Ainslee's Magazine/Love's Way in Arcadia

by J. S. Fletcher

LOVE'S WAY IN ARCADIA

By J. S. Fletcher

SWEETBRIAR FARM, when I went to stay there that summer, seemed to me a crystallization of all the storied sweets of Arcadia as one reads of them in the poets and the dreamers. The house itself was some five hundred years old; it had diamond-paned windows framed in ivy; on one side where there was no ivy the gray walls were covered with clematis, and honeysuckle, and jessamine. There was a walled garden, gay with blossom; there was an orchard where the blossom fell on lush grass in which golden daffodils sprang up. At the end of the orchard ran a stream, brown and mysterious, in whose deeper pools lurked speckled trout. All about the house, and the garden, and the orchard the birds sang, for the nesting and breeding season was scarce over; and at night in a coppice close by a nightingale sang its heart out to the rising moon.

Within the old farmstead everything was as Arcadian as without. My sitting room—otherwise the best parlor—was a dream of old oak, old china, old pewter, and old pictures. It smelled always of roses and lavender—you could smoke the strongest tobacco there without offense, for the flower scent was more powerful. A dream, too, was my sleeping chamber, with its lavender-kept linen, its quaint chintz hangings, and its deep window seat, in which one could sit of a night to see the moonlight play upon garden and orchard, or of an early morning to watch the dew-starred lawn sparkle in the fresh sunlight.

And once free of the house there was the great kitchen to admire, with its mighty hearth, its old brass and pewter, its ancient grandfather clock, its flitches and hams hanging, side by side with bundles of dried herbs, from the oaken rafters; and beyond it the dairy, a cool and shadowy place, where golden butter was made out of snow-white cream; and beyond that again the deep, dungeonlike cellar, where stood the giant casks of home-brewed ale—nectar fit for the gods.

Nor were the folk who inhabited this Arcadia less interesting than the Arcadia itself. There was the old farmer, a fine specimen of an Englishman, with a face like the rising sun and an eye as blue as the cornflowers which grew in his hedgerows. There was his wife, a gay and bustling lady of sixty youthful years, who was never without a smile and a cheery word, and who, like, her good man, had but one regret, which each bore with admirable resignation that the Lord had never blessed them with children. There were the people who came and went about the farm—ruddy-faced and brown-faced men, young maidens, and old crones, children in all stages of youthfulness. And there was also John William, and there was Susan Kate.

John William Marriner—who was usually spoken of as John Willie—was the elder of the two laborers who lived in the house. He was a youth of apparently one and twenty years of age, and as straight and strong as a promising ash sapling. Whether in his Sunday suit of blue serge, or in his workaday garments of corduroy, John Willie was a picture of rustic health—his red cheeks always glowed, his blue eyes were always bright; he had a Gargantuan appetite, and when he was not smiling he was whistling or singing. Up with the lark and at work all day, he spent his evenings in the company of Susan Kate.

Susan Kate was the maid of all work at Sweetbriar Farm—a handsome, full-blown English rose of nineteen, with cherry cheeks and a pair of large, liquid, sloe-black eyes which made her white teeth all the whiter. It was an idyl in itself to see Susan Kate—whose surname was Sutton—milking the cows or feeding the calves out of a tin bucket; it was still more of an idyl to watch her and John William hanging over the orchard gate of an evening, the day's work behind them and the nightingale singing in the neighboring coppice.

It seemed to me that Mr. Marriner and Miss Sutton were certainly lovers, and that matrimony was in their view. Now and then they went to church together, Susan Kate carrying a clean handkerchief and a prayer book; John Willie carrying Susan Kate's umbrella.

Sometimes they went for walks on a Sunday afternoon. I more than once encountered them on these occasions, and curiously observed the manner of their love-making. We invariably met in shady lanes or woodland paths—Mr. Marriner in his Sunday suit, with some hedgerow flower in his buttonhole, invariably came first, bearing Miss Sutton's umbrella, with which he would occasionally switch the grass; Miss Sutton, very rosy-cheeked, followed at a distance Of two yards. They never seemed to hold any discourse one with the other, but if they looked sheepishly conscious they were undeniably happy.

