‘“Your pore Cissie,” he said. “She’s a hatful o’ trouble. But you shall have ’em, Miss Phil. They’re all ready put by for you.” And, would you believe it, the old sinner pulled my three silver spoons out of his dirty pocket, and polished them on his cuff! “Here they be,” he says, and he gave them to me, just as cool as though I’d come to have my warts charmed. That’s the worst of people having known you when you were young. But I preserved my composure. “Jerry,” I said, “what in the world are we to do? If you’d been caught with these things on you, you’d have been hanged.”
‘“I know it,” he said. “But they’re yours now.”
‘“But you made my Cissie steal them,” I said.
‘“That I didn’t,” he said. “Your Cissie, she was pickin’ at me and tarrifyin’ me all the long day an’ every day for weeks, to put a charm on you, Miss Phil, and take away your little spitty cough.”
‘“Yes, I knew that, Jerry, and to make me flesh up!” I said. “I’m much obliged to you, but I’m not one of your pigs!”
‘“Ah! I reckon she’ve been talking to you, then,” he said. “Yes, she give me no peace, and bein’ tarrified – for I don’t hold with old women – I laid a task on her which I thought ’ud silence her. I never reckoned the old scrattle ‘ud risk her neckbone at Lewes Assizes for your sake, Miss Phil. But she did. She up an’ stole, I tell ye, as cheerful as a tinker. You might ha’ knocked me down with any one of them liddle spoons when she brung ’em in her apron.”
‘“Do you mean to say, then, that you did it to try my poor Cissie?” I screamed at him.
‘“What else for, dearie?” he said. “I don’t stand in need of hedge-stealings. I’m a freeholder, with money in the bank; and now I won’t trust women no more! Silly old besom! I do beleft she’d ha’ stole the Squire’s big fob-watch, if I’d required her.”
‘“Then you’re a wicked, wicked old man,” I said, and I was so angry that I couldn’t help crying, and of course that made me cough.
‘Jerry was in a fearful taking. He picked me up and carried me into his cottage – it’s full of foreign curiosities – and he got me something to eat and drink, and he said he’d be hanged by the neck any day if it pleased me. He said he’d even tell old Cissie he was sorry. That’s a great come-down for a Witchmaster, you know.
‘I was ashamed of myself for being so silly, and I dabbed my eyes and said, “The least you can do now is to give poor Ciss some sort of a charm for me.”
‘“Yes, that’s only fair dealings,” he said. “You know the names of the Twelve Apostles, dearie? You say them names, one by one, before your open window, rain or storm, wet or shine, five times a day fasting. But mind you, ‘twixt every name you draw in your breath through your nose, right down to your pretty liddle toes, as long and as deep as you can, and let it out slow through your pretty liddle mouth. There’s virtue for your cough in those names spoke that way. And I’ll give you something you can see, moreover. Here’s a stick of maple which is the warmest tree in the wood.”’
‘That’s true,’ Una interrupted. ‘You can feel it almost as warm as yourself when you touch it.’
‘“It’s cut one inch long for your every year,” Jerry said. “That’s sixteen inches. You set it in your window so that it holds up the sash, and thus you keep it, rain or shine, or wet or fine, day and night. I’ve said words over it which will have virtue on your complaints.”
‘“I haven’t any complaints, Jerry,” I said. “It’s only to please Cissie.”
‘“I know that as well as you do, dearie,” he said. And – and that was all that came of my going to give him a flogging. I wonder whether he made poor Troubadour shy when I lashed at him? Jerry has his ways of getting even of people.’
‘I wonder,’ said Una. ‘Well, did you try the charm? Did it work?’
‘What nonsense! I told René about it, of course, because he’s a doctor. He’s going to be a most famous doctor. That’s why our doctor hates him. René said, “Oho! Your Master Gamm, he is worth knowing,” and he put up his eyebrows – like this. He made joke of it all. He can see my window from the carpenter’s shed, where he works, and if ever the maple stick fell down, he pretended to be in a fearful taking till I propped the window up again. He used to ask me whether I had said my Apostles properly, and how I took my deep breaths. Oh yes, and the next day, though he had been there ever so many times before, he put on his new hat and paid Jerry Gamm a visit of state – as a fellow-physician. Jerry never guessed René was making fun of him, and so he told René about the sick people in the village, and how he cured them with herbs after Dr Break had given them up. Jerry could talk smugglers’ French, of course, and I had taught René plenty of English, if only he wasn’t so shy. They called each other Monsieur Gamm and Mosheur Lanark, just like gentlemen. I suppose it amused poor René. He hasn’t much to do, except to fiddle about in the carpenter’s shop. He’s like all the French prisoners – always making knick-knacks; and Jerry had a little lathe at his cottage, and so – and so – René took to being with Jerry much more than I approved of. The Hall is so big and empty when Dad’s away, and I will not sit with old Amoore – she talks so horridly about everyone – specially about René.
