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A Rolling Stone, Vol. I

Chapter XI

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Chapter XI.

‘O give me thy hand,
One writ with me in sour misfortune's book!’

Palmer's house stood almost close to the high road. There was a gravelled yard in front, and on each side and extending for some distance at the back, an ill-kept piece of ground which once had been a garden. Its flowers had perished long since; but there still remained some clumps of sicklylooking shrubs and overgrown trees which were choking one another. Near the gateway Randall noticed a heap of blackened and broken beehives. ‘Yes, I did for them!’ said Palmer triumphantly. ‘Mrs. Sligo had her headquarters here; in summer she was always after a swarm or fixing a beehive when I wanted my dinner. She was such a sight, too, covered up with a thick green veil, tied round the neck with mufflers, and the biggest and thickest gloves I've ever seen on her hands. People wondered whom I had about the place, and well they might. She never got stung, of course! but as surely as I went across the yard some bee made a bee-line for me.’

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Palmer led the way to a side-door, which was so low that Randall instinctively stooped as he entered, and so narrow that it could hardly have admitted two at once. Within was a passage equally low and narrow, and dark in addition, and pervaded with a curious musty odour—the odour of a house that has been empty and shut up for a time, or, it might be said, of one which is neither cleaned nor ventilated regularly.

From the passage they entered the sitting-room. It had been swept and garnished once, doubtless, but the records of that cleansing must have been lost in the mists of antiquity. Dust was here, in thickness sufficient to have afforded sustenance for small herbs. Cobwebs were here, old and hoary, such as thrifty housewives would have groaned over. Spiders also, the patriarchs of their race, who had seemingly spun their webs and caught their prey here for the whole of their abnormally prolonged lives. What there was of furniture was good, even expensive, of its kind, but had suffered much from careless usage. A heavy mahogany table was strewn all over with books, papers, pens lying loose or sticking in the open inkstand, letters half written, others that had been read and crumpled into little balls, knives with open blades in a dangerous state of sharpness, little heaps of screws and nails, and various small parts of machinery—in short, all those little waifs and strays which may be expected to accumulate on the table of a busily-occupied man page 143 who seldom puts anything away until he is obliged.

The whole room was in a hopeless-looking state of disorder. The mantelpiece was crowded with things; there were things on the sofa, things under the table, things on the window-ledges, and things on the floor in each corner of the room. It was not often that a stranger was admitted into this room; but on such rare occasions it had happened that the visitor, after remaining for a moment, as if spellbound, in the doorway, had timidly seated himself as near that place as possible, feeling sure that an excursion amongst the débris which encumbered and encompassed everything could only result in disaster.

There was a large bookcase in each of the recesses by the fireplace. Palmer was an insatiable reader. Most of the books appeared to be kept for use, not show, and to be often removed from the shelves, which accounted for a comparative scarcity of cobwebs and spiders in these corners. There was a carpet on the floor, and in one respect it was like a net cast into the sea—it had gathered of every kind. Its pattern had nearly disappeared beneath a layer of dust, but there was a tolerably bright and clean portion, where the frayed and faded window curtains hung down, and a large musical-box stood in their shelter.

Over the mantelpiece hung an oil-painting—a portrait that was almost lifelike, so well and faithfully had the artist done his work. It was the page 144 portrait of a lady whose pleasing face was shadowed by the thick masses of her black hair, curling in little waves and ripples over the forehead, and hanging in heavy plaits low on the neck. The large and brilliant eyes seemed as if just turned to meet one's glance; the lips were slightly parted as if she would speak.

‘That's my mother,’ said Palmer, when he noticed how often Randall's eyes wandered to this singular and attractive portrait. ‘There are no such women nowadays, and that's the reason I'm here by myself, a lone old bachelor. It's a great delusion, however, to suppose that a man can't keep house. I'm perfectly comfortable. I have my meals sent in every day from the cottage over the road, where one of my men lives. His wife looks after the cleaning and washing; and this room—I won't have any woman meddling here—I attend to myself well enough.’