Into this apparent paradise suddenly entered a serpent.

There came into my sitting room one morning, for the purpose of laying the tablecloth for my breakfast, a Susan Kate whom I had certainly not seen before. This Susan Kate had evidently spent a considerable part of the night in affliction; her eyes were red and heavy, and there was even then a suspicious quiver at the corners of her red and pouting lips. She set the plates and the knives and forks upon the table as if it was in her mind to do an injury to them.

“Why, Susan Kate!” said I. “What is the matter?”

Susan Kate's only immediate answer was to sniff loudly and to retire to the kitchen, whence she presently returned with a cold ham, uncarven as yet, and a crisp lettuce, either of which was a sight sufficient to cheer up the saddest heart. But Susan Kate was apparently indifferent to any creature comforts. She sniffed again, and disappeared again, and came back with the eggs, and the toast, and the tea.

“I'm afraid, Susan Kate,” said I, with all the dignified gravity of middle age, “I'm afraid you are in trouble.”

Susan Kate applied a corner of her apron to her left eye as she transferred a bow! of roses from the sideboard to the middle of the breakfast table. Then she found her tongue, and I noticed that her hands trembled as she rearranged my cup and saucer.

“It's all that there Lydia Lightowler!” she burst out, with the suddenness of an April shower. “A nasty, spiteful thing!”

I drew my chair to the table.

“And who is Lydia Lightowler, Susan Kate?” I inquired.

Susan Kate snorted instead of sniffing.

“She's the new girl at the Spinney farm,” she answered.

“Oh! I said. “I didn't know they had a new girl at the Spinney farm. Where's Rebecca got to?”

“'Becca's mother,” replied Susan Kate, “was took ill, very sudden, and 'Becca had to leave. So this here Lydia Lightowler come in her place. And wish she'd stopped where she came from, wherever that may be!”

I carved myself some delicate slices of ham.

“Ah!” I said. “And what has Lydia Lightowler done, Susan Kate?”

Susan Kate, whose stormy eyes were fixed on something in vacancy, and who was twisting and untwisting her apron, looked as if she would like to deliver her mind to somebody.

“Well, it isn't right if a young man's been making up to a young woman for quite six months that he should start carrying on with another!” she burst out at last. “It's more than what flesh and blood can stand.”

“Quite so—quite so, Susan Kate,” I said. “I quite appreciate your meaning. So John Willie——”

“I had to go on an errand to the Spinney farm last night,” said Susan Kate, “to fetch a dozen of ducks' eggs it was, for the missis, and lo and behold who should I come across walking in Low Field Lane but John William and Lydia Lightowler—a nasty cat! So when I saw them I turned and went an-another way, and when John William came home, him and me had words, and this morning he wouldn't speak.”

Here Susan Kate's tears began to flow afresh, and she suddenly threw her apron over her head and rushed from the parlor, no doubt to have a good cry in some of the many recesses of the ancient farmstead. It was plain that Susan Kate's heart was fashioned of the genuine feminine stuff.

In the course of my walk that morning I crossed the field in which Mr. John William Marriner was performing his daily task. Usually he sang or whistled all day long, and you could locate him by his melody at least a quarter of a mile away. But on this particular morning—a very beautiful one—John William was silent. He neither whistled nor sang, and when got up to him I saw that his good-natured face was clouded over. In fact, John William looked glum, not to say sulky. He was usually inclined to chat, but upon this occasion his answers were short, and mainly monosyllabic, and I did not tarry by him. It was plain that John William was unhappy.

So there was a cloud over Arcadia. It appeared to increase in density. It was on a Tuesday when it first arose; after Wednesday Susan Kate wept no more, but went about with dry eyes and her nose in the air, wearing an injured expression, while John William conducted his daily avocations in a moody and somber fashion. There were no more idyls of the orchard gate, and the farmhouse kitchen heard no merry laughter.

