Chapter XII: Mrs Gribble’s Tea-Party

A few days after this interview a tea-party was assembled at the house of Mr Gribble. A rumour of the impending marriage of Hal Rushton with the late ‘school teacher’ had circulated Deepdale, and the inhabitants were eager and curious to ascertain the truth, and learn all particulars concerning it. The widow and her son had therefore been invited with much ceremony to spend the evening with the churchwarden and his wife, and all the principal scandalmongers of the place were asked to meet them. There were present Mr and Mrs Axworthy, of course, and old Miss Foker, who was supposed to have seen ‘better days.’ Mrs M‘Causland, the widow of a dissenting minister, and Mr Rohan, the miller, who passed as a very godly man, completed the circle, not forgetting, of course, ferrety-eyed Mr Gribble and his portly spouse, who sat at the head of her tea-table, perspiring in a plum-coloured merino dress, which made her complexion look like a boiled beetroot. Carrie and Lottie, her two sweet children, were also present, with their hair violently oiled and tied with red ribbons, but their hands and faces innocent of soap and water. They were as excited as the rest of the party, as their mamma had particularly urged them to recall every incident they could relative to the famous visit to Haltham, for the benefit of their guests, and they looked forward to the repetition much as other children would to a show performance on the piano or violin. When Mrs Rushton entered, clad in her rusty widow’s weeds, appealing to the sympathy of her audience by tottering feebly as though she had no strength to walk, and followed by her sandy-haired and freckled son, she was received much as she would have been had she sustained some crushing misfortune by death or otherwise. Mr Gribble conducted her to a chair, and Mrs Axworthy assisted her to remove her shawl and dispose of her umbrella.

‘Now, don’t you say a word, poor dear, till you’ve ’ad a cup of good ’ot tea,’ exclaimed Mrs Gribble sympathetically. ‘This is a terrible trial for you, to be sure, but it’s only what one might have expected from a ’ot-’eaded and wrong-minded young man like ’Al Rushton. Mr Snaley, sir, pray find yourself a seat. I ’ope I see you well, though this horful business must be quite a turn up for you as well as for your poor ma.’

‘Ah, my poor lad,’ murmured the widow, ‘I feels it more for him than for myself. His step-pa wouldn’t have be’aved so cruel to him, Mrs Gribble. He meant my Ted to have heverythink, and so he would if it ’adn’t been for unjustifiable hinterference. I know my dooty, Mr Gribble, and yours, and so I mention no names, and make no hinferences. Still, I can’t help feeling that my poor dear ’usband’s real wishes were not executed, and that he must be a-looking down on all this with eyes of spurn and displeasure.’

‘Well, you mustn’t think about that now, but ’ope he don’t see nothing of it,’ replied Mrs Gribble consolingly. ‘Here’s your tea, Mrs Rushton, and ’ope it’s to your liking, my dear--milk and sugar?--and when you’re a bit refreshed, you must tell us all you know about this unholy marriage.’

‘Marriage, indeed,’ quoth little Miss Foker, ‘I’m sure _I_ shall never call it a marriage, after the shocking things I’ve heard took place in the schoolhouse.’

‘There can’t be no blessing upon it,’ added Mr Gribble, ‘and I’m thankful it ain’t to take place in Deepdale. But just to fancy that young woman coming back here! I wonder she has the face to do it--_she_, whom we didn’t count worthy to teach our dear children. And now presuming to place herself atop of us all, as it were, and reigning at Highbridge Farm.’

‘Oh, it ain’t to be a _farm_ no longer, Mr Gribble,’ said Ted Snaley, with an unpleasant sneer. ‘The lady’s too fine and mighty to come to a farm. It’s to be called “’Ighbridge ’All.” Hal has had it painted up in white letters right across the drive gates. Miss Stafford is to be the lady of “’Ighbridge ’All.”’

‘Redikerlous!’ exclaimed Mr Gribble, ‘whilst we is content to live in a viller. Well, pride has a fall, they say, and Mr and Mrs Hal Rushton ain’t seen the last of the scandal yet, perhaps.’