The conclusion of this sentence, gravely delivered by Palmer sitting in the midst of cobwebs, dust, and disorder, was too much for Randall, who was obliged to laugh. Palmer also laughed loudly, and then drew back the curtains, when the dingy room was filled with a glow of warm sunshine. He opened one of the windows, and leaning out of it began to ring violently a bell he had taken from the table, that common resting-place of all things.

At the ringing of the bell the door of the cottage on the other side of the road was suddenly burst page 145 open, and a little girl carrying a tray staggered out and across the road. Palmer received the tray at the window, and with difficulty found a place for it on the table.

‘Sit down, Randall, and have something with me. It will be a charity if you do; I don't often have company. Tush! don't object. I want to make a friend of you, not a——’

He did not finish the sentence; but the other could easily supply the blank. The former vagrant coloured a little, but sat down to the strangely-decked table; or rather he was about to sit down, when Palmer suddenly drew his chair away.

‘Can't trust you with that; one leg is as nearly gone as possible. Take this one; it has a ragged covering, but it's strong. Now I'll brew the tea. I always do that; no woman can suit me in teamaking. My late housekeeper used to offer me dish-water.’

‘Mrs. Sligo? She seems of an amiable disposition.’

‘Amiable? yes—too amiable by half. It was on account of that I had to dispense with her services.’

‘On account of that?’

‘Yes. Would you believe it?’—and Palmer looked as if he were about to impart some information of a thoroughly disgusting nature—‘she entered my house with the design of marrying me, whether I liked it or not. And—I don't care; you may page 146 laugh, if you please; but sometimes I'm afraid she'll do it yet.’

‘What! against your will?’

‘Do you think a man never has been married against his will? You can have no idea of the deepness of that woman. She's a widow. I hope both you and I may be preserved from widows.’

‘You must have had the experiences of Mr. Weller,’ said Randall, dexterously capturing a large spider that had fastened a light rope-ladder to the sugar basin.

‘Of ten Wellers,’ said Palmer. ‘Some men have a horror of old maids, and are always suspecting them of designs. I don't. Poor things, the very fact that they are old maids is a proof of their harmlessness. But a widow! there's no end to the duplicity of a widow. She has already captured one man, and he hasn't survived it very long. She has' twice the experience of other women in laying traps for ignorant helpless fellows like myself. I don't know what possessed me to engage one. I will acknowledge she kept the house well, but I had no comfort while she was in it. It was always, “Oh, Mr. Palmer, don't come in here, please, with those boots,” or,—in the sweetest, softest voice she could produce—“Mr. Palmer, mayn't I dust amongst those papers of yours; they're a sight,” or, “Mr. Palmer, I really must have that carpet up and the room cleaned;”—and then, scrub, rub; hurry, scurry; water by the gallon, and a smell of soap that kept page 147 me awake at night. How would you have liked that?’

‘Well, provided it was done when I was out of the way I think I could have borne it.’

‘It was always doing! Of course the house was clean—painfully, horribly clean. She made me take off my boots and put slippers on whenever I came in. Bah! when I think of the things that woman made me do I rage. I had a little bag given me to put my comb and brush in, and a little stand for my tooth-brush. I'd always stuck it in the window-frame before, and now she's gone I stick it there again. I'd different pegs for my different hats, and she sorted out all my clothes into best, second, and third best, and wouldn't let me wear the best except when she liked. She took me to church with her, and by and by people would smile at each other when they saw us going into the pew together; and lastly, it came to this—a report, got up by her of course, flew over all the neighbourhood, that I was going to marry her!’

Palmer was out of breath when he arrived at this climax. He gulped down half a cup of tea, and continued, ‘Yes, our agreement struck on that rock. She didn't stay long after that. She'd expected to stay always, and had made herself quite at home. There was her flower garden in one corner and in another her detestable bees, which were always swarming and stinging me. And she'd have friends to take tea with her or spend the evening; in fact, she made page 148 so free with my house that strangers would often call her Mrs. Palmer, which didn't displease her at all. I couldn't stand that. It took me a week to get clear of her and her luggage, mostly trunks and boxes which held her nine hundred and odd dresses or thereabouts. So now I'm alone, and all the better for it.’

