Chapter V: The Accident

Though Lawrence Maynard was a man of intelligence far deeper than Thomas Palk, yet the latter began to arrive at a juster conclusion concerning his new life and his new master than did his fellow worker.

Nor was it experience of life that led the horseman to his judgment. Experience of life has little to do with duration of life; and as a gutter-snipe of eight will often know more about it and be quicker to read character than a rural boy of fifteen, so, with men, it is the native power to grind what life brings to the mill that makes the student. Maynard had both seen and felt far more than Palk, yet in the matter of their present environment, Thomas it was who divined the situation correctly. And this he did inspired by that most acute of prompters: self-interest; while precisely in this particular Lawrence Maynard was indifferent. His interests, for one with the greater part of his life still to live, were unusually limited. His own life, by the accident of circumstances, concerned him but little. Chance had altered the original plan and scope so largely that he was now become impassive and so emptied of his old former apprehension and appetite for living, that he did not at present trouble himself to use the good brains in his head. The very work he had chosen to do was not such work as he might have done. It was less than the work he once did; but it contented him now. Yet his activities of mind, while largely sharing an apathy from which it seemed unlikely the future would ever awaken him, were not wholly sunk to the level of his occupation. Sometimes he occupied himself with abstract speculations involving fate and conduct, but not implicating humanity and character.

So he took people at their own valuation, from indifference rather than goodwill, and in the case of his new master, found this attitude create a measure of satisfaction. He liked Mr. Stockman, appreciated his benevolence and took him as he found him, without any attempt to examine beneath the smiling and genial surface that Joe invariably presented. He had proved exceedingly kind and even considerate. He had, in fact, though he knew it not, wakened certain sentiments in the younger man's heart and, as a result of this, while their acquaintance was still of the shortest, moved by a very rare emotion, Maynard challenged his master's friendship by the channel of confidence. Nor did it appear that he had erred. The farmer proved exceedingly understanding. Indeed, he exhibited larger sympathies than he was in reality capable of feeling, for Mr. Stockman, among his other accomplishments, had a royal genius for suggesting that the individual who at any time approached him could count upon his entire and single-hearted attention--nay, his devotion. He appeared to concentrate on his neighbour's welfare as though that were the vital interest of his own life; and it was only the harder-headed and long-memoried men and women who were not deluded, but had presence of mind to wait for results and compare Joe's accomplishment with his assurance.

Thus, after a month at Falcon Farm, Lawrence Maynard honestly felt something like enthusiasm for the master, while Thomas Palk failed of such high emotion. Not that Thomas had anything to quarrel about actively; but weighing Joe's words against his deeds, he had slowly, almost solemnly, come to the conclusion that there was a disparity. He voiced his opinion on a day when he and Lawrence were working together on the great fern slopes under the Beacon. There, some weeks before, the bracken had been mown down with scythes, and now the harvest was dry and ready to be stacked for winter litter. They made bales of the fern and loaded up a haycart.

"The man tighteneth," said Palk. "I don't say it in no unkind spirit and I've nought to grumble at; but it ain't working out exactly same as he said it was going to. I wouldn't say he was trying to come it over me, or anything like that; but he's a masterpiece for getting every ounce out of you. If he worked a bit himself, he wouldn't have so much time to see what we was doing."

"Can't say he asks anything out of reason."

"No, no--more I do; but I warn you. He edges in the work that crafty--here a job and there a job--and such a scorn of regular hours. 'Tis all very well to say when our work's done we can stop, no matter what the hour is; but when is our work done? Never, till 'tis too dark to see it any longer."

Maynard laughed.

"We must suit ourselves. It's a free country. I find him a very understanding man, and friendly."

"So do I, so do I; but I mark the plan he goes on. 'Tis the same with the hosses. I won't say it's not a very good plan for a farmer. Feeds well and pays well and treats well; but, behind all that, will have a little more than his money's worth out of man and beast."

"Can't say I've found him grasping."

"Then I hope to God I'm wrong and 'tis my fancy. Time will show. I'm satisfied if you are; and if his daughter don't feel no call to be uneasy, why for should us?"

"For my part I like work," declared Lawrence. "I may not have been so keen once; but there's very little to my life but work. I've got used to looking at work as about the only thing in the world."

