Ah never thinks when I feedsAh was alays a bad hand at counts. Gies it up.
Why, youre like a horse that never was rode! Try again, old man, said the farmer.
If I drags a cart, Master Gammon replied, that aint no reason why I should leap a gate.
The farmer felt that he was worsted as regarded the illustration, and with a bit of the boys fear of the pedagogue, he fought Anthony off by still pressing the arithmetical problem upon Master Gammon; until the old man, goaded to exasperation, rolled out thunderingly,
If I works fer ye, that aint no reason why I should think fer ye, which caused him to be left in peace.
Eh, Robert? the farmer transferred the question; Come! what is it?
Robert begged a minutes delay, while Anthony watched him with hawk eyes.
I tell you what it isits pounds, said Robert.
This tickled Anthony, who let him escape, crying: Capital! Pounds it is in your pocket, sir, and you hit that neatly, I will say. Let it be five. You out with your five at interest, compound interest; soon comes another five; treat it the same: in ten yearseh? and then you get into figures; you swim in figures!
I should think you did! said the farmer, winking slyly.
Anthony caught the smile, hesitated and looked shrewd, and then covered his confusion by holding his plate to Mrs. Sumfit for a help. The manifest evasion and mute declaration that dumpling said mum on that head, gave the farmer a quiet glow.
When you are ready to tell me all about my darlin, sir, Mrs. Sumfit suggested, coaxingly.
After dinner, motherafter dinner, said the farmer.
And were waitin, are we, till them dumplings is finished? she exclaimed, piteously, with a glance at Master Gammons plate.
After dinner well have a talk, mother.
Mrs. Sumfit feared from this delay that there was queer news to be told of Dahlias temper; but she longed for the narrative no whit the less, and again cast a sad eye on the leisurely proceedings of Master Gammon. The veteran was still calmly tightening. His fork was on end, with a vast mouthful impaled on the prongs. Master Gammon, a thoughtful eater, was always last at the meal, and a latent, deep-lying irritation at Mrs. Sumfit for her fidgetiness, day after day, toward the finish of the dish, added a relish to his engulfing of the monstrous morsel. He looked at her steadily, like an ox of the fields, and consumed it, and then holding his plate out, in a remorseless way, said, You make em so good, marm.
Mrs. Sumfit, fretted as she was, was not impervious to the sound sense of the remark, as well as to the compliment.
I dont want to hurry you, Mas Gammon, she said; Lord knows, I like to see you and everybody eat his full and be thankful; but, all about my Dahly waitin,I feel pricked wi a pin all over, I do; and theres my blessed in London, she answered, and we knowin nothin of her, and one close by to tell me! I never did feel what slow things dumplins was, afore now!
The kettle simmered gently on the hob. Every other knife and fork was silent; so was every tongue. Master Gammon ate and the kettle hummed. Twice Mrs. Sumfit sounded a despairing, Oh, deary me! but it was useless. No human power had ever yet driven Master Gammon to a demonstration of haste or to any acceleration of the pace he had chosen for himself. At last, she was not to be restrained from crying out, almost tearfully,
When do you think youll have done, Mas Gammon?
Thus pointedly addressed, Master Gammon laid down his knife and fork. He half raised his ponderous, curtaining eyelids, and replied,
When I feels my buttons, marm.
After which he deliberately fell to work again.
Mrs. Sumfit dropped back in her chair as from a blow.
But even dumplings, though they resist so doggedly for a space, do ultimately submit to the majestic march of Time, and move. Master Gammon cleared his plate. There stood in the dish still half a dumpling. The farmer and Rhoda, deeming that there had been a show of inhospitality, pressed him to make away with this forlorn remainder.
The vindictive old man, who was as tight as dumpling and buttons could make him, refused it in a drooping tone, and went forth, looking at none. Mrs. Sumfit turned to all parties, and begged them to say what more, to please Master Gammon, she could have done? When Anthony was ready to speak of her Dahlia, she obtruded this question in utter dolefulness. Robert was kindly asked by the farmer to take a pipe among them. Rhoda put a chair for him, but he thanked them both, and said he could not neglect some work to be done in the fields. She thought that he feared pain from hearing Dahlias name, and followed him with her eyes commiseratingly.
Does that young fellow attend to business? said Anthony.
The farmer praised Robert as a rare hand, but one affected with bees in his nightcap,who had ideas of his own about farming, and was obstinate with them; pays you due respect, buts got a notion as how his way of thinkings better n his seniors. Its the style now with all young folks. Makes a butt of old Mas Gammon; laughs at the old man. It aint respectful t age, I say. Gammon dont understand nothing about new feeds for sheep, and dam nonsense about growing such things as melons, fiddle-faddle, for em. Roberts a beginner. What he knows, I taught the young fellow. Then, my question is, wheres his ideas come from, if theyre contrary to mine? If theyre contrary to mine, theyre contrary to my teaching. Well, then, what are they worth? He cant see that. Hes a good one at workIll say so much for him.
Old Anthony gave Rhoda a pat on the shoulder.
CHAPTER III
Pipes in the middle of the days regular revelry, ejaculated Anthony, whose way of holding the curved pipe-stem displayed a mind bent on reckless enjoyment, and said as much as a label issuing from his mouth, like a figure in a comic woodcut of the old style:thats, he pursued, thats if you havent got to look up at the clock every two minutes, as if the devil was after you. But, sitting here, you know, the afternoons a long evening; nobodys your master. You can on wi your slippers, up wi your legs, talk, or go forard, counting, twicing, and three-timesing; by George! I should take to drinking beer if I had my afternoons to myself in the city, just for the sake of sitting and doing sums in a tap-room; if its a big tap-room, with pew sort o places, and dark red curtains, a fire, and a smell of sawdust; ale, and tobacco, and a boy going by outside whistling a tune of the day. Somebody comes in. Ah, theres an idle old chap, he says to himself, (meaning me), and where, I should like to ask him, d his head be if he sat there dividing two hundred and fifty thousand by forty-five and a half!
The farmer nodded encouragingly. He thought it not improbable that a short operation with these numbers would give the sum in Anthonys possession, the exact calculation of his secret hoard, and he set to work to stamp them on his brain, which rendered him absent in manner, while Mrs. Sumfit mixed liquor with hot water, and pushed at his knee, doubling in her enduring lips, and lengthening her eyes to aim a side-glance of reprehension at Anthonys wandering loquacity.
Rhoda could bear it no more.
Now let me hear of my sister, uncle, she said.
Ill tell you what, Anthony responded, she hasnt got such a pretty sort of a sweet blackbirdy voice as youve got.
The girl blushed scarlet.