‘You like solitude then!’ said Randall, when he had overcome a strong desire to laugh, which he thought it better not to indulge, as Palmer had recounted the foregoing with impressive seriousness.

‘No, I don't; but solitude is better than some company. It's because I don't like being alone that I've brought you here. But I like to read here undisturbed by bustle and bother, with my musical box jingling beside me. If there's anything I love it's music, and you are a musician, I've found that out. I've no idea how your violin will go with a musical box; but we'll try them together. That's right, laugh at me. I've done you some good to-night, if it's only by making you laugh; you're not the same man with a smile on your face.’

‘Indeed, you have done me a great deal of good,’ said Randall.

‘I remember now,’ said Palmer, balancing his empty tea-cup on the tips of his fingers, ‘that there's another musical instrument in the house; but I fear it isn't Ai. There's an old piano in the next room. It belonged to a sister of minne. She was coming out to join me here—it was thought that her life page 149 might be saved by the change to a warmer climate, —and she brought her piano with her. It arrived all right, but she didn't, poor girl. My housekeeper used to thump on it and sing to it in her cracked voice, till I put a stop to her discords by locking it. You might tune it up, if it isn't too far gone. There's another inducement for you to stay with me.’

‘But, Mr. Palmer,’ said his guest, looking him very earnestly in the face, ‘how and for what purpose am I to stay with you? You have told me plainly that you will not employ me as a workman. To-night you have said that you want me as a friend, not as a—servant, I believe you meant to say. But if I stay here I must work for my living in some way or other. I can only be what I am now—a working man, and your servant.’

‘You shall be my right-hand man, my lieutenant, my manager, my bookkeeper, secretary—anything you like to call yourself. Oh, don't be afraid, there'll be plenty of work.’

‘And are you willing to take me into such a place without the slightest knowledge of what I have been or what I am able to do!’

‘I know what you've been: you've been very unfortunate,’ said Palmer simply.

‘Don't waste your pity on me. It is no use. Others have tried to help me. I have always disappointed them in the end. I have almost vowed to myself not to accept help again.’

‘That was one of the vows which are made to be page 150 broken. Do you think I don't guess how it has been with you? Let me ask you a plain question, and answer it or not, as you please. What are you doing here?—you! among labouring men, sharing their work and pretending to be one of them. It's a sorry pretence, for you can't walk, speak, look, or do anything without showing what you are. Nay, now, don't start up and leave me,’ and he laid his hand with a close grasp on Randall's arm. ‘I don't want to pry into your affairs, though what I'm going to say may make you wince a little. I don't care to know what you've been or what has brought you here. But it's a shame, I tell you, that you should accept such a lot, and care, or seem to care for nothing else.’

‘What else have I to care for, then?’ There was an affectation of recklessness in the voice and manner.

‘You know well enough. To care for? You have the world! the whole world!’ Palmer brought his hand down on the table vehemently. ‘And what are you doing with it? As the common saying goes, all honest work is honourable; but it is not honourable for a man to shirk the work he was taught and trained for, and fall back upon some lower kind; something which any one can do who is willing to tell the strength of his arm. People have nothing but praise for the labourer's son who does better than his father, and makes the scanty education that was spent upon him return a hundredfold. page 151 Everyone speaks well of such a man when he raises himself to a higher class; and he deserves it. What do they say of the gentleman who goes down to work with day labourers? Doesn't he confess himself a failure—a waste of talent, of training, of education, of time, of money even, spent on all these. Don't you know, such men as yourself represent a frightful waste—one of the greatest in this world—and all nature cries out against waste. People don't generally, I believe, send their sons to universities that they may eventually be good hands in a harvest field. Rather an expensive education for a farmlabourer, and a useless one too, in such a case. It would be just as ridiculous for me to silverplate my engine and have my threshing machine ornamented with polished and inlaid woods. It's waste again, as well as folly, to use fine tools for rough coarse work.’

He waited for a few seconds in expectation of a reply, but none came, and he went on again.

‘I've thought all this over for the last fortnight. It has been bottled up till now for your benefit, and had to come out. I've watched you till I've fancied I could read your thoughts. My good friend, you are not so contented with what you've come to, nor so careless of your future as you pretend to be. You've swallowed down a good deal of your pride, but it has been a hard swallow. There is some good stuff in you—don't let it be wasted.’

