Hungry Hill (27 page)

Sometimes he would enquire anxiously at breakfast as to how his grandfather had slept, and Copper John, unused to such solicitude from his eldest grandson-for it was Henry, like his namesake, who possessed the manners in the new generation combbgan to think that perhaps after all young Johnnie had some natural feeling, and might become a companion by and by. He often felt lonely, these days, did Copper John, with his two sons dead, as well as his little Jane, and Barbara practically an invalid. One day he took the boy with him on a visit to the mine, and was amused at many of his questions, particularly when he enquired of Captain Nicholson whether his grandfather would die if he were pushed down the shaft, “I’m afraid he would, Master Johnnie,” said the mining captain, and Copper John was quite touched when his grandson looked thoughtful, and remarked that no doubt there were many dangerous characters about, and his grandfather would do well to keep his stick with him.

“When you are older,” said Copper John, as they rode home together, the boy mounted on his pony, “you shall come with me to the mines and help me keep the fellows in order. There is plenty of work to be done.”

“I will come with you now, grandfather,” said the boy eagerly. “I should very much like to go with you every day.”

Copper John laughed, and seemed amused at his flushed, black-haired grandson, who was suddenly beginning to show an interest in the life about him. “Time enough for that when your schooling is over,” he said. “Your uncle Henry went through Eton and Oxford before he knew much about the mining business.”

“But, grandfather…” began the boy, and then stopped, for he remembered that he could scarcely remind his grandfather that by that time he would have been in his grave for years, and he changed his sentence, and said instead, “I trust you are not over-tired from your ride?”, and Copper John said, “No, indeed not, I could ride double the journey and feel nothing of it,” which seemed to impress the youngster, for he looked thoughtful again. At any rate, mused Copper John, the lad was becoming civil at last.

That autumn Fanny-Rosa had her young family painted. The picture was hung upon the wall of the dining-room, on the opposite side to Jane’s portrait. The group is an attractive one, of the five children in their red velvet pantaloons, playing in the garden of Clonmere. Little Herbert, sitting upon the ground in his petticoats, smiles gaily, and so does Edward, with his crop of curls.

Henry is more thoughtful, and Fanny, with all the responsibility of being the one girl of the family, is a trifle pale, a trifle wan. Johnnie dominates the group, Johnnie with his bow and arrow, his careless tumbling hair, his proud, obstinate, handsome face. He looks out upon the world with arrogance and bravado, as though he is determined to show the people who might one day look upon his portrait that Johnnie Brodrick of Clonmere cares for nothing and for no one.

When Johnnie was fourteen he was sent to Eton.

With each succeeding holiday Fanny-Rosa took up more space for herself and her boys. Barbara, by now a hopeless invalid, seldom left her room, and gave up all the housekeeping into her sister-in-law’s hands. Eliza put as good a face upon the matter as she could, but was inclined to spend more time in Saunby these days than she did at Doonhaven. As for Copper John, he carried his seventy years as though he were still barely sixty, and although his thick hair was now white, his figure more bent than it had been, his mind was as keen as ever, and he transacted the business of the mines with the thoroughness and the efficiency of a man half his age. He became possibly a little more formidable to his grandsons as the years passed. There was something awe-inspiring about the grim, set face, the square shoulders, the massive jaw, that seemed symbolic of God Almighty, and when he took his place at the head of the breakfast table, with the open Bible in front of him, the boys would have the uneasy feeling that the Great Presence had indeed descended upon Doonhaven, and with one fierce glint of his eye might sweep them all into everlasting destruction. “I am Alpha and Omega, the first and the last,” the solemn voice would announce, and young Herbert firmly believed that his grandfather spoke about himself, and waited for a dove to fly down and circle over his head, as it did in the frontispiece of his prayer-book. Fanny, who was naturally of a timid disposition, was frankly terrified of the old man, and vanished to her room whenever she caught sight of him. Henry was the only member of the family who appeared to be on normal terms with his grandfather. He was a frank, engaging child, with a charm peculiar to himself, and strikingly like the uncle Henry he had never known. Perhaps it was this likeness that made Copper John lean more kindly to the boy than he did to his other grandsons, and during the summer holidays he would sometimes walk with the lad about the grounds, the inevitable stick in his hand, his shovel hat upon his head, while Henry asked his opinion on the political affairs of the day, to the old man’s silent amusement. Johnnie by now was frankly antagonistic. The commanding voice at dinner, which would allow none other to speak while he himself was speaking, was a source of irritation.

