The Treasure of Heaven Part 14

"Sorry for ye!" said the individual called Bill Bush, nodding encouragingly to Helmsley. "I'm a bit that way myself."

He winked, and again the company laughed. Bill was known as one of the most daring and desperate poachers in all the countryside, but as yet he had never been caught in the act, and he was one of Miss Tranter's "respectable" customers. But, truth to tell, Miss Tranter had some very odd ideas of her own. One was that rabbits were vermin, and that it was of no consequence how or by whom they were killed. Another was that "wild game" belonged to everybody, poor and rich. Vainly was it explained to her that rich landowners spent no end of money on breeding and preserving pheasants, grouse, and the like,--she would hear none of it.

"Stuff and nonsense," she said sharply. "The birds breed by themselves quite fast enough if let alone,--and the Lord intended them so to do for every one's use and eating, not for a few mean and selfish money-grubs who'd shoot and sell their own babies if they could get game prices for them!"

And she had a certain sympathy with Bill Bush and his nefarious proceedings. As long as he succeeded in evading the police, so long would he be welcome at the "Trusty Man," but if once he were to be clapped into jail the door of his favourite "public" would be closed to him. Not that Miss Tranter was a woman who "went back," as the saying is, on her friends, but she had to think of her licence, and could not afford to run counter to those authorities who had the power to take it away from her.

"I'm a-shrivellin' away for want o' suthin' to do," proceeded Bill. "My legs aint no show at all to what they once was."

And he looked down at those members complacently. They were encased in brown velveteens much the worse for wear, and in shape resembled a couple of sticks with a crook at the knees.

"I lost my sitiwation as gamekeeper to 'is Royal 'Ighness the Dook o'

Duncy through bein' too 'onest," he went on with another wink. "'Orful pertikler, the Dook was,--n.o.buddy was 'llowed to be 'onest wheer '_e_ was but 'imself! Lord love ye! It don't do to be straight an' square in this world!"

Helmsley listened to this bantering talk, saying nothing. He was pale, and sat very still, thus giving the impression of being too tired to notice what was going on around him. Peke took up the conversation.

"Stow yer gab, Bill!" he said. "When _you_ gits straight an' square, it'll be a round 'ole ye'll 'ave to drop into, mark my wurrd! An' no Dook o' Duncy 'ull pull ye out! This 'ere old friend o' mine don't unnerstand ye wi' yer fustian an' yer galligaskins. 'E's kinder eddicated--got a bit o' larnin' as I 'aves myself."

"Eddicated!" echoed Bill. "Eddication's a fine thing, aint it, if it brings an old gaffer like 'im to trampin' the road! Seems to me the more people's eddicated the less they's able to make a livin'."

"That's true! that's _dorned_ true!" said the man named Dubble, bringing his great fist down on the table with a force that made the tankards jump. "My darter, she's larned to play the pianner, an' I'm _dorned_ if she kin do anythin' else! Just a gillflurt she is, an' as sa.s.sy as a magpie. That's what eddication 'as made of 'er an' be _dorned_ to 't!"

"'Scuse me," and Bill Bush now addressed himself immediately to Helmsley, "_ef_ I may be so bold as to arsk you wheer ye comes from, meanin' no 'arm, an' what's yer purfession?"

Helmsley looked up with a friendly smile.

"I've no profession now," he answered at once. "But in my time--before I got too old--I did a good deal of office work."

"Office work! In a 'ouse of business, ye means? Readin', 'ritin', 'rithmetic, an' mebbe sweepin' the floor at odd times an' runnin'

errands?"

"That's it!" answered Helmsley, still smiling.

"An' they won't 'ave ye no more?"

"I am too old," he answered quietly.

Here Dubble turned slowly round and surveyed him.

"How old be ye?"

"Seventy."

Silence ensued. The men glanced at one another. It was plain that the "one touch of nature which makes the whole world kin" was moving them all to kindly and compa.s.sionate feeling for the age and frail appearance of their new companion. What are called "rough" and "coa.r.s.e" types of humanity are seldom without a sense of reverence and even affection for old persons. It is only among ultra-selfish and callous communities where over-luxurious living has blunted all the finer emotions, that age is considered a crime, or what by some individuals is declared worse than a crime, a "bore."

At that moment a short girl, with a very red face and round beady eyes, came into the room carrying on a tray two quaint old pewter tureens full of steaming soup, which emitted very savoury and appetising odours.

Setting these down before Matt Peke and Helmsley, with two goodly slices of bread beside them, she held out her podgy hand.

"Threepence each, please!"

They paid her, Peke adding a halfpenny to his threepence for the girl herself, and Helmsley, who judged it safest to imitate Peke's behaviour, doing the same. She giggled.

"'Ope you aint deprivin' yourselves!" she said pertly.

"No, my dear, we aint!" retorted Peke. "We can afford to treat ye like the gentlemen doos! Buy yerself a ribbin to tie up yer bonnie brown 'air!"

She giggled again, and waited to see them begin their meal, then, with a comprehensive roll of her round eyes upon all the company a.s.sembled, she retired. The soup she had brought was certainly excellent,--strong, invigorating, and tasty enough to have done credit to a rich man's table, and Peke nodded over it with mingled surprise and appreciation.

"Miss Tranter knows what's good, she do!" he remarked to Helmsley in a low tone. "She's cooked this up speshul! This 'ere broth aint flavoured for _me_,--it's for _you_! Glory be good to me if she aint taken a fancy ter yer!--shouldn't wonder if ye 'ad the best in the 'ouse!"

Helmsley shook his head demurringly, but said nothing. He knew that in the particular position in which he had placed himself, silence was safer than speech.

Meanwhile, the short beady-eyed handmaiden returned to her mistress in the kitchen, and found that lady gazing abstractedly into the fire.

"They've got their soup," she announced, "an' they're eatin' of it up!"

"Is the old man taking it?" asked Miss Tranter.

"Yes'm. An' 'e seems to want it 'orful bad, 'orful bad 'e do, on'y 'e swallers it slower an' more soft like than Matt Peke swallers."

Miss Tranter ceased to stare at the fire, and stared at her domestic instead.

"Prue," she said solemnly, "that old man is a gentleman!"

Prue's round eyes opened a little more roundly.

"Lor', Mis' Tranter!"

"He's a gentleman," repeated the hostess of the "Trusty Man" with emphasis and decision; "and he's fallen on bad times. He may have to beg his bread along the road or earn a s.h.i.+lling here and there as best he can, but nothing"--and here Miss Tranter shook her forefinger defiantly in the air--"nothing will alter the fact that he's a gentleman!"

Prue squeezed her fat red hands together, breathed hard, and not knowing exactly what else to do, grinned. Her mistress looked at her severely.

"You grin like a Ches.h.i.+re cat," she remarked. "I wish you wouldn't."

Prue at once pursed in her wide mouth to a more serious double line.

"How much did they give you?" pursued Miss Tranter.

"'Apenny each," answered Prue.

"How much have you made for yourself to-day all round!"

"Sevenpence three fardin's," confessed Prue, with an appealing look.

"You know I don't allow you to take tips from my customers," went on Miss Tranter. "You must put those three farthings in my poor-box."

"Yes'm!" sighed Prue meekly.