”

“You are angry, papa dear; but when you grow calm you will tell me I’ve done quite right.”

“Humph! I’ll tell you so now, my darling,” said the Doctor, kissing her affectionately; “but my fingers itched to knock him down.”

“And when you had done so, you would have been very sorry, papa dear; for you would have hurt yourself.”

“What, my knuckles?”

“No, papa – your dignity as a gentleman; and you would have hurt me, too, very much.”

“You’re a witch, Very,” said the Doctor, drawing a long sigh. “What an overbearing brute it is! and I’ll be bound to say that son of his will develop into just such another animal.”

“Papa!”

“Hallo! what have I said?” cried the Doctor, with his eyes winking.

“Hit me after all,” said Very to herself, as she ran sobbing out of the room, but only to be caught upon the stairs and tenderly kissed and petted till her eyes grew dry, and the hysterical sobs which would rise to her lips had cleared.

About a couple of hours later the Doctor was down in his garden with a large note-book in his hand, a pen behind his ear, and an exciseman’s ink-bottle suspended by a piece of silk ribbon to his button-hole. Every now and then, as he walked up and down the gravel walk, he stopped to gaze away south at the lovely prospect, his eyes resting longest on a magnificent clump of fir trees which grew just beyond the bottom of the grounds, and hid from sight some very, shabby sand pits, which had something to do with the place being called “Sandleighs.”

They were splendid old trees, every one having grown straight and clean, for the sandy soil suited them, and a timber merchant would have looked at them longingly, and thought what fine sticks of timber they were, and what fine broad planks they would make if borne to a saw-mill.

Veronica was busy too, but not too busy to run to her father from time to time, as she saw that he took his pen from behind his ear, dipped it, and carefully wrote some note for his work. This note he would read aloud to her, and ask her opinion; after which Veronica hurried back to her work, pricking her fingers in spite of her thick gloves, as she carefully went over her rose trees to free them from the enemies with which they swarmed.

Close at hand, upon his knees, which were protected by an old mat, was Thomas, the old gardener, who was diligently extracting little tufts of weed from the gravel walk, and making observations to his young mistress as he went on.

“Make a deal o’ fuss at the Manor ’bout her ladyship’s roses; but they ain’t nowt to yourn.”

“Indeed!”

“Nowt, miss. You see that this guaney jooce as I waters ’em with is reg’lar hessence, and I saves it up. Seven gard’ners, ’cloodin’ a boy, they keeps there; but they can’t touch us in roses, miss.”

Chod !

“What’s that?” said Veronica, looking up as a peculiar sound struck her ear.

Chud ! Then chad ! and directly after, chod !

Thomas was kneeling bolt upright now, and took off his very shabby cap, and began from habit to scratch his head with the blunt point of the old weed knife.

“Don’t you hear, Thomas?” cried Veronica, keeping a rose grub in suspense between her finger and thumb; and as she spoke the sounds came at regular intervals.

“Ay, miss: sounds like some ’un a choppin’ ’ard.”

“Ah!” ejaculated Veronica, as she caught sight of a couple of men through an opening in the shrubbery at the bottom of the lawn, and she ran to where her father was busily writing down a note, speaking aloud as he went on.

“In the half-ruined capsule – ”