There are few things more restful than watching other people working hard, and the sensation is doubly piquant when one is sitting in the shade watching the worker toiling beneath the sun. Mrs. Peters was sitting in the shade; and though she would have denied the suggestion of idleness (for was she not picking the names of likely helpers for the imminent bazaar?), it was not unpleasant to observe Brown, the odd-job man, mowing the lawn. He seemed willing, though of course you must remember he had been taken on only two days ago, and besides, knew that the mistress had her eye on him; sober, too, refusing beer in favor of lemonade--but there! that might be hypocrisy, for there is always something, and these quiet men are often worse than the patently unsteady. Probably he gambled.... Still, at present he was undeniably working, and he had sense enough to oil the machine every quarter of an hour.
The vicarage lawn was big enough for two tennis-courts, with a little over for croquet in miniature or clock-golf. It took, theoretically, an able-bodied man an hour and a half to "run the machine over it." The optimistic phrase was the vicar's, who had not run the machine (or its predecessors) for twenty years. A succession of practical runners made the sum come out differently; and one rebellious soul--"of course, my dear, a radical chapel-goer"--had invited his employer to shove the qualified mower himself and see if 'e could do it in a qualified howerananarf. The sporting offer was not accepted, but the idealistic standard maintained. It was, in fact, a grass-cutting bogy who had never been beaten yet.
"Be careful, Brown," said Mrs. Peters, preparatory to a departure indoors, "to gather up all the grass and put it in the sack. It looks so untidy if you leave any lying about."
"Yes, ma'am," said Brown respectfully; "I'll be sure to do so. I ought to finish in half an hour or so."
"Less, if you work, Brown," said Mrs. Peters reprovingly. She knew he had been mowing for little over an hour, but discipline must be kept up. Besides, does not Browning say, "A man's reach should exceed his grasp, or what's a Heaven for?" Without waiting for possible protests she went into the house.
The odd-job man smiled.
"She's all right," he said softly to no one in particular. "Oh, lor', yes!... She's all right."
He whistled softly, but without obvious discontent, and made a change in his labors. Giving the machine a well-earned rest, he began to gather up the cut grass from a square of canvas that lay extended on the ground and stuffed it into the sack referred to by Mrs. Peters. This task brought him near the tall privet-hedge, reinforced by a four-foot paling, which sheltered the vicarage garden from the road. He had hardly accounted for a dozen armfuls when a voice from the other side of the hedge said, "Good morning."
Regardless of Mrs. Peters' late instructions, the odd-job man dropped a generous portion of grass and stood transfixed. "So you've come!" he said quietly but distinctly. "For goodness' sake let's have a look at your pretty face!"
The privet-hedge parted, and a damsel of twenty-three smiled upon the gratified Brown.
"Is that better?" she asked.
"Lots," replied the odd-job man, pressing closer to the hedge. "But I tell you what would be better still----"
"Yes?"
"I shall have to whisper it...."
The damsel, full of innocent curiosity, bent forward to listen. The odd-job man, congratulating himself on extraordinary cunning, bent forward and essayed a kiss of welcome. The intended recipient, however, seemed to be possessed of a sixth sense or instinct, for, when his lips were on the point of meeting hers, she drew back with a melodious cry of surprise. The kiss was too late to be checked, and unhappily was bestowed upon a bunch of privet.
The odd-job man mildly whispered the equivalent of "How very annoying!" and then remonstrated in a louder tone. He pointed out that he had not seen his visitor for a week, and that under the circumstances the least she could do, etc.
"Ye ... es," agreed the damsel, parting the hedge once more, "it is true, all that you say. But you forget that you have not earned it yet."
"Holy Moses!" said the odd-job man, appealing to the heavens. "Here I chuck my job in London at a word--or, rather, a letter from you! I come down here got up as a laborer; I hang about the blessed village till I'm sick for the town and you again; I get taken on here to work--and, mind you, it is work, though I don't grumble at that. And it's all for to keep an eye on a chap I've never seen."
"And not for me?"
"You silly chu--I beg your pardon, miss--that is, my dear! What I do mean is, who are you gettin' at? Of course, it's for you, and I'm going through with it. But I do think you might give me a bit of encouragement like, when you come at last----"
He paused; there was the sound of steps coming down the road, and he had no wish to be overheard courting. Thus drawn back to real life, conscience pricked him, and he wondered if there was any danger of Mrs. Peters reappearing. In a panic he looked over his shoulder.... No! the lawn was deserted: he still had time. But when he turned to the hedge he was surprised to see his love with her head pushed right through the privet, scarlet from excitement. A hand, too, appeared, enjoining caution and silence.