‘It is wasted. I threw away my chances long ago.’

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‘No,’ said Palmer. ‘How can it be so when you are here yet, with a world full of opportunities waiting for you? Let me read you a leaf out of my own book. I tell you, instead of the world being like a great lottery, with few prizes and abundance of blanks, there are prizes for every one who is born into it, and the saddest thing of all is to see how we poor shortsighted mortals go blundering past them. Come, draw your chair up by the window in the moonlight and listen to me a little longer. I mean to help you because—well, because of a reason you needn't know at present, and I'll do it in spite of yourself if you're restive.’

‘Don't think me ungracious,’ said the other, looking much moved. ‘It is only because I do not trust myself. Others have tried to help me and I disappointed them.’

‘Well, if you can't be helped, you can't. But you are surely not so fond of the Slough of Despond as to want to stick fast in it for ever? Now, without any sham about it, I really want a man to do these things for me: keep my books in order—figures curdle my brain—oversee some of the men, as I can't be in two places at once, and help me generally. If you hadn't been here I should have engaged some one else; so it isn't out of pure charity, you see, but springs from that selfishness which is inherent in the human breast. I daresay I shall get the best of the bargain. We'll talk no more of it just now. You shall tell me in the morning whether it is Ay or page 153 No. Wind up my collection of preserved tunes, will you? That's right; now we have both moonlight and music.’

The musical box played through its fifteen popular airs to an audience of two thoughtful persons sitting by the open window. The breeze blew freshly in, laden with delicious odours from the cottage garden over the road, where roses and verbenas were in their prime. When the moon drooped lower and lower, and at last seemed to dissolve away on the misty horizon, Palmer filled a lamp, with fearful waste of kerosene, and lighting it, applied himself to the study of an old copy of Bacon's essays, which his frequent readings were hastening to its end. He observed to Randall that no such books were written nowadays.

‘Look at this page. Every line of it has been quoted over and over again by writers who can see it is good but haven't brains to invent anything of equal merit. Why, whenever I read a passable newspaper article, and come to a well-turned, sonorous sentence, properly put together, and not like those jerky little ones modern writers fire off like snap-shots—I know, I feel it's Bacon's, no matter how well his copyist may have disguised him. Do you like books? When I was your age I devoured rather than read every one which came in my way.’

‘I used to spend whole days amongst my father's books,’ said Randall; ‘but that was a long while ago. page 154 Lately I have not read much, because books have been out of my way.’

‘I give you the freedom of my library,’ said Palmer. ‘Look, some of the best are in rags and tatters, like princes in a beggar's gabardine. I wouldn't exchange them for all the splendour of gilt and morocco bindings. I saved up my shillings—my pence even—when I was a boy, to buy them one by one. Half-a-crown was a fortune to me then. Did you ever do that? Did you go every day to the bookstall to look with hungry eyes at the book you were pinching and saving for, fearing lest it should be bought by some one else before you'd got the little sum together, and rejoicing when you found it there?’

‘No,’ said Randall. ‘I never did that, because then I never knew what it was to wait for anything I wanted.’

Randall took a book from the shelves, but it could not chain his restless thoughts, and his eye often wandered from the page to watch the engrossed reader of Bacon. Palmer was seated in a manner supposed to be strictly American, with the heels of his boots propped against the chimney-piece. His chair was tilted as much as was safe, and when at times he turned to Randall, with some words on what they were reading, it was with a swift semicircular sweep of the same much-enduring article of furniture. It was probably owing to this habit that most of his chairs were rickety, and behaved page 155 in an alarming manner when used by incautious persons.

A little clock on the chimney-piece struck eleven. Palmer lighted two tarnished silver candlestick which occupied positions on each side of the clock.

‘I never sit up later than eleven, and I never go to bed before that hour. I suppose Mrs. Hickson has swept out and fixed your room; I know I ordered it. I'll show you the way.’

They went along the passage by several doors, all closed and locked, till they came to a stairway. Palmer ascended, taking two of the narrow steps at a time.