‘What has become of the gentleman who was known to visit at the schoolhouse? Has he never appeared again?’ inquired Mrs M‘Causland.

‘Ma! ma!’ cried Carrie Gribble, tugging at her mother’s skirts, ‘is that the man with the beard?’

‘Yes, lovey; but wait a bit. You shall tell the ladies all you know afterwards. But lor’, Mrs M‘Causland, is it likely he would have appeared again? _She_ gave ’im good notice of what followed his visit, you may depend on that. But I wonder what he’ll say when he hears as she’s Mrs Rushton. Perhaps he will come back then and ’ave a row.’

‘Have you moved into the cottage yet, ma’am?’ inquired the churchwarden of the widow.

‘Oh, yes, Mr Gribble, and what a change. It’s cruel. Here am I, who have been mistress of the farm for so many years, degraded to a eight-roomed ’ouse. I’m sure I’ve near cried myself blind since I hentered it. It looks so mean. And only the old furniture, too. Not one stick of noo has he put into it.’

‘And you should see the noo things at the ’All,’ interrupted Ted Snaley; ‘all the carpets and curtains come from Snoad’s, though they ain’t put up yet on account of the paint. Collett is doing the parlour all in blue and white, and the best parlour in buff, and heverythink is to match. And there’s a pianner, and a new sofa, and brass pots to put flowers in, and I can’t say what. And the vicar’s wife is arranging it all with Hal, and she’s been twice into Haltham with ’im.’

‘_What!_’ cried the assembled company. ‘Do you mean Mrs Measures?’

‘Of course. She and ’Al is as thick as thieves.’

Mr Gribble cast his eyes upwards.

‘Oh, I am grieved to ’ear this,’ he said, ‘I am grieved to ’ear this. I thought as Mr Measures would have seen things with clearer heyes.’

‘Lor’! Mr Gribble, ain’t he always been on ’Al’s side?’ exclaimed the widow. ‘Didn’t he stand by my poor dear ’usband’s dying bed and threaten ’im till he was that weak and frightened he altered his will. Heverythink had been left to me, sir--_heverythink_. And just see me now. ’Al _did_ say at one time (and my son Edward can bear me out) that his stepbrother shouldn’t suffer by the injustice. He said he shouldn’t never marry, and Ted would come into it if he died. And now his wedding day’s fixed for the twenty-eighth of this month. Oh, the wanity of human ’opes.’

‘But how did it all happen?’ asked Miss Foker. ‘Mr Rushton appears to have been very sly about the matter. Was this settled before Miss Stafford left Deepdale?’

‘Oh, I expect so, ma’am, though he never said a word to _me_ about it.’

‘But anyone could see he was sweet on her, mother,’ said Ted Snaley. ‘I’ve told you scores o’ times how I catched ’im sneaking in or out of the schoolhouse door.’

‘But, whatever his previous intentions may have been, one would have thought he would have abandoned them as soon as he ’eard the shocking scandal about the young woman, and on such good authority as Mr Gribble’s,’ interposed Mrs Gribble. ‘If he’d ’ad any right feeling, he would have dropped ’er like a ’ot pertater. He must be as habandoned as herself.’

‘It is incomprehensible,’ said her husband; ‘but thank ’Evin we _can’t_ understand it. Sich ways is noo and strange to us. We’ve been reared respectable and pure, Mrs Rushton. No one has never been able to say a word against my good lady there, nor yet against myself. We can ’old up our ’eads with the best, and it’s a trial to think that such as Miss Stafford is to ride over us roughshod.’

‘Oh, but we mustn’t let her do it,’ exclaimed Mrs Axworthy; ‘we must put her in her proper place at once, and just show her what we think of her. The hussy!’

But Mr Axworthy stooped down and whispered a caution in his wife’s ear.