But on the next Monday morning Susan Kate, coming in to minister to my comfort, showed undoubted signs of grief—in fact, she looked as if she had cried her eyes out. And this time there was no need to invite her confidence, for she was only too anxious to pour out her woes.

“He walked her to church and home again last night!” exclaimed Susan Kate, nearly sobbing. “And they sat in the same pew, and sang out of the same book, same as what him and me used to do. And Bob Johnson, he saw them going down Low Field Lane, and he said they were hanging arms!”

“Dear, dear, dear!” said I. “This, Susan Kate, is getting serious.”

“And it's the flower show at Cornborough this week,” continued Susan Kate; “and he'd promised faithful to take me to it, but now I expect he'll take her—a nasty, mean, spiteful cat!”

“John William's conduct is most extraordinary,” I said. “It is—yes, Susan Kate, it is reprehensible. Reprehensible!”

Susan Kate looked at me half suspiciously.

“I don't want to say nothing against John Willie,” she said. “I know what's the matter with him. It's 'cause she dresses so fine—I saw her the first Sunday she came to church. And John Willie has such an eye for finery. But fine feathers make fine birds. I could be just as fine as what she is if I hadn't had to send my wages home to my mother when father broke his leg the other week. There's a hat in Miss Duxberry's window at Cornborough that would just suit me if I could only buy it. I'd like to see what John Willie would say then. 'Cause I'm as good looking as what she is, any day, for all she's got yellow hair!”

Then Susan Kate retired, presumably to weep some more tears. But next morning she was all pride again.

“He's going to take her to the flower show,” she said, as she set my breakfast before me. “He told Bob Johnson so last night, and Bob told me this morning.

“That's very sad, Susan Kate,” I said. “A man should never break his promise. I'm surprised at John William. Hasn't he said anything to you about it?”

“We haven't spoken a word to each other since I gave him a piece of my mind about meeting him and her in Low Field Lane,” said Susan Kate. “Nay, if he prefers her to me, he can have her, and welcome. I shall have naught no more to do with young men—they're that fickle!”

“Shall you go to the flower show, Susan Kate?” I inquired.

“No, I shan't!” snapped out Susan Kate. “They can have it to themselves, and then they'll happen be suited.”

I walked into Cornborough during the day and discovered the whereabouts of Miss Duxberry's shop. It was not difficult to pick out the hat to which Susan Kate had referred, nor to realize that the girl had uncommonly good taste, and that it would look very well indeed on her wealth of raven hair. A label attached to its stand announced that it came from Paris, and that its price was a guinea—well, Susan Kate was well worthy of twenty-one shillings' worth of the latest Parisian fashion. Besides, there was John William's future to consider. So I dispatched the Paris hat to Sweetbriar Farm by a specially commissioned boy, who solemnly promised to remember with what duty he was charged.

That evening, after my return to the farm, and following upon my supper and a short conference with Susan Kate, I made my way to the courtyard, where Bob Johnson, the second “liver-in,” was invariably to be found in his leisure moments, seated on the granary steps, and engaged either in plaiting whiplashes or making whistles out of ash twigs. Mr. Johnson was a stolid, heavy-faced, heavily fashioned young gentleman of twenty, with just sufficient intelligence to know a plow from a harrow, and a firm conviction that the first duty of all well-regulated citizens was to eat and drink as much as possible. I gave him a cigar, at which he immediately began to suck as if it had been his own pipe, and passed the time of day with him.

“I suppose you'll be going to the flower show to-morrow?” I said.

Mr. Johnson shook his head.

“I'm sure I don't know,” he answered. “The master's given me a half day off, but I'm none so great on them occasions. I doubt I shan't be present.”

“Look here,” I said, “would you like to earn half a sovereign?”