"The first thing, not the only thing," answered Thomas. "There's religion and, in the case of many people, there's their families and the rising generation. We'm bachelors and ban't troubled in that way; but I believe in regular hours myself, so far as you can have 'em in farming. I like to get away from work and just do nothing--with mind and body--for a good hour sometimes. 'Tis a restful state."

Palk started with a full cart presently, while Maynard began to collect fresh masses of the dry fern and bind it. He found himself well content at Falcon Farm. He was settling down and liked the place and the people. He did not observe, or attempt to observe, anything beneath the surface of his new neighbours; but they proved agreeable, easy, friendly; they satisfied him well. He liked John Bamsey; he liked Melinda Honeysett, and had visited her father and found a spirit who promised to throw light on some of his own problems.

Now he was to meet yet another from his new circle. He worked two hundred yards above the road that ran slantwise across the hillside to Buckland; and from below him now, whence the sound of a trotting horse's footfall ascended, he heard a sudden, harsh noise which spoke of an accident. Silence followed. The horse had ceased to trot and had evidently come down. Maynard dropped his hay fork, tightened his leather belt and descended swiftly to the hedge. Looking over into the deep lane below he saw a pony on the ground, the shaft of a light market-cart broken, and a girl with her hat crushed, her hair fallen and a bloody face, loosening the harness.

She was a brown, young woman with a pair of dark grey eyes and a countenance that preserved a cheerful expression despite her troubles. She wore a tweed skirt and a white flannel bodice upon which the blood from her face had already dropped. She was kneeling and in some danger of the struggling pony's hoofs.

"Stand clear!" shouted Lawrence. Then he jumped the sheer eight feet of the wall, falling for his own comfort on the mass of beech leaves that filled the water-table below. The girl rose. She was filled with concern for the pony.

"Poor chap; he's been down before. How's his knees? All my fault. I got thinking and forgot the road was slippery."

"You're badly cut I'm thinking."

"It's nothing much. I fell on top of him when he came down. 'Twas a buckle done it I expect."

The man freed the pony and pulled back the trap. The animal had not hurt itself, but was frightened and in a mood to run away. The cart had a shaft broken short off, but was not otherwise injured.

Its driver directed Lawrence.

"Thank you I'm sure. That comes of wool-gathering when you ought to be minding your business. Serve me right. I'll take the pony--he knows me. D'you think you could pull the trap so far as Buckland, or shall I send for it? I can put it up there in a shed and send to Lower Town for a new shaft."

"I'll fetch it along. Is your face done bleeding?"

"Very near. You'll be Mr. Lawrence Maynard I suppose?"

"So I am then. How d'you know it?"

"Guessed it. I'm Dinah Waycott. I expect my young man has told you about me. 'Orphan Dinah' they call me. I'm tokened to John Bamsey, the water-keeper, my foster-father's son."

He nodded.

"I've heard tell about you. John Bamsey often drops in at Falcon Farm."

He pulled the trap along and she walked beside him leading the pony. She spoke kind words to the creature, apologised to it and told it to cheer up.

Maynard had leisure to observe her and quickly perceived the nature of her mind and that outspeaking quality that had occasioned argument. Ac their present meeting it took the form of a sort of familiarity that impressed Lawrence as strange from a woman to a man she had never met before.

"I was wishful to see you, because Johnny likes you. But he's not much of a hand at sizing up people. Perhaps if he was, he wouldn't be so silly fond of me."

This was no challenge, but merely the utterance of her honest opinion. Nothing of the coquette appeared in Dinah. She had received his succour with gratitude, but expressed no dismay at the poor figure she cut on their meeting.

"He's a good chap," he said, "and terrible fond of you, miss."

Thus unconsciously he fell into her own direct way of speech. He did not feel that he was talking to a stranger; and that not because he had already heard so much about her, but because Dinah created an atmosphere of directness between herself and all men and women. She recognised no barriers until the other side raised them. There was a frank goodwill about her that never hid itself. She was like a wild thing that has not yet fallen in with man, or learned to distrust him.

"Are you a chap with a pretty good judgment of your fellow creatures?" she asked. "You've got a thoughtful sort of face as if you might be."

He smiled and looked at her.

"Your fellow creatures make you thoughtful," he answered.

"Don't they? Never you said a truer word! Your life all depends upon the people in it seemingly."

"They make or mar it most times."

"Yes, they're the only difficult thing about it."