‘I was rude to René, I’m afraid; but I was properly served out for it. One always is. You see Dad went down to Hastings to pay his respects to the General who commanded the brigade there, and to bring him to the Hall afterwards. Dad told me he was a very brave soldier from India – he was Colonel of Dad’s regiment, the Thirty-third Foot, after Dad left the Army, and then he changed his name from Wesley to Wellesley,4 or else the other way about; and Dad said I was to get out all the silver for him, and I knew that meant a big dinner. So I sent down to the sea for early mackerel, and had such a morning in the kitchen and the store-rooms. Old Amoore nearly cried.
‘However, my dear, I made all my preparations in ample time, but the fish didn’t arrive – it never does – and I wanted René to ride to Pevensey and bring it himself. He had gone over to Jerry, of course, as he always used, unless I requested his presence beforehand. I can’t send for René every time I want him. He should be there. Now, don’t you ever do what I did, child, because it’s in the highest degree unladylike; but – but one of our woods runs up to Jerry’s garden, and if you climb – it’s ungenteel, but I can climb like a kitten – there’s an old hollow oak just above the pigsty where you can hear and see everything below. Truthfully, I only went to tell René about the mackerel, but I saw him and Jerry sitting on the seat playing with wooden toy trumpets. So I slipped into the hollow, and choked down my cough, and listened. René had never shown me any of these trumpets.’
‘Trumpets? Aren’t you too old for trumpets?’ said Una.
‘They weren’t real trumpets, because Jerry opened his shirt collar, and René put one end of his trumpet against Jerry’s chest, and put his ear to the other. Then Jerry put his trumpet against René’s chest, and listened while René breathed and coughed. I was afraid I would cough too.
‘“This hollywood one is the best,” said Jerry. “’Tis won‘erful like hearin’ a man’s soul whisperin’ in his innards; but unless I’ve a buzzin’ in my ears, Mosheur Lanark, you make much about the same kind o’ noises as old Gaffer Macklin – but not quite so loud as young Copper. It sounds like breakers on a reef – a long way off. Comprenny?”
‘“Perfectly,” said René. “I drive on the breakers. But before I strike, I shall save hundreds, thousands, millions perhaps, by my little trumpets. Now tell me what sounds the old Gaffer Macklin have made in his chest, and what the young Copper also.”
‘Jerry talked for nearly a quarter of an hour about sick people in the village, while René asked questions. Then he sighed, and said, “You explain very well, Monsieur Gamm, but if only I had your opportunities to listen for myself! Do you think these poor people would let me listen to them through my trumpet – for a little money? No?” – René’s as poor as a church mouse.
‘“They’d kill you, Mosheur. It’s all I can do to coax ’em to abide it, and I’m Jerry Gamm,” said Jerry. He’s very proud of his attainments.
‘“Then these poor people are alarmed – No?” said René.
‘“They’ve had it in for me for some time back because o’ my tryin’ your trumpets on their sick; and I reckon by the talk at the alehouse they won’t stand much more. Tom Dunch an’ some of his kidney was drinkin’ themselves riot-ripe when I passed along after noon. Charms an’ mutterin’s and bits o’ red wool and black hens is in the way o’ nature to these fools, Mosheur; but anything likely to do ’em real service is devil’s work by their estimation. If I was you, I’d go home before they come.” Jerry spoke quite quietly, and René shrugged his shoulders.
‘“I am prisoner on parole, Monsieur Gamm,” he said. “I have no home.”
‘Now that was unkind of René. He’s often told me that he looked on England as his home. I suppose it’s French politeness.
‘“Then we’ll talk o’ something that matters,” said Jerry. “Not to name no names, Mosheur Lanark, what might be your own opinion o’ someone who ain’t old Gaffer Macklin nor young Copper? Is that person better or worse?”