Johnnie, bored, restless, longing to escape from the table and saddle his pony, would mutter to himself, “Get on with you, you damned old fool,” knowing that his grandfather’s hearing was not what it had been, and taking a silent delight in watching the look of terror on his sister’s face when she heard the whisper. The days of practical jokes were over. A fellow who goes to Eton does not put white mice under the servants’ petticoats, or balance jugs of water upon the door, but there were other amusements these days that the adult world disapproved of just as much as they had done of the practical jokes, such as smoking in secret behind the stables, and drinking ale with the village lads in Doonhaven.

It was exciting to climb out of the pantry window after dark, when he was believed to be in bed, and go off to the park and meet Pat Dolan, and Jack Donovan, and one or two others, all several years older than himself, but far more ignorant, or so they pretended to be. Lying on their backs in the long grass, with pipes in their mouths (which, truth to tell, made Johnnie feel a little sick), the “young gentleman” would hold forth upon life at Eton, and the number of his friends, and how his tutor could do nought with him, and how he proposed to leave before he was eighteen if he wanted to. “When the old man dies all this will belong to me,” Johnnie would say airily, with a wave of his hand. “I shall invite you fellows up to the castle if I want to,” and there would be much sniggering from the youths, much flattery and calling of him “a splendid sport, the pick of the pups,” words which sent a glow of pride through Johnnie, whose friends at Eton were not as numerous as he would have the village lads believe. In fact, Henry appeared to do very much better in three weeks than Johnnie had done in three years. He adapted himself to the strange world of public school with an ease and grace that his elder brother envied, and Johnnie, resentful of discipline, loathing work, and fresh from a passionate quarrel with a boy who had been his best friend and now forsook him for another, would see his younger brother laughing and contented, befriended alike by his tutors and his companions, and he would wonder miserably what was wrong with himself that he must be at such constant war with everything and with everybody.

“I loathe Eton,” he told Henry, on the way home to Clonmere for the long summer vacation, just after his seventeenth birthday. “I’ve a good mind to ask mother if I can leave. There’s no one in the house now worth speaking to, and I find the life there incredibly tedious.”

“It was a pity you never took up rowing,” said Henry. “It’s been half my fun, and all the most amusing fellows row. I’m going to join the beagles next half. Both Locksley and Middleton have asked me to spend a week with them before we go back, and I should rather like to go. Locksley’s father has the best shooting in England.”

Johnnie was silent. No one had asked him to spend a week when he was only fourteen. He had been to one or two fellows’ homes, but he had never particularly enjoyed himself. Friendships seemed to be a burden to him instead of a pleasure. He glanced at his brother, smiling to himself over the paper he was reading, and suddenly saw his own reflection in the window, sombre, scowling, moody, and the contrast depressed him. If that was how he looked always, no wonder fellows found him unattractive.

His mother, as usual, restored something of his self-confidence.

“My darling boy,” she exclaimed, throwing her arms about him, “how you have grown in the last three months! Why, you are almost a man. It’s surely absurd that you should still be at school, poring over lesson books.”

Johnnie hugged her with affection. It was good to have your own thoughts spoken aloud by somebody else. His mother was a wonderful person, but why in God’s name had she got a stocking wound round her head, instead of a cap, and surely, with her brilliant hair, that had grown even more brilliant since last holidays, it was a mistake to wear a crimson jacket? She was fatter, too, than she used to be.

“I’m glad you think it a waste to be poring over books,” he said. “The fact is there is nothing to be gained by my staying on at Eton, and I want to leave.”

“Of course you shall do so,” she said. “I shall speak to your uncle Bob about getting you a commission in the Dragoons. You know your poor grandfather is dead?”

“What?” Johnnie shouted in excitement.

“No, no,” said his mother quickly, glancing over her shoulder. “I mean Grandfather Simon. Uncle Bob is over at Andriff now, trying to set the place to rights. Everything was in incredible confusion, of course.”

“I wish,” said Johnnie in low tones, “that it had been Grandfather Brodrick.”