‘First door on the right hand. The other rooms have been a prey to dust and spiders for I don't know how long. I've no use for half this large house.’

The bedchamber was large, and being one of the rooms which Mrs. Hickson was allowed to supervise at stated periods, was tolerably clean and well-arranged. It had, as Palmer remarked, formerly been occupied by Mrs. Sligo, and all trace of her sojourn had not yet disappeared. A holland wall-pocket, embroidered with very coarse wool in very large stitches, and a pink silk pincushion, adorned the toilet-table with their faded charms. The housekeeper also had, doubtless, once fastened her abundance of hair with one or two exceedingly long hairpins bent into many strange contortion. Other souvenirs of the same lady were a framed woolwork page 156 picture of a patriarchal person, who, she had always said, was Jacob sitting under a palm-tree, and a pencil drawing which showed that Mrs. Sligo had been proficient in a style of art that outdid Pre-Raphaelism in its attention to detail and its scorn of more beauty, but which was not so devoted to truth.

‘If you've any artistic feeling, you'll long to tear that down and burn it,’ said Palmer. ‘You may do so it you like. She would leave it, and that other eyesore, like a piece of carpeting, as a present for me. Well,—remember it is to be Ay or No in the morning.’

Morning again. The impartial sun shone as brightly on the dingy old house and its ill-kept grounds as on a palace and its gardens. There had been rain in the night, the dust was subdued, and the air had a delicious freshness. Towards the clear pure sky, faint wreaths of smoke went up from sheltered spots among the fields wherever there was hearth and a home. It was very quiet; the day was too young for many people to be abroad. But Palmer had left his room soon after the appearance of daylight; he was noted for his early rising, and despised all sluggards without reservation. If the night were meant for sleep daylight had undoubtedly been provided in order that men might work thereby, from dawn till the dusk of eve if possible. Had he lived in high latitudes Palmer might have found it necessary to modify his opinions; but in a country much nearer to the equator than to page 157 the poles he seldom failed to rise with the sun during summer time, and in winter utterly put that glorious luminary to shame.

To say that his workmen dreaded him in the early morning would be no exaggeration. At that time, refreshed by a night's rest, he was more exacting and capricious, more active himself and less tolerant of the sluggishness of his hirelings than at any other hour. It was the time he generally chose for convincing them of their errors, and for dis-charging them, unless they gave proofs of a sincere desire for the mending of their ways. This very morning, while the sweet sounds of a creaking grindstone in full work were enlivening the backyard, Palmer and a refractory workman were arguing together in voices neither soft nor low.

‘Oh, so you object to be called up at six. You knew when you came what you'd have to do, and your wage is high enough to cover all you've done for me so far, and more than that.’

‘Ay, you'd better speak of the wage, sir,’ said the man, who was very nearly a match for his master in fluency of speech. ‘A pretty wage it is; nigh upon all the men I know are getting more.’

‘And do more,’ said Palmer. ‘Wages according to merit is my motto. You fellows ought to be subjected to a competitive examination to weed out the worthless.’

‘Well, sir,’ stoutly answered the man, ‘if you say wages is according to merit, I say work according page 158 to wages. You give me a low wage; now, where's the sense in me furnishing a high quality of work? But bring up your wage and I'll bring up my work to suit it. But fact is, you want to get thirty shillings' worth of work out of me and only pay me a pound.’

‘Man,’ said Palmer, astounded at this application of his argument, but not altogether displeased that he had at last found a man who could fight him with his own weapons, ‘you misunderstand the question. I pay you a pound a week, and you do about fifteen shillings' worth of labour; and allow me to remind you that half of what you did yesterday will have to be done over again. As for high quality of work—preserve us! I've yet to find the labourer who has it in him. If I ever do find such a man I shall be inclined to bid him sit down and to serve him myself. But as you hint that I'm defrauding you, for goodness sake don't injure yourself by staying with me any longer. I'll pay you, and you can go.’

‘And if this is the way with masters in New Zealand,’ cried the man, ‘I wish I'd never seen it! I thought one ‘ud have fair play here, short hours and easy work, but it's not much better than at home. I must say, sir, and I'll say it to your face, that it's not Christian nor right to hire men one day and send them about their business the next for little things like this.’