"If we could live it all to ourselves, it might be easy enough."

"So I think when I look at a squirrel. But I dare say, if he could talk, he'd tell us the other squirrels was a nuisance, and cadged his food and worried him."

"I dare say he would."

"I'm one of the lucky ones," she said.

"Ah!"

"Yes. If I could put my finger on a trouble, which I can't, I should find it was of my own making."

"Like to-day?"

"This don't amount to a trouble--just an accident with nobody the worse. Only a cranky mind would call this a trouble."

"You might have broke your neck, however."

"But I didn't, nor yet the pony's knees--my luck."

"You may have marked your cheek for life."

"And what does that matter? Suppose I'd knocked half my teeth down my throat: that would have been something to worrit about."

"You're the hopeful sort. Perhaps that's your best luck--that you're built to take a bright view, miss."

"Perhaps it is. Aren't you?"

"We may be built to one pattern and then life come along and unbuild us."

"I wouldn't let life unbuild me."

He did not answer, and presently she asked him a question.

"What d'you think of Johnny Bamsey, Mr. Maynard?"

"Hardly know him well enough to say."

"You know him as well as he knows you--better, because Johnny will be talking more than thinking, same as me. But you're not like that seemingly. In fact, though he's took to you and sees you've got a brain, he says you're rather glum for a young man."

"I expect I am to the eyes of my own generation."

"Why? People ain't glum for nought."

"Oh yes, they are--often for less than nought. It ain't life, it's nature makes many downcast. You see chaps, chin-deep in trouble, always ready to forget it and laugh with the loudest."

"So you do then."

"And others--prosperous men, with nothing to grizzle about--always care-foundered and fretty."

"You'd say you was glum by nature then?"

"I wouldn't say I was glum--you've only got John Bamsey's word for it. Miss Stockman wouldn't tell you I was glum."

"She likes you very much. She told me so when she was over to my home last week. Soosie-Toosie's a woman quick to welcome a bit of luck, because she don't get much, and she likes you, and Mr. Palk also."

"I'm glad she does."

"And what d'you think of Johnny?"

"A very good chap I'm sure. Rather excitable, perhaps."

"He is, you might say a thought unreasonable sometimes."

"Never where you are concerned I'm sure."

"He's got the loveliest hair ever I saw on a man."

"Fine curly hair, sure enough."

"I believe temper always goes with that fashioned hair. I've noticed it."

"I'm sure his temper is good most times."

"He's sulky if he's crossed."

"He's young. Perhaps he hasn't been crossed often."

"Never--never once in his life--until now. But he's a thought vexed because I won't name the day."

"Who shall blame him?"

"Nobody. I'm sure I don't."

"I expect you will name it pretty soon, miss?"

"I expect so. How d'you like Cousin Joe?"

"Mr. Stockman? Very much indeed. I feel a lot obliged to him--a kindly, understanding man. He looks at life in a very wise way, and he's got a thought to spare for other people."

"I'm glad you like him. He's cruel lazy; but what does that matter? It takes all sorts to make a world."

"Everybody tells me he's lazy. I shouldn't call him particular lazy for his time of life. He's done a deal of work in the past."

"Glad you're so well suited. Where d'you come from, if I may ask?"

"Somerset."

They had reached Buckland, and Dinah hitched her pony to the hedge, opened a gate and directed Lawrence to wheel the trap into a byre close at hand.

"I'll tell Mr. Budge what's happened and he'll let father's cart bide there for the minute. Then I'll take the pony and my parcels home."

"You're all right?"

"Never righter. And thank you, I'm sure--a proper good Samaritan. I won't forget it; and if ever I can do you a good turn, I will."

"I'm sure you will. Very pleased to meet you, miss. And you see doctor for that cut. 'Tis a pretty deep gash and did ought to be tended."

"Foster-father'll put me right. And if you're in a mind to come over one day to Sunday dinner, I hope you will. He'll be wishful to thank you."

"No need at all. But I'll come some time, since you're so kind as to offer."

"Mind you do then. I want for you to."

They parted and Lawrence returned to his work in the fern. He came back as swiftly as he might, but the better part of an hour was past, during which he had been absent. He found Thomas Palk and his master. Joe had taken his coat off and placed it on a stone. He was handling Lawrence's fork and assisting Thomas to fill the haycart. As Maynard entered a gate beneath and ascended to the fern patch, Mr. Stockman laboriously lifted a mass of litter up to Thomas on the cart. Then he heaved a heavy sigh, dropped the fork and rubbed his side.

