Brownsmith's Boy: A Romance in a Garden

by George Manville Fenn

  CHAPTER TWENTY THREE.

  I BEGIN WORK.

  Boys like sleep in the morning, but the desire to cuddle up for a fewminutes more and to go back to dreamland is not there on the firstmorning at a new home or at a fresh school.

  On that particular morning I did not feel in the least sleepy, onlyuncomfortably nervous; and, hearing voices through the wall, I jumped upand dressed quickly, to find on going down that Mr Solomon was in thekitchen putting on his thick boots.

  "Just coming to call you," he said, nodding. "Harpus five. Hah! changecoming," he cried, stamping his feet in his boots; "rain--rain. Comealong."

  He unbolted the door and I followed him out, drawing a breath of thesweetly fragrant air as we stepped at once into the bright sunshine,where the flowers were blooming and the trees were putting forth theirstrength.

  But I had no opportunity for looking about the garden, for Mr Solomonled the way at once to the stoke-holes down behind the glass-houses,rattled open the doors, and gave a stoke here with a great iron rod, anda poke there where the fires were caked together; while, without waitingto be asked, I seized upon the shovel I saw handy and threw on somecoke.

  "Far back as you can, my lad," said Mr Solomon. "Seems a rum time ofyear to be having fires; but we're obliged to keep up a little,specially on cloudy days."

  This done, he led the way into one of the sunken pits where the melonswere growing, and after reaching in among them and snipping off a runneror two he routed out a slug and killed it.

  Then turning to me:

  "First thing in gardening, Grant, is to look out for your enemies.You'll never beat them; all you can do is to keep 'em down. Now lookhere," he said, picking off a melon leaf and holding it before me,"What's the matter with that?"

  "I don't see much the matter," I said, "only that the leaf looks speckeda little with yellow, as if it was unhealthy."

  "Turn it over," he said.

  I did, and looked at it well.

  "There are a few red specks on it--very small ones," I said.

  "Good eyes," he said approvingly. "That's what's the matter, my lad.You've seen the greatest enemy we have under glass. Those red specks,so small that you can hardly see them, cover the lower parts of theleaves with tiny cobwebs and choke the growth while they suck all thegoodness out, and make the yellow specks on the top by sucking all thesap from the leaves."

  "What, those tiny specks!"

  "Yes, those little specks would spoil all our melon plants if we did notdestroy them--melons, cucumbers, vines, peaches, and nectarines--anything almost under glass. But there's your gun and ammunition; loadup and shoot 'em. Never give them any rest."

  I looked at him wonderingly, for he was pointing at a syringe standingin a pail of soapy-looking water.

  "Yes," he continued, "that's right--kill 'em when you can. If you leavethem, and greenfly, and those sort of things, alone till to-morrow, bythat time they're turned into great-grandfathers, and have got such afamily of little ones about 'em that your leaves are ten times worse."

  "But what are those red specks?" I said.

  "Red spider, boy. Now I'll show you. This is my plan to keep my plantshealthy: have a bucket of soap and water in every house, and a syringein it. Then you take it up as soon as you see the mischief and kill itat once. It's all handy for you, same as it is to have a bit of mattinghanging up on a nail, ready to tie up the stem that wants it. Somebodysaid, Grant, `A stitch in time saves nine,' it ought to have been, `Awashed leaf keeps off grief.' See here."

  He took the syringe, filled it, and sent a fine shower beneath theleaves of the melons, where they were trained over a trellis, thoroughlywashing them all over.

  "Now you try," he said, and taking off my jacket I syringed awayvigorously, while with matting and knife he tied in some loose strandsand cut off others, so as to leave the vines neat.

  "That'll do for the present," he said; "but mind this, Grant, if everyou see an enemy, shoot him while he's a single man if you can. Waittill to-morrow, you'll have to shoot all his relations too."

  He led the way out of the pit, and round by the grounds, where differentmen were at work mowing and sweeping, the short cut grass smellingdelicious in the morning air. He spoke to first one and then another ina short business-like way, and then went on with me to one of the greatconservatories up by the house.