You must have recognized ere this that Brown, the odd-job man beneath the thrall of Mrs. Peters, was none other than Mr. Henry Brown, cab-proprietor, under different auspices. You will remember, then, the type of man he was but a few chapters ago, middle-aged, reserved, cautious and a little unenterprising. But you will not forget that love had made a change in his habits, outlook and elan. He was younger now, more alert, audacious and full of guile. So you must not be surprised that when he saw his lady beckoning, appealing to him to come closer, be careful, not talk, but observe--when he saw her head (and it was a very pretty head) framed in harmonious privet--when he saw this gift of fortune, you must not be surprised that he accepted it. He drew near and kissed her very quietly but very heartily. She, for some obscure reason wishing to remain unseen, did not dare to withdraw her head or box his ears. All she could do was to bite her lip and stamp her dainty heel, while she remained, ostrich-like, in the hedge.
The footsteps passed, but before they began to grow fainter Henry Brown repeated the salutation. "Couldn't help it!" he said meekly, answering the sparkle in her eyes. "You shouldn't tempt a man. Now, what's the row?"
She was too excited to rebuke him; the moment was too precious to be lost. "You see him?" she queried, pointing to the retreating figure of Lionel, who was on the road to The Quiet House. "Well, that is the man you are to watch! That is he from whom you are to recover the document!"
"The deuce it is!" said Henry, gazing after Lionel with interest. "Well, he's big enough to give trouble...."
"You are not afraid?"
"Not particularly," he said with a slow smile. "It's not a job I hanker after, but I've promised you to try, and I will try. You'll tell me, I dare say, what you think the best way of setting about it?"
"Of course. You are far too stupid to think for yourself. And now, good-by!"
"I say, you're not going! And I had such a lot to talk about ... that wedding, for instance...."
"What wedding?" She paused, chin in air.
"Come! that's a good 'un. Ours."
"Pstt! the assurance of these male creatures!--As if I would marry a man who kisses me by force! No, Mr. Brown, do not count on that. Do what you have promised first, and then I will think about it. If I choose, well ... If I do not choose, well ... I promise nothing."
"That's a poor sort of bargain."
"It is no bargain: I do not bargain. I give an order. Good-by. Oh, I will write to you----"
"Thank you--thank you----" he began.
"To tell you what to do. I shall not be far, but you must not attempt to see me without my leave."
She turned on her heel and marched down the road. The odd-job man whistled in amused dismay. "They're all alike," he muttered as he turned to his work again and met the vicar's wife. She was coming from the house and wore a severe expression.
"Did I hear you talking, Brown?"
"I can't say, ma'am," he answered stolidly. She frowned.
"Be good enough not to equivocate," she commanded. "Were you talking?"
"I often talk aloud to myself," said Henry mildly. He was an honest man and did not take kindly to lies, even of the whitest. Mrs. Peters frowned again.
"Indeed!" she said icily. "Do you mean to say you were not talking to a young woman through the hedge?"
"Yes, ma'am," said Henry, "I was. I suppose I'm allowed to rest for a minute now and then."
"Rest is a very different thing from philandering. That I can not allow. It looks very bad from the road to see the vicarage servants gossiping or worse through the hedge. Remember, Brown, it must not happen again. I can not understand one of our village girls----"
She paused interrogatively, but Henry was not so silly as to fall into the trap. He began to oil the machine, and even Mrs. Peters did not like to ask pointblank who his sweetheart was. Instead, she finished with a snap, "--making herself so cheap."
She went back to the house again. Henry straightened up and glared after her. "They're all alike!" he said again; but how he could include two such different people as Mrs. Peters and his adored in the same condemnation is hard to understand. The words of the sentence, it is true, were identical; but the inflection hinted at a great gulf fixed between the two offenders. Possibly they were charged with different offenses.
"They're all alike...." Are they? Does the same essential lurk beneath the surface? Supposing we could dissect Mrs. Peters, Alicia, Mizzi, Beatrice Blair, and a thousand Ermyntrudes or Sallies, should we find the same germ of woman? Take Lionel's evidence, if it were available. You might safely assert that to him Beatrice was different from and superior to any other woman you could produce. Henry Brown would as stoutly hold the same of his anonymous sweetheart. Mr. Peters and Mr. Hedderwick we may hope would take an identical line, or at least they would have once. But these are, or have been, lovers, the blindest of mortals, and their evidence is too partial to be trustworthy. A cynic like Pope would tell you that every woman is at heart a rake, and might find a score of others to support him. A Shaw might produce a monster like Ann Whitfield and brazenly say she was typical. A Chesterton would talk of women being sublime as individuals but horrible in a herd. A son might say that his mother was perfect, but he, too, would be partial. What is the truth about woman? Only a woman can say, and she would find it hard to take a detached view. Probably truth was partly expressed by the odd-job man in words--wholly expressed by his words and inflection. They are human and feminine if you probe deep enough, but there are variations, unimagined harmonies and discords for the seeker. "They're all alike"--with a difference, and no man can learn the whole truth from a text-book. The text-book can give him elementary rules which may serve him well, but he must be prepared to find plenty of exceptions. The student, however, need not fear monotony.