‘Well, perhaps it isn't,’ said Palmer, struck by page 159 this remark. ‘I thought you wanted to be off, but I don't mind giving you another chance. I didn't suppose it would kill you to turn a grindstone round a few times before breakfast.’

‘You can't deny, sir, that I've stuck to the work in working-hours. We was told fortunes might be made here, but it's mortal hard to support a family just as it is anywhere else.’

‘Support a family!’ said Palmer, with scornful emphasis. ‘Don't attempt to bamboozle me with that. It's far more likely that your family support you. I feel for your family!’

The man, who was determined to have the last word, replied to this with much spirit, but Palmer heard him not, for his attention was arrested by the appearance of another person, so begrimed about the face and hands, and with clothes which were so sooty in their hue that, as he vaulted over the fence, to save himself the trouble of going round to the gate, he looked like a huge black crow flapping to the ground. It was his former engine-driver, the much-desired Smithers, who flew to meet him with outspread arms.

‘Smithers!’ said Palmer, receding a few steps, ‘although at this moment you are a most welcome sight, I have no desire to embrace you.’

‘How's the ingine, sir?’ inquired Smithers, as anxiously as if he had been asking after the health of some dear friend.

‘In a much better condition than it ever was in page 160 your time. I've found out things about the working of that engine during your absence, Smithers, that have convinced me you are one of the greatest shams I have ever known. But I suppose it's no use talking to you now about oil or——’

‘Oil, sir!’ exclaimed Smithers, catching at this word. ‘Why, I'd rather stint myself of bread than an ingine or machinery of whatever kind of oil. It's the life of ‘em, Mr. Palmer.’

‘It may be,’ said Palmer, ‘but we got along very well while you were away with about half the quantity you would have used. You'd better see about joining the other men, and quickly too, if you want to begin work at eight.’

‘I shall know at once if it's been neglected or ill-used,’ said Smithers, referring to the engine.

Palmer went into the house, and having ascertained that his guest had been up for some time, rang the bell, which as usual was answered by the punctual appearance of the little maid from the cottage, bearing the breakfast tray. Breakfast with Palmer was a very early and uncomfortable meal. Generally he ate it as the Israelites of old partook of their passover feast—in haste and solemn silence, and girded for a journey. He wasted no time over any of his meals; gravely and swiftly despatching them in a manner which would lead one to suppose that he deplored the necessity for eating. He had sat silent at the table with Randall for some minutes before he remembered that he was not alone.

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‘I'm so used to solitude that I had almost forgotten you,’ he said. ‘You haven't told me yet, and I haven't asked, whether you go or stay.’

‘If I can do the work you have to give me I will stay,’ said Randall.

‘Do you know I was afraid you wouldn't. I hate to be disappointed, but I expected it.’

‘And would it have been any disappointment? You promised I should know why you are so anxious to befriend a stranger. I am nothing to you.’

‘Another time you shall know. You are not like a stranger to me.’

‘It is only a few days since I saw you for the first time. I don't believe we had ever met before.’

‘You are quite right. Neither of us had seen the other before that first day of the threshing at Langridge's. But as soon as I knew who you were I made up my mind that you ought not to be a stranger to me.’

‘I am very dull, I suppose; but I really don't understand you.’

‘Because there really is nothing to understand,’ said Palmer, impatiently twisting about on his chair; ‘nothing you need puzzle about, at any rate. Can't one man engage another to help him without mystery? I liked you from the first, I don't mind telling you that. I know enough of you—more than you suppose.’

‘I believe you mean to be kind to me,’ said Randall.

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‘You needn't believe it unless you like,’ said Palmer. ‘We shall get on well enough provided you leave off talking this stuff about “befriending a stranger,” and “kindnesses.” I dislike to have that kind of thing thrown in my face. What I offer to you isn't much after all; if you look at it properly it ought only to be a stepping-stone. You'll have to work, I can assure you, at all sorts of things, and you'll find me queer enough at times. But come into my workshop, and I'll give you something to do. Langridge says you are a mechanical genius. I'm in what Smithers calls a “quandary”—got a machine all in pieces, and can't put it together again.’