  "I might put you to that sort of work, Grant," he said, giving his heada backward jerk; "but that wants no brains. Work under glass does. Youwant to work with your hands and your head. Now we'll have a tidy up inhere. Sir Francis likes plenty of bright flowers."

  I should have liked to stop looking about as soon as we were in thelarge glass building, which was one mass of bloom; but following MrSolomon's example I was soon busily snipping off dead flowers andleaves, so as to make the various plants tidy; and I was extremely busyin one corner over this when I suddenly found that Mr Solomon waswatching me, and that a big bell was ringing somewhere.

  "That's right," he said, nodding his head in a satisfied way. "That'swhat I want. You don't know much yet, but you will. If I was to setone of those men to do that he'd have knocked off half the buds, and--what have you been doing there?"

  "I tied up those two flower-stems," I said. "Wasn't it right, sir?"

  "Right and wrong, my lad," he said, whipping out his knife and cuttingthem free. "Look here."

  He took a piece of wet matting--a mere strip--and tied them up again,with his big fingers moving so quickly and cleverly that I wondered.

  "There, that's the way. Looks the same as you did it, eh?"

  "Yes," I said, smiling.

  "No, it isn't. You tied yours in front of the stem, with an ugly knotto rub and fret it, and make a sore place when the windows were open.I've put a neat band round mine, and the knot rests on the stick."

  "Oh, I see!" I cried.

  "Yes, Grant, there's a right way and a wrong way, and somehow thenatural way is generally the wrong. Never saw one tried, but I believeif you took a savage black and told him to get up on a horse, he wouldgo on the wrong side, put his left foot in the stirrup, and throw hisright leg over, and come down sitting with his face to the tail.Breakfast."

  "What! so soon?" I said.

  "Soon! Why, it's past eight."

  I was astounded, the time had gone so quickly; and soon after I wassaying "good morning" to Mrs Solomon, and partaking of the plain meal.

  "Well?" said Mrs Solomon in her cold impassive way.

  Mr Solomon was so busy with a piece of cold bacon and some bread thathe did not look up, and Mrs Solomon waited patiently till he raised hishead and gave her a nod.

  "I am glad," she said, giving a sigh as if she were relieved; and thenshe turned to me and looked quite pleasantly at me, and taking my cup,refilled it with coffee, and actually smiled.

  "Notice the missus?" said Mr Solomon, as, after a glance at his bigsilver watch, he had suddenly said "Harpusate," and led the way to thevineries.

  "Notice Mrs Brownsmith?" I said.

  "Yes; see anything about her?"

  "I thought she looked better this morning than she did last night. Wasshe ill?"

  "Yes," he said shortly. "Get them steps."

  I fetched _them_ steps, and thought that a gardener might just as wellbe grammatical.

  He opened them out, and opening his knife, cut a few strands of mattingready, stuck them under one of his braces, after taking off his coat,and then climbed up to the top to tie in a long green cane of thegrape-vine.

  "Hold the steps steady," he said; and then with his head in amongst theleaves he went on talking.

  "Bit queer in the head," he said slowly, and with his face averted."Shied at you."

  I stared. His wife was not a horse, and I thought they were the onlythings that shied; but I found I was wrong, for Mr Solomon went on:

  "I did, too. Ezra said a lot about you. Fine young shoot this, ain'tit?"

  I said it was, for it was about ten feet long an
d as thick as my finger,and it seemed wonderful that it should have grown like that in a fewmonths; but all the time my cheeks were tingling as I wondered what OldBrownsmith had said about me.

  "Sounded all right, but it's risky to take a boy into your house whenyou are comfortable without, you see."

  I felt ashamed and hurt that I should have been talked of so, andremained silent.

  "The missus said you might be dirty and awkward in the house. This canewill be loaded next year if we get it well ripened this year, Grant.That's why I'm tying it in here close to the glass, where it'll getplenty of sun and air."

  "What! will that bear grapes next year, sir?" I said, for I feltobliged to say something.

  "Yes; and when the leaves are off you shall cut this one right out downat the bottom yonder."