He spoke to Lawrence as he arrived.

"Here's the man! Well, Lawrence, you've been taking the air I see; but I can't help feeling, somehow, that it's a thought ill-convenient in the midst of a busy working morning, with the dry litter crying to be stored, that you should make holiday. I've filled the breach, of course, as my custom is. I've been doing your work as well as I was able--an old man, gone in the loins through over-work; but what d'you think? What d'you think about it, my son?"

"There was a good reason, master."

"Thank God! I'm glad of that. I told Palk I hoped there was; for, if I'd thought just for a thirst, or some wilful fancy to see a maid, or suchlike nonsense, you'd forgot your duty, I should have felt a lot cast down in my mind and wondered how I'd come to misread you. And what was the reason? Work while you tell me."

The young man explained, and Stockman was instantly mollified.

"Enough said as to you. You could do no less. A female in trouble is a very good excuse for leaving your duty. In fact you may say a female in trouble is everybody's duty."

The silent man in the cart made a note of this admirable sentiment, while Joe continued.

"To think that Orphan Dinah should let the pony down--such a very wide-awake young thing as her! Dreaming about Johnny no doubt. And hurt you say?"

"Miss had got a bad cut across her face; but she made nothing of it, for joy the pony wasn't scratched."

"A nice maid. Too large-minded for safety some might think; but she ain't. Hope she's not marked. Not that her face is her fortune by any means; her fortune's in her heart, for by the grace of God her heart is gold. But she's got a nice sort of face all the same. I like a bit hidden in a woman myself--for the pleasure of bringing it to light. But she's so frank as a young boy, and I dare say, to some minds, that would be more agreeable than tackling the secret sort."

"She says what she means, master."

"She does, and what's a lot rarer even than that, she knows what she means--so far as a human can. Many never do. Many in my experience find the mere fact of being alive such a puzzle to them that they ain't clear about anything--can't see clear and can't speak clear. They go through their days like a man who've had just one drop too much."

"Life be a drop too much for some people," said Lawrence.

"It is. Keep working, keep working. An hour lost is an hour lost, even though you'd knocked off to help the Queen of England. Oh, my poor side! There's a muscle carried away I'm fearing. Shouldn't wonder if I was in bed to-morrow. What a far-reaching thing a catastrophe may be! Orphan Dinah gets mooning and lets down her pony. Then you, as needs you must, go to the rescue, and drop your work and make a gap in the orderly scheme of things in general. Then I come along, to see how we'm prospering, and forgetting my age and infirmity, rush in to fill the gap. Then once more my rash spirit gets a reminder from the failing flesh, and I'm called to suffer in body as well as pocket. That's the way how things be always happening. Nobody to blame, you understand, but somebody to pay. Somebody's got to pay for every damn thing. Nature's worse than they blasted moneylenders."

"I'll put my part right."

"Yes, exactly so, Lawrence; and somebody always do offer to put their part right. Good men are always offering. But 'tis in the cranky nature of things that oftener than not the wronger ban't the righter. You can't call home sixty minutes of time, any more than you can order the sun to stay in his tracks. And you can't right my twisted thigh. So the harm's done for all eternity."

"The fern will be in to-night before milking."

"That's a brave speech, such as I should have spoken at your age," said Joe. "Now I must limp back afore I'm stiff, and see what my daughter can do for me. I dare say a valiant bout of elbow grease on her part may stave off the worst. If you use 'Nicholson's embrocation'---the strength they make it for hosses--it will often save the situation. Many a day when I've been bone-tired after working from dawn till moon-up, I've refreshed the joints with 'Nicholson's'--hoss strength."

He left them, going slowly and relying much upon his stick. Then, when he was out of ear-shot, Thomas spoke.

"What d'you think of that?" he asked.

"Did he do much work?"

"Pitched three forks of fern, or it might be four--not a darned one more."

"He's a clever old man, however."

"I never said he weren't," answered Palk. "He's the cleverest old man ever I saw. I'm only telling you us may find out he's too clever."

"We'll get the fern in anyway."

Mr. Stockman had sat down two hundred yards from them by the grassy track to the farm.

"He's waiting for me to give him a lift home," said Thomas.