“So do I,” said his mother; “but what’s the use of discussing that? Anyway, Grandfather Simon died very happily. He went to bed the worse for drink as usual, poor darling, and set fire to his blankets.

His pipe must have fallen out of his mouth, and when the servant went to his room he was nearly suffocated by the fumes of tobacco, and whisky, and smoke, all mingled together. The dear old man seems to have been asphyxiated by his own breath. The servant said he looked very peaceful.”

“I suppose Castle Andriff goes to Uncle Bob?” said Johnnie.

“Yes, and whatever money there is, which can’t be more than twopence. He has left all his port to you, by the way.”

“Oh, come, that’s something,” said Johnnie.

“Can’t we get it over to Clonmere, and put it away, so that grandfather does not know anything about it?”

His mother laughed, and for one moment looked like the Fanny-Rosa of other days, as she closed one eyelid, and put her finger on her lips.

“It’s there already,” she said. “I’ve got it stacked away in one of the attics. Your grandfather will never find it. And anyway, I’m mistress of the house these days; no one would dare to ask any questions.”

“How is Aunt Barbara?” asked Henry.

“Much the same,” said his mother. “She never leaves her room, and eats about as much as a sparrow.

Uncle Willie says she can scarcely live through the winter. Of course she ought to be in a milder climate, but she has not strength enough to move.”

“What age is she, mother?” enquired Johnnie.

“Your aunt? Oh, I suppose she is not more than forty-eight.”

“My family seem to die uncommon young,” said Johnnie. “You’d say there was a curse on the lot of us.”

“There does not seem to be a curse on your grandfather,” said Fanny-Rosa. “Do you know-of course it’s only gossip-but I hear the mines are bringing in as much as twenty thousand a year? And still we have cold supper on Sunday nights, and no fires before October. I really can’t stand it these days, and have Thomas bring turf up to my room, and a tray too, if I’m feeling hungry. Don’t stare too hard at the new housemaid, by the way. She has a squint, and is not quite right in the head.”

“Why, whatever happened to Meg?”

“Oh, she and I had a naming disagreement, and I sent her packing. They say now in Doonhaven that the girls won’t come out to Clonmere, because I am so difficult. Did you ever hear of anything more absurd ? Why, I am the easiest mistress in the barony. As for looking under the beds, I would not dream of it. I’d be too afraid of what I should find.”

The two boys laughed. What an entertaining companion their mother could be when she chose, with her easy laugh, her slanting eyes, her expressive gestures, and what did it matter after all if she did let her complexion go to hang with all those freckles, and never brushed the flaming curls, and wore that ridiculous stocking round her hair to keep it in place?

“I’ve started a great scheme in Doonhaven,” she went on, “and that’s to be teaching the young girls of the village how to make lace Some half-dozen of them come up to the castle every Thursday.”

“What on earth for?” asked Johnnie.

“Why, it’s a form of culture, isn’t it? And what would they be doing with themselves otherwise? Lying under the hedges with the lads, no doubt. As for the reverend father, he called upon me in great anger, as you can imagine. “It’s devil’s work, Mrs.

Brodrick,” he said to me, “for you to be giving these girls ideas above their station. You’ll have them all discontented with their lot before you’ve finished. And if you want to do good works,” he said to me, as I bowed him from the door, “you’d do better to leave the young women of Doonhaven alone, and look to your sister’s bastards.” I called him something he would not forget in a hurry… . Poor Aunt Tilly! don’t I send her a parcel of old clothes every Christmas ? She has eleven children now, all running barefoot in the streets of Andriff. You’d think Sullivan would make shoes for them, being a cobbler by trade.”

The drawing-room at Clonmere had all the old disorder of Lletharrog. There were bits and pieces of lace lying about the floor and on the chairs, and the vases were filled with dead flowers that Fanny-Rosa kept forgetting to throw away. Parcels of books lay on the writing-table, the paper and string beside them.

Fanny-Rosa was constantly seeding for books, and then neglecting to read them when they came. The latest puppy had messed on the carpet, and no one had cleared it up, and there was a lot of sticky toffee in a corner of the sofa that had doubtless fallen out of Herbert’s pocket. Johnnie and Henry went along the passage to say good evening to their aunt.