  He tapped a beautiful branch or cane from the main stem, which wasbearing about a dozen fine bunches of grapes, and it seemed a pity; butof course he knew best, and he began cutting and snapping out shoots andbig leaves between the new green cane and the glass.

  "She was afraid you'd be a nuisance to me, and said you'd be playingwith tops, and throwing stones, and breaking the glass. I told her thatBrother Ezra wouldn't send me such a boy as that; but she only shook herhead. `I know what boys are,' she said. `Look at her ladyship's two.'But I said that you wouldn't be like them, and you won't, will you?"

  I laughed, for it seemed such a comical idea for me to be behaving asMrs Solomon had supposed.

  "What are you laughing at?" he said, looking down at me.

  "I was thinking about what Mrs Brownsmith said," I replied.

  "Oh yes! To be sure," he continued. "You'll like her. She's a verynice woman. A very good woman. I've known her thirty years."

  "Have you had any children, sir?" I said.

  "No," he replied, looking at me with a twinkle in his eye; "and yet I'vealways been looking after nurseries--all my life."

  In about an hour he finished his morning work in the vinery, and I wentout with him in the garden, where he left me to tidy up a great bed ofgeraniums with a basket and a pair of scissors.

  "I've got to see to the men now," he said. "By-and-by we'll go and havea turn at the cucumbers."

  The bed I was employed upon was right away from the house in a sort ofnook where the lawn ran up amongst some great Portugal laurels. It wasa mass of green and scarlet, surrounded by shortly cropped grass, and Iwas very busy in the hot sunshine, enjoying my task, and now and thenwatching the thrushes that kept hopping out on to the lawn and then backunder the shelter of the evergreens, when I suddenly saw a shadow, and,turning sharply, found that my friend of the peach-house had come softlyup over the grass with another lad very much like him, but a littletaller, and probably a couple of years older.

  "Hullo, pauper!" said the first.

  I felt my cheeks tingle, and my tongue wanted to say something verysharp, but I kept my teeth closed for a moment and then said:

  "Good morning, sir!"

  He took no notice of this, but turned to his brother and whisperedsomething, when they both laughed together; and as I bent down over mywork I felt as if I must have looked very much like one of the scarletgeraniums whose dead blossom stems I was taking out.

  Of course, a boy with a well-balanced brain and plenty of sound, honest,English stuff in him ought to be able to treat with contempt the jeeringand laughter of those who are teasing him; but somehow I'm afraid thatthere are very few boys who can bear being laughed at with equanimity.I know, to be frank, I could not, for as those two lads stared at me andthen looked at each other and whispered, and then laughed heartily--well, no; not heartily, but in a forced way, I felt my face burn and myfingers tingle. My mouth seemed to get a little dry, too, and thethought came upon me in the midst of my sensations that I wanted to getup and fight.

  The circumstances were rather exceptional, for I was suffering from twosore places. One started from my shoulder and went down my back, wherethere must have been the mark of the cane; the other was a mental sore,caused by the word _pauper_, which seemed to rankle and sting more thanthe cut from the cane.

  Of course I ought to have treated it as beneath my notice, but whoeverreads this will have found out before now that I was very far fromperfect; and as those two lads evidently saw my annoyance, and went ontrying to increase it, I bent over my work in a vicious way, and kept ontaking out the dead leaves and stems as if they were some of the enemiesMr Solomon had been talking about in the pits.

  All at once, as I was bending down, I heard Courtenay, the elder boy,say:

  "What did he say--back to school and be flogged?"

  "Yes," said Philip aloud; "but he didn't know. They only flog workhouseboys and paupers."

  "I say, though," said Courtenay, "who is that chap grubbing out theslugs and snails?"

  My back was turned, and I went on with my work. "What! that chap Ispoke to?" said Philip; "why, I told you. He's a pauper."

  "Is he?"

  "Yes, and Browny fetched him from the workhouse. Brought him home inthe cart. He's going to be a caterpillar crusher."