‘“Better – for time that is,” said René. He meant for the time being, but I never could teach him some phrases.
‘“I thought so too,” said Jerry. “But how about time to come?”
‘René shook his head, and then he blew his nose. You don’t know how odd a man looks blowing his nose when you are sitting directly above him.
‘“I’ve thought that too,” said Jerry. He rumbled so deep I could scarcely catch. “It don‘t make much odds to me, because I’m old. But you‘re young, Mosheur – you’re young,” and he put his hand on René’s knee, and René covered it with his hand. I didn’t know they were such friends.
‘“Thank you, mon ami,” said René. “I am much oblige. Let us return to our trumpet-making. But I forget” – he stood up – “it appears that you receive this afternoon!”
‘You can’t see into Gamm’s Lane from the oak, but the gate opened, and fat little Doctor Break stumped in, mopping his head, and half-a-dozen of our people followed him, very drunk.
‘You ought to have seen René bow; he does it beautifully.
‘“A word with you, Laennec,” said Dr Break. “Jerry has been practising some devilry or other on these poor wretches, and they’ve asked me to be arbiter.”
‘“Whatever that means, I reckon it’s safer than asking you to be doctor,” said Jerry, and Tom Dunch, one of our carters, laughed.
‘“That ain’t right feeling of you, Tom,” Jerry said, “seeing how clever Dr Break put away your thorn in the flesh last winter.” Tom’s wife had died at Christmas, though Dr Break bled her twice a week. He danced with rage.
‘“This is all beside the mark,” he said. “These good people are willing to testify that you’ve been impudently prying into God’s secrets by means of some papistical contrivance which this person” – he pointed to poor René – “has furnished you with. Why, here are the things themselves!” René was holding a trumpet in his hand.
‘Then all the men talked at once. They said old Gaffer Macklin was dying from stitches in his side where Jerry had put the trumpet – they called it the devil’s ear-piece; and they said it left round red witchmarks on people’s skins, and dried up their lights, and made ’em spit blood, and threw ’em into sweats. Terrible things they said. You never heard such a noise. I took advantage of it to cough.
‘René and Jerry were standing with their backs to the pigsty. Jerry fumbled in his big flap pockets and fished up a pair of pistols. You ought to have seen the men give back when he cocked his. He passed one to René.
‘“Wait! Wait!” said René. “I will explain to the doctor if he permits.” He waved a trumpet at him, and the men at the gate shouted, “Don’t touch it, Doctor! Don’t lay a hand to the thing.”
‘“Come, come!” said René. “You are not so big fool as you pretend, Dr Break. No?”
‘Dr Break backed toward the gate, watching Jerry’s pistol, and René followed him with his trumpet, like a nurse trying to amuse a child, and put the ridiculous thing to his ear to show how it was used, and talked of la Gloire, and la Humanité, and la Science, while Dr Break watched Jerry’s pistol and swore. I nearly laughed aloud.
‘“Now listen! Now listen!” said René. “This will be moneys in your pockets, my dear confrère.5 You will become rich.”
‘Then Dr Break said something about adventurers who could not earn an honest living in their own country creeping into decent houses and taking advantage of gentlemen’s confidence to enrich themselves by base intrigues.
‘René dropped his absurd trumpet and made one of his best bows. I knew he was angry from the way he rolled his “r’s”.
‘“Ver-r-ry good,” said he. “For that I shall have much pleasure to kill you now and here. Monsieur Gamm” – another bow to Jerry – “you will please lend him your pistol, or he shall have mine. I give you my word I know not which is best; and if he will choose a second from his friends over there” – another bow to our drunken yokels at the gate – “we will commence.”
‘“That’s fair enough,” said Jerry. “Tom Dunch, you owe it to the doctor to be his second. Place your man.”
‘“No,” said Tom. “No mixin’ in gentry’s quarrels for me.” And he shook his head and went out, and the others followed him.
‘“Hold on,” said Jerry. “You’ve forgot what you set out to do up at the alehouse just now. You was goin’ to search me for witchmarks; you was goin’ to duck me in the pond; you was goin’ to drag all my bits o’ sticks out o’ my little cottage here. What’s the matter with you? Wouldn’t you like to be with your old woman tonight, Tom?”
‘But they didn’t even look back, much less come. They ran to the village alehouse like hares.