‘Aye, what’s that?’ she said sharply. ‘It _can’t_ be true. Mrs Rushton, ma’am, Mr Axworthy says that your stepson and this young woman are invited to stay the first week at the vicarage. But he must be mistook. Mrs Measures would never demean herself so.’

The widow shook her head sorrowfully.

‘He ain’t mistook, Mrs Axworthy. What Deepdale’s a-coming to I can’t say, but the vicar and his lady seem to set themselves against all the godly souls in the place, and take up with the castaways. They _is_ a-going to the vicarage as soon as they return from their wedding trip.’

‘But has Mr Hal seen Miss Stafford since she left Deepdale?’ inquired Mrs M‘Causland.

‘Oh, yes, ma’am. He’s been down to her ’ouse in Devonshire, though ’e’s very close as to what he see there. He don’t tell me nor my poor Ted nothing, except as we were to turn out of the ’ouse at a moment’s notice, and go to Wavertree Cottage. Which I’m sure it’s damp, for I’ve felt the rhoomatics all over me ever since I entered it. And fancy _me_ ma’am, who’s ridden in my carriage for the last ten year, ’aving to walk for the rest of my days. It seems as if the Lord was bent upon trying me.’

‘But you have your phee-aton, Mrs Rushton, sure_ly_?’ exclaimed Mrs Gribble.

‘Oh, no, ma’am, I haven’t. The phee-aton’s not mine, nor the ’orse, nor nothing. My stepson’s took good care to make me understand _that_. His madam is to have a noo carriage, and my phee-aton is to be sold, and she will kick the dust up in my face as she rolls by whilst I am tramping on the pathway.’

And thereupon Mrs Rushton produced a very dirty pocket-handkerchief, and rubbed her nose up with it violently.

‘Poor, dear soul,’ cried the ladies simultaneously. ‘It is a trial, indeed. But perhaps there’ll be a way out of it. He ain’t married yet, remember, and there may come something to prevent it. Or she may die, ’Evin’s ways is so mysterious, and then Mr ’Al’s heyes will be opened to the wickedness she has committed.’

‘Oh, I’ve no ’ope of that,’ said Mrs Rushton mournfully.

‘But if they _are_ married,’ interposed Mr Gribble, ‘they mayn’t keep together. A flighty school teacher will make a flighty wife, and Mr Hal, if I’m not mistook, will have cause to regret his rashness in marrying Miss Stafford. We mayn’t ’ave seen the last of the man with the beard.’

‘Oh, ma, mayn’t we tell what we seed in Haltham now? You said we might,’ urged Lottie.

‘Well, love, if you like. I don’t keep nothink of this from my little gals,’ continued Mrs Gribble, to the assembled company, ‘for they can’t learn too soon to ’ate and abhor such goings on.’

‘And we was in Haltham with teacher on market day,’ exclaimed both the youngsters in a breath, ‘and when we was in Mr Spring’s shop a big man with a black beard came in and he kissed teacher, and he says, “Hullo, my dear,” and she says, “Oh, don’t, afore the children,” and he says, “Yes, I will,” and she says, “Come and see me to-night at Deepdale,”’ and then the little liars stopped for a moment and glanced for approbation at their plum-coloured mamma.

‘Oh, shocking! terrible! To think the dear lambs were exposed to the horrors of such infamy!’ exclaimed the whole party.

‘Yes, ladies,’ said churchwarden Gribble, ‘and _that_ is the sort of teaching _all_ our dear lambs would have been subjected to had I not stood up like a lion and exposed her. I have suffered for it, ladies, I may say considerably suffered in the estimation of the vicar and Mrs Measures, I can see that plainly. And yet I do not repent of my courage, but am willing to be a martyr in such a cause.’

‘Grand!’ ‘Noble!’ ‘Self-sacrificing!’ were amongst the murmured comments that went round the little room.

‘But tell us what we are to do now, dear Mr Gribble,’ asked Mrs Axworthy. ‘How must we behave to this young woman on her return to Deepdale? Must we ask her to join our respectable parties, mix with our innocent children, associate with ourselves? Why, not a gentleman in the village will be safe from her machinations.’