  I felt as if I should have liked to be a boy crusher, and have run athim with my fists clenched, and drubbed him till he roared for mercy,but I did not stir.

  "Then what's he doing here?" said Courtenay in a sour, morose tone ofvoice. "He ought to be among the cabbages, and not here."

  This was as if they were talking to themselves, but meant for me tohear.

  "Old Browny was afraid to put him there for fear he'd begin wolfingthem. I caught him as soon as he came. He got loose, and I found himin the peach-house eating the peaches, but I dropped on to him with thecane and made the beggar howl."

  "Old Browny ought to look after him," said Courtenay.

  "Don't I tell you he ran away. I expect Browny will have to put adog-collar and chain on him, and drive a stake down in thekitchen-garden to keep him from eating the cabbages when he'scaterpillaring. These workhouse boys are such hungry beggars."

  "Put a muzzle on him like they do on a ferret," said Courtenay; and thenthey laughed together.

  "Hasn't he got a rum phiz?" said Philip, who, I soon found, was thequicker with his tongue.

  "Yes; don't talk so loud: he'll hear you. Just like a monkey," saidCourtenay; and they laughed again.

  "I say, is he going to stop?" said Courtenay.

  "I suppose so. They want a boy to scrape the shovels and light thefires, and go up the hothouse chimneys to clear out the soot. He's justthe sort for that."

  "He'll have to polish Old Browny's boots, too."

  "Yes; and wash Mother Browny's stockings. I say, Court, don't he look ahungry one?"

  "Regular wolf," said Courtenay; and there was another laugh.

  "I say," said Courtenay, "I don't believe he's a workhouse."

  "He is, I tell you; Browny went and bought him yesterday. They sell 'emcheap. You can have as many as you like almost for nothing. They'reglad to get rid of 'em."

  "I wonder what they'd say to poor old Shock!" I thought to myself."I'm glad he isn't here."

  "I don't care," said Courtenay; "I think he's a London street boy. Helooks like it from the cut of his jib."

  I paid not the slightest heed, but my heart beat fast and I could feelthe perspiration standing all over my face.

  "I don't care; he's a pauper. I wonder what Old Browny will feed himon."

  "Skilly," said Courtenay; and the boys laughed again. All at once Ifelt a push with a foot, and if I had not suddenly stiffened my arms Ishould have gone down and broken some of the geraniums, but theyescaped, and I leaped to my feet and faced them angrily.

  "Here, what's your name?" said Courtenay haughtily.

  I swallowed my annoyance, and answered:

  "Grant."

  "What a name for a boy!" said Courtenay. "I say, Phil, isn't his haircut short. He ought to have his ears trimmed too. Here, where are yourfather and mother?"

  I felt a catch in my throat as I trie
d to answer steadily:

  "Dead."

  "There, I told you so," cried Philip. "He hasn't got any father ormother. Didn't you come out of the workhouse, pauper?"

  "No," I said steadily, as my fingers itched to strike him.

  "Here, what was your father?" said Courtenay.

  I did not answer.

  "Do you hear? And say `sir' when you speak," cried Courtenay with abrutal insolent manner that seemed to fit with his dark thin face. "Isay, do you hear, boy?"

  "Yes," I replied.

  "Yes, _sir_, you beggar," cried Courtenay. "What was your father?"

  "He don't know," cried Philip grinning. "Pauper boys don't know.They're all mixed up together, and they call 'em Sunday, Monday,Tuesday, or names of streets or places, anything. He doesn't know whathis father was. He was mixed up with a lot more."

  "I'll make him answer," said Courtenay. "Here, what was your father?"

  "An officer and a gentleman," I said proudly.

  "Ha! ha! ha!" laughed Philip, dancing about with delight, and hanging onto his brother, who laughed too. "Here's a game--a gardener's boy agentleman! Oh my!"

  I was sorry I had said those words, but they slipped out, and I stoodthere angry and mortified before my tormentors.

  "I say, Court, don't he look like a gentleman? Look at the knees of histrousers, and his fists."

  "Never mind," said Courtenay, "I want to bat. Look here, you, sir, canyou play cricket?"