But while we have been indulging in cheap philosophy Mr. Brown's sweetheart has got well down the road, following at a considerable distance the footsteps of Lionel. Evidently she is in a good humor with the world, for she hums an air that has a sprightly sound as of the boulevards or cabarets, and she stops to pick a wild rose. She is smiling at her thoughts--possibly at the lamentable lack of self-control exhibited by her lover, possibly at the remembrance of the grass still to be mown and neatly gathered. And as she is in a good humor, self-possessed, and the air is of the balmiest, is it wonderful that she should smile absently on a good-looking stranger sitting by the roadside, smoking a cigarette? Surely not, as the stranger is Tony Wild, who has left Mr. Hedderwick exhausted at The Happy Heart, while he strolls out to examine the lie of the land.
"Good morning," says Tony courteously, raising his cap. He does not get up, for that might frighten her away. "Can you tell me which is the road to Hetton-le-Hole? Forgive me asking, but...."
"I have never heard of it," says the lady, with a smile that shows she penetrates Tony's elementary artifice. "I am sorry.... Good morning."
Tony deliberately flicks the ash from his cigarette.
"What a bore!" he observes with a fluent laziness in his voice, and of course the lady can not continue her progress while he is speaking. It would look so prudish. "I was awfully keen on seeing Hetton-le-Hole, but nobody here seems to know the road, so I suppose I shall have to give up the idea. I say, don't you find life rather a bore?" It was an abrupt change of subject, but there seemed no inconsequence as the words dropped idly from his lips. He appeared to be talking at random for an obvious purpose, but with an unaffected sincerity. "Nothing to do, I mean, and not a vast amount to see. One day following another, and so forth, you know...."
"Heavens, no!" replied the lady with an amused contempt. "There is so much to see--to ask--to think about! What can a young man like you think of himself if he is bored at ... at twenty-six?"
"Good shot!" said Tony. "I say, please forgive me being so forward and pushing and all that, and do sit down and talk to me. I should be tremendously gratified, and I'd do my best to amuse you."
"I have stayed too long already," she said with a crisp note of rebuke. "I have neither the time nor the wish to stop and relieve the tedium of bored strangers. I hope you will soon find the road you speak of."
She turned and went on her way. Tony smiled good-naturedly; really, she had been quite lenient, though he had hardly deserved all she said and implied. She was more than pretty and was evidently no fool. A lady? N--no ... but ... was it worth following up? Should he try to engineer a small flirtation or be content with the fair promises held out by Mr. Hedderwick? N ... no ... Yes! She had spurned his lightly-proffered homage to her charms, and amour propre would not allow him to give in without a struggle. He was only too willing in most things to step aside of his own free will--things so soon lost their interest; but to be forced to play the part of rejected spectator, that could not be permitted. His eyes followed her smilingly. "I bet she turns and waves!" thought the despicable Tony. "She's a charming lady's maid who likes fun, respects herself, and means to be treated with correctness--when she chooses. She will turn and wave before reaching that bend in the road. And I will be stand-offish and refuse to reply. A perfect cause of offense, with a delightful misunderstanding to follow. But, I shall follow her secretly along the hedge and find out where she lives. Admirable!"
She had gone some little distance, but still did not turn round. Worshipers of beauty, modesty, good feeling and decorous behavior, rejoice! She did not turn round! Her gay svelte figure marched bravely along, virginal defiance in her shoulders and the swing of her tailor-made skirt. The fragments of a gallant whistle floated back to Tony, and he murmured "Bravado!" with an uneasy doubt. The curve of the road was close at hand now: a few more yards would carry her past in triumph, and the sex be vindicated. Tony was in painful agitation, for his knowledge of woman and powers of swift diagnosis were at stake. Three yards were left--two--hope seemed dead. Then, alas! she stopped and a smile crept to his lips. But she did not turn round--there is still a loophole for the sex,--she did not turn round! All she did was to open her reticule and take her handkerchief from it. As the handkerchief was withdrawn a bit of pasteboard was caught in its folds and fell--unnoticed?--on the road. Tony waited with vast contentment until she had turned the corner. Then with a light heart he followed and picked up the card. He read the inscription with amused curiosity. It was, "Miss Arkwright, The Quiet House."
