The Trumpet-Major. Thomas Hardy
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course you were.’
‘Sometimes, however, I wish I had never joined the army. My father gave me a very fair education, and your father showed me how to draw horses – on a slate, I mean. Yes, I ought to have done more than I have.’
‘What, did you know my father?’ she asked with new interest.
‘O yes, for years. You were a little mite of a thing then; and you used to cry when we big boys looked at you, and made pig’s eyes at you, which we did sometimes. Many and many a time have I stood by your poor father while he worked. Ah, you don’t remember much about him; but I do!’
Anne remained thoughtful; and the moon broke from behind the clouds, lighting up the wet foliage with a twinkling brightness, and lending to each of the trumpet-major’s buttons and spurs a little ray of its own. They had come to Oxwell park gate, and he said, ‘Do you like going across, or round by the lane?’
‘We may as well go by the nearest road,’ said Anne.
They entered the park, following the half-obliterated drive till they came almost opposite the hall, when they entered a footpath leading on to the village. While hereabout they heard a shout, or chorus of exclamation, apparently from within the walls of the dark buildings near them.
‘What was that?’ said Anne.
‘I don’t know,’ said her companion. ‘I’ll go and see.’
He went round the intervening swamp of watercress and brooklime which had once been the fish-pond, crossed by a culvert the trickling brook that still flowed that way, and advanced to the wall of the house. Boisterous noises were resounding from within, and he was tempted to go round the corner, where the low windows were, and look through a chink into the room whence the sounds proceeded.
It was the room in which the owner dined – traditionally called the great parlour – and within it sat about a dozen young men of the yeomanry cavalry, one of them being Festus. They were drinking, laughing, singing, thumping their fists on the tables, and enjoying themselves in the very perfection of confusion. The candles, blown by the breeze from the partly opened window, had guttered into coffin handles and shrouds, and, choked by their long black wicks for want of snuffing, gave out a smoky yellow light. One of the young men might possibly have been in a maudlin state, for he had his arm round the neck of his next neighbour. Another was making an incoherent speech to which nobody was listening. Some of their faces were red, some were sallow; some were sleepy, some wide awake. The only one among them who appeared in his usual frame of mind was Festus, whose huge, burly form rose at the head of the table, enjoying with a serene and triumphant aspect the difference between his own condition and that of his neighbours. While the trumpet-major looked, a young woman, niece of Anthony Cripplestraw, and one of Uncle Benjy’s servants, was called in by one of the crew, and much against her will a fiddle was placed in her hands, from which they made her produce discordant screeches.
The absence of Uncle Benjy had, in fact, been contrived by young Derriman that he might make use of the hall on his own account. Cripplestraw had been left in charge, and Festus had found no difficulty in forcing from that dependent the keys of whatever he required. John Loveday turned his eyes from the scene to the neighbouring moonlit path, where Anne still stood waiting. Then he looked into the room, then at Anne again. It was an opportunity of advancing his own cause with her by exposing Festus, for whom he began to entertain hostile feelings of no mean force.
‘No; I can’t do it,’ he said. ‘’Tis underhand. Let things take their chance.’
He moved away, and then perceived that Anne, tired of waiting, had crossed the stream, and almost come up with him.
‘What is the noise about?’ she said.
‘There’s company in the house,’ said Loveday.
‘Company? Farmer Derriman is not at home,’ said Anne, and went on to the window whence the rays of light leaked out, the trumpet-major standing where he was. He saw her face enter the beam of candlelight, stay there for a moment, and quickly withdraw. She came back to him at once. ‘Let us go on,’ she said.
Loveday imagined from her tone that she must have an interest in Derriman, and said sadly, ‘You blame me for going across to the window, and leading you to follow me.’
‘Not a bit,’ said Anne, seeing his mistake as to the state of her heart, and being rather angry with him for it. ‘I think it was most natural, considering the noise.’
Silence again. ‘Derriman is sober as a judge,’ said Loveday, as they turned to go. ‘It was only the others who were noisy.’
‘Whether he is sober or not is nothing whatever to me,’ said Anne.
‘Of course not. I know it,’ said the trumpet-major, in accents expressing unhappiness at her somewhat curt tone, and some doubt of her assurance.
Before they had emerged from the shadow of the hall some persons were seen moving along the road. Loveday was for going on just the same; but Anne, from a shy feeling that it was as well not to be seen walking alone with a man who was not her lover, said —
‘Mr. Loveday, let us wait here a minute till they have passed.’
On nearer view the group was seen to comprise a man on a piebald horse, and another man walking beside him. When they were opposite the house they halted, and the rider dismounted, whereupon a dispute between him and the other man ensued, apparently on a question of money.
‘’Tis old Mr. Derriman come home!’ said Anne. ‘He has hired that horse from the bathing-machine to bring him. Only fancy!’
Before they had gone many steps further the farmer and his companion had ended their dispute, and the latter mounted the horse and cantered away, Uncle Benjy coming on to the house at a nimble pace. As soon as he observed Loveday and Anne, he fell into a feebler gait; when they came up he recognized Anne.
‘And you have torn yourself away from King George’s Esplanade so soon, Farmer Derriman?’ said she.
‘Yes, faith! I couldn’t bide at such a ruination place,’ said the farmer. ‘Your hand in your pocket every minute of the day. ’Tis a shilling for this, half-a-crown for that; if you only eat one egg, or even a poor windfall of an apple, you’ve got to pay; and a bunch o’ radishes is a halfpenny, and a quart o’ cider a good tuppence three-farthings at lowest reckoning. Nothing without paying! I couldn’t even get a ride homeward upon that screw without the man wanting a shilling for it, when my weight didn’t take a penny out of the beast. I’ve saved a penn’orth or so of shoeleather to be sure; but the saddle was so rough wi’ patches that ‘a took twopence out of the seat of my best breeches. King George hev’ ruined the town for other folks. More than that, my nephew promised to come there to-morrow to see me, and if I had stayed I must have treated en. Hey – what’s that?’
It was a shout from within the walls of the building, and Loveday said —
‘Your nephew is here, and has company.’
‘My nephew here?’ gasped the old man. ‘Good folks, will you come up to the door with me? I mean – hee – hee – just for company! Dear me, I thought my house was as quiet as a church?’
They went back to the window, and the farmer looked in, his mouth falling apart to a greater width at the corners than in the middle, and his fingers assuming a state of radiation.
‘’Tis my best silver tankards they’ve got, that I’ve never used! O! ’tis my strong beer! ’Tis eight candles guttering away, when I’ve used nothing but twenties myself for the last half-year!’
‘You didn’t know he was here, then?’ said Loveday.
‘O no!’ said the farmer, shaking his head half-way. ‘Nothing’s known to poor I! There’s my best rummers jingling as careless as if ’twas tin cups; and my table scratched, and my chairs wrenched out of joint. See how they tilt ’em on the two back legs – and that’s ruin to a chair! Ah! when I be gone he won’t find another old man to make such work with, and provide goods for his breaking, and house-room and drink for