  "Yes," I said, "a little."

  "Yes, _sir_, you beggar; how many more times am I to tell you! Come outin the field. You've got to bowl for us. Here, catch!"

  He threw a cricket-ball he had in his hand at me with all his might, andin a nasty spiteful way, but I caught it, and in a jeering way Philipshouted:

  "Well fielded. Here, come on, Court. We'll make the beggar run."

  I hesitated, for I wanted to go on with my work, but these were mymaster's sons, and I felt that I ought to obey.

  "What are you standing staring like that for, pauper?" cried Philip."Didn't you hear Mr Courtenay say you were to come on and bowl?"

  "What do you want, young gentleman?" said a voice that was very welcometo me; and Mr Solomon came from behind the great laurels.

  "What's that to you, Browny? He's coming to bowl for us in the field,"said Courtenay.

  "No, he is not," said Mr Solomon coolly. "He's coming to help me inthe cucumber house."

  "No, he isn't," said Philip; "he's coming to bowl for us. Come along,pauper."

  I threw the ball towards him and it fell on the lawn, for neither of theboys tried to catch it.

  "Here, you, sir," cried Courtenay furiously, "come and pick up thisball."

  I glanced at Mr Solomon and did not stir.

  "Do you hear, you, sir! come and pick up this ball," said Courtenay.

  "Now, pauper, look alive," said Philip.

  I turned and stooped down over my work.

  "I say, Court, we're not going to stand this, are we?"

  "Go into the field and play, boys," said Mr Solomon coldly; "we've gotto work."

  "Yes, paupers have to work," said Courtenay with a sneer.

  "If I thought that worth notice, young fellow, I'd make you take thatword back," said Mr Solomon sternly.

  "Yes, it's all right, Courtenay; the boy isn't a pauper."

  "You said he was."

  "Yes, but it was a mistake," sneered Philip; "he says he's a gentleman."

  The two boys roared with laughter, and Mr Solomon looked red.

  "Look here, Grant," he said quietly, "if being a gentleman is to be likethese two here, don't you be one, but keep to being a gardener."

  "Ha, ha, ha!--ho, ho, ho!" they both laughed. "A gentleman! Prettysort of a gentleman."

  "Pauper gentleman," cried Philip maliciously. "Yes, I daresay he hasgot a title," said Courtenay, who looked viciously angry at beingthwarted; and he was the more enraged because Mr Solomon bent down andhelped me at the bed, taking no notice whatever of the orders for me togo.

  "Yes," said Philip; "he's a barrow-net--a wheelbarrow-net. Ha, ha, ha!"

  "With a potato-fork for his crest."

  "And ragged coat without any arms," said Philip.

  "And his motto is `Oh the poor workhouse boy!'" cried Courtenay.

  "There, that will do, Grant," said Mr Solomon. "Let these little boysamuse themselves. It won't hurt us. Bring your basket."

  "Yes, take him away, Browny," cried Philip.

  "Ah, young fellows, your father will find out some day what nice boysyou are! Come along, Grant and let these young _gentlemen_ talk tillthey're tired."

  "Yes, go on," cried Philip; while I saw Courtenay turn yellow with rageat the cold bitter words Mr Solomon used. "Take away your pauper--takecare of your gentleman--go and chain him up, and give him his skilly.Go on! take him to his kennel. Oh, I say, Courtenay--a gentleman! Whata game!"

  I followed Mr Solomon with my face wrinkled and lips tightened up, tillhe turned round and looked at me and then clapped his hand on myshoulder.

  "Bah!" he said laughing; "you are not going to mind that, my lad. Itisn't worth a snap of the fingers. I wish, though, you hadn't saidanything about being a gentleman."

  "So do I, sir," I said. "It slipped out, though, and I was sorry whenit was too late."

  "Never mind; and don't you leave your work for them. Now come and havea look at my cucumber house, and then--ha, ha, ha! there's somethingbetter than skilly for dinner, my boy."

  I found out that Mr Solomon had another nature beside the one thatseemed cold.