In order to emphasize this munificent offer, I drew the coin alluded to from my waistcoat pocket, and let the evening sun shine on it. Mr. Johnson's eyes twinkled, and he opened his mouth cavernously.

“How?” he said, and scratched his right ear.

“Now listen to me,” I said! “To-morrow afternoon you're to put your best things on, and you're to take Susan Kate to the flower show. I'll give you two shillings to pay you in, and five shillings to take with you, and you shall have five shillings more when you come back.”

Mr. Johnson scratched his ear again.

“Happen Susan Kate won't go,” he said dubiously. “I've never walked her out anywheres.”

“Susan Kate will go with you,” I said decisively. “You be ready at three o'clock. And remember, you're not to say a word about this to anybody—not one word to John William. If you do, there'll be no ten shillings.”

Mr. Johnson nodded his head.

“John Willie's going to the flower show,” he remarked. “He's going with the new servant lass at the Spinney farm. Him and Susan Kate's fallen out. I say, mister!”

“Well?” I replied.

“I'm not a great one for lasses,” said Mr. Johnson. “I don't want Susan Kate to think that I'm courting her. 'Cause I'm not going to.”

“Susan Kate will quite understand matters,” I said.

“Well, of course, ten shilling is ten shilling,' murmured Mr. Johnson. “Otherwise I should have stopped at home.”

At half-past two next day I took up a position in the garden from which I could see the setting out to the flower show. Presently issued forth John William, clad in his best and sporting a yellow tea rose. He marched valiantly away, but his face was gloomy and overcast.

A quarter of an hour later Miss Sutton and Mr. Johnson appeared round the corner of the house. The lady looked really handsome in her best gown and the new hat, and it was very evident to my jaded eyes that she knew her own worth and was armed for conquest. There were a flush on her cheek and a light in her eye which meant a good deal.

As for Mr. Johnson, who was attired in a black cutaway coat and slate-blue trousers, and wore a high collar and a billycock hat two sizes too small for him, he looked about as happy as if he were going to instant execution, and gazed miserably about him, as though seeking some deliverance. He walked a yard in the rear of Susan Kate—and Susan Kate seemed to regard him as one regards a dog at heel.

It might have been about an hour and a half afterward that Mr. Johnson came shambling down the meadow toward the farm—alone. He looked thoughtful, but infinitely relieved, as if some great weight had been lifted from his mind. I went out into the courtyard, and found him sitting on the wall of the well.

“You are soon home again,” I remarked.

“Yes,” he answered. “Yes. I didn't see no call to stop there—flower shows is naught in my line. Of course, I did what you said, mister—I took Susan Kate there, and went in with her, and walked her round.”

“And where is Susan Kate?” I inquired.

Mr. Johnson took off the too-small billycock, and scratched his head.

“Why,” he said, “she's with John Willie. Ye see, when her and me got there, I walked her round the big tent, and we met John Willie and that there Lydia Lightowler, from the Spinney. Susan Kate took no notice of 'em, but passed 'em as if they were so much dirt, and John Willie he looked at us as black as thunder. Well, we went on, and we'd gotten to a quietish part when up comes John Willie by himself and gets hold of me by the arm. 'What does thou mean,' he says, fierce like, 'by walking my lass out? Thee hook it, else I'll break every bone in thy body.' 'I didn't know Susan Kate were thy lass now,' I said. 'I thought ye'd quarreled.' 'Hook it!' he says. 'Oh, very well,' I says. 'Ye can settle it among yourselves.' So I left Susan Kate with him, and came home. Ye might give me that other five shillings now, if ye please, mister.”

Then Mr. Johnson retired to assume more comfortable attire, and I went for a walk to meditate. And, coming back in the soft twilight, I came across John William and Susan Kate. They were lingering at a wicket gate, and his arm was round her waist, and just as I caught sight of them he stooped and kissed her.

That, of course, accounted for the extraordinary happiness in Susan Kate's face when she brought in my supper.