‘“No matter for these canaille,” 6 said René, buttoning up his coat so as not to show any linen. All gentlemen do that before a duel, Dad says – and he’s been out five times. “You shall be his second, Monsieur Gamm. Give him the pistol.”
‘Dr Break took it as if it was red-hot, but he said that if René resigned his pretensions in certain quarters he would pass over the matter. René bowed deeper than ever.
‘“As for that,” he said, “if you were not the ignorant which you are, you would have known long ago that the subject of your remarks is not for any living man.”
‘I don’t know what the subject of his remarks might have been, but he spoke in a simply dreadful voice, my dear, and Dr Break turned quite white, and said René was a liar; and then René caught him by the throat, and choked him black.
‘Well, my dear, as if this wasn’t deliciously exciting enough, just exactly at that minute I heard a strange voice on the other side of the hedge say, “What’s this? What’s this, Bucksteed?” and there was my father and Sir Arthur Wesley on horseback in the lane; and there was René kneeling on Dr Break, and there was I up in the oak, listening with all my ears.
‘I must have leaned forward too much, and the voice gave me such a start that I slipped. I had only time to make one jump on to the pigsty roof – another, before the tiles broke, on to the pigsty wall – and then I bounced down into the garden, just behind Jerry, with my hair full of bark. Imagine the situation!’
‘Oh, I cant!’ Una laughed till she nearly fell off the stool.
‘Dad said, “Phil – a – del – phia!” and Sir Arthur Wesley said, “Good Ged!” and Jerry put his foot on the pistol René had dropped. But René was splendid. He never even looked at me. He began to untwist Dr Break’s neckcloth as fast as he’d twisted it, and asked him if he felt better.
‘“What’s happened? What’s happened?” said Dad.
‘“A fit!” said René. “I fear my confrère has had a fit. Do not be alarmed. He recovers himself. Shall I bleed you a little, my dear Doctor?” Dr Break was very good too. He said, “I am v
astly obliged, Monsieur Laennec, but I am restored now.” And as he went out of the gate he told Dad it was a syncope7 – I think. Then Sir Arthur said, “Quite right, Bucksteed. Not another word! They are both gentlemen.” And he took off his cocked hat to Dr Break and René.
‘But poor Dad wouldn’t let well alone. He kept saying, “Philadelphia, what does all this mean?”
‘“Well, sir,” I said, “I’ve only just come down. As far as I could see, it looked as though Dr Break has had a sudden seizure.” That was quite true – if you’d seen René seize him. Sir Arthur laughed. “Not much change there, Bucksteed,” he said. “She’s a lady – a thorough lady.”
‘“Heaven knows she doesn’t look like one,” said poor Dad. “Go home, Philadelphia.”
‘So I went home, my dear – don’t laugh so! – right under Sir Arthur’s nose – a most enormous nose – feeling as though I were twelve years old, going to be whipped. Oh, I beg your pardon, child!’
‘It’s all right,’ said Una. ‘I’m getting on for thirteen. I’ve never been whipped, but I know how you felt. All the same, it must have been funny!’
‘Funny! If you’d heard Sir Arthur jerking out, “Good Ged, Buck-steed!” every minute as they rode behind me; and poor Dad saying, “’Pon my honour, Arthur, I can’t account for it!” Oh, how my cheeks tingled when I reached my room! But Cissie had laid out my very best evening dress, the white satin one, vandyked8 at the bottom with spots of morone 9 foil, and the pearl knots, you know, catching up the drapery from the left shoulder. I had poor mother’s lace tucker and her coronet comb.’
‘Oh, you lucky!’ Una murmured. ‘And gloves?’
‘French kid, my dear’ – Philadelphia patted her shoulder – ‘and morone satin shoes and a morone and gold crape fan. That restored my calm. Nice things always do. I wore my hair banded on my forehead with a little curl over the left ear. And when I descended the stairs, en grande tenue,10 old Amoore curtsied to me without my having to stop and look at her, which alas! is too often the case. Sir Arthur highly approved of the dinner, my dear: the mackerel did come in time. We had all the Marklake silver out, and he toasted my health, and he asked me where my little bird’s-nesting sister was. I know he did it to quiz me, so I looked him straight in the face, my dear, and I said, “I always send her to the nursery, Sir Arthur, when I receive guests at Marklake Hall.”’