‘Ah! ladies, Mrs Axworthy has started a delicate question. It’s a ’ard matter for a churchwarden to set up to judge his vicar. If Mr and Mrs Measures hinsists upon patronising Mrs Hal Rushton, I don’t see how we can go for to “cut” her. I would do the genteel, ladies, in deference to the vicar, but I would draw the line there. I wouldn’t ’ave her mingle with _my_ wife and little ’uns for anythink. And you must all judge likewise for yourselves--’

‘Oh! _I_ sha’n’t ask ’er to _my_ ’ouse,’ and ‘She’ll see by my heye what _I_ think of ’er,’ were amongst the free comments passed on the churchwarden’s address.

‘I ’ope she won’t come ’ere,’ said Carrie Gribble, ‘for I ’ate ’er. Lottie and me, we like Miss Brown, our new teacher ever so much better nor Miss Stafford. Miss Brown kisses us, and calls us “dear,” and ain’t ’alf so pertikerler over our books and our playtime. We likes Miss Brown awful.’

‘Dear little creatures!’ said Mrs Axworthy. ‘It’s just the same with my Laura and Sophia. They’re twice as ’appy as they was, poor dears.’

At this juncture, all the tea and cake having been disposed of, and Mrs Rushton having told what she knew concerning Hal Rushton’s intended marriage, the party began to think of going home.

‘Now, don’t you despond, there’s a dear,’ were Mrs Gribble’s parting words to the widow, ‘for there’s no saying ’ow things may turn out, nor if you mayn’t find yourselves at the farm again before long. Lor’! what should a gal like that know of ’ousekeeping? It don’t look a ’opeful prospeck to _me_, that I can tell you. You keep your mouth shut, ma’am, and your eyes open, and if you don’t find out something queer before long I shall be astonished. Good-night!’

As Ted Snaley limped home by his mother’s side, he turned his little, evil-looking green eyes up in the moonlight, and reverted to these words.

‘She’s right, mother, Mrs Gribble is. “Keep your mouth shut, and your eyes open, and you’ll find out something queer afore long.” I sha’n’t forget them words. I shall watch Mrs ’Al like a ferret at a rabbit’s ’ole, till I catch her tripping again. They never does it only _once_, mother. And then, if ’Al finds her out too, who knows if he mayn’t go back to his old word, and leave some of the property to me.’

‘Oh, my lad, she’ll be too deep for that. She’ll keep in now she’s got in. But there are other ways, Ted--there are other ways. Only, you must mind one thing. You mustn’t quarrel with your stepbrother, or it’ll be all up a tree with us. We must speak fair to both on ’em, and keep our footing at the ’All. There’s many a thing will find its way down from there to here, if we play our cards well. We shall get nothing by showing our ’ands. For whatever Hal may think afterwards, he’ll be just bound up in ’er at first, and ready to quarrel with anyone that’s agen her, and especially as so many of ’em will be. So let you and I fall in with the vicar and his wife, and seem to be friendly. Do you ’ear me?’

‘All right, mother.’

‘It’s a terrible come down,’ sighed the widow, as she opened the garden gate of Wavertree Cottage and realised there was no servant to meet her at the door and take her orders, ‘but it’s no use our making of it worse. It’s a good thing I’ve got a little money laid by in the bank for you, Teddy, in case I go first, for there’ll be no more saving now. But there’s six hundred pounds there safe enough. That’s not bad for ten years’ savings when it’s had to be scraped out of the vittles. Ah, well, there’s no saying, after all, what may come to pass. Fetch me the matches off the chimbley-piece, my boy, and light the lamp, and we’ll ’ave a bit of bread and bacon and a drop o’ beer afore we goes to bed.’

END OF VOL. I.

COLSTON AND COMPANY, PRINTERS, EDINBURGH.

TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES

Apparent typographical errors in spelling and punctuation have been silently corrected.

Spellings representing dialect have been retained.

Italics have been represented by _underlines_.