_ CHAPTER TWENTY FIVE. MAY'S GUARDIANS
Dame Halliburt made her appearance at Downside early the next morning to enquire after May. Miss Pemberton, who had expected the good woman, begged her to step into her dispensary, as she called the small room in which she received her poorer visitors, that they might talk over the matter.
The dame said that she should have come up the previous evening, but that Jacob had not returned till late at night, when he told her what had happened. He had been on the look-out for young Gaffin to bring him to account for his conduct, but had been unable to find him.
"I am sorry for that," said Miss Jane. "I charged him to use no violence towards the young man."
"Lord bless you, marm," answered the dame, "our Jacob is as gentle as a lamb. I don't think he could use violence towards any man, though to be sure if he had fallen in with that impudent young chap he would have given him a pretty sound drubbing."
"I fear that your son's style of drubbing would be a pretty strong act of violence," observed Miss Jane. "Judging from the appearance of his arm, it possesses sufficient strength to fell an ox, and one blow from it might injure the youth for life."
"I don't doubt but that our Jacob could hit pretty hard if his spirit was up," observed the dame with a smile of maternal pride. "I cannot say, however, but what I am glad he didn't find young Gaffin."
"One thing is certain, we must not let our May run the chance of being spoken to again by this young fellow. If he is stopping at the inn he probably will not remain long in the place, and she will soon be able to go to and fro from your house as usual. Indeed, I hope from the proper way she treated him that he will not again make the attempt to speak to her."
"Fellows of his sort are not so easily put down as you may suppose, Miss Jane, and if he is the miller's son, he may be as audacious as he is impudent," observed the dame.
"Whatever he is, we will take good care that he has no opportunity of exhibiting his audacity," said Miss Pemberton; "and I beg that you will charge your son to take no further notice of the affair. If your husband could see the young man and warn him of the consequences of his conduct, he might induce him to behave properly in future. Now you will like to see May."
Miss Jane went out, and sent May into the room.
The dame received her with a warm embrace, but as the subject of young Gaffin was a disagreeable one, she did not speak much about it.
"Have you told the ladies about the grand doings to take place at Texford?" asked the dame.
May confessed that she had forgotten all about it.
"Then while I am here I will just put in a word. A little change will do you good, and if I tell them I'll keep you by my side all the time, I don't think they will object."
"We will think about it," was Miss Jane's answer, when the dame told her. "I am not an admirer of fetes and fantastic worldly doings such as I conclude will take place at Texford. I fear there is more harm done than pleasure obtained."
"The scene may amuse her, as she has seen nothing of the sort," observed Miss Mary. "Far be it from me to countenance even indirectly the follies of worldly people, but as this fete is intended to afford amusement to the tenantry and labourers, it must be kindly meant, and if May herself desires to accompany Dame Halliburt, I think that we ought not to deny her the amusement."
"Thank you," said May, simply. "I should like to go, very much."
The dame returned home satisfied that May was not likely to receive any further annoyance from young Gaffin, and well pleased that there would be no difficulty about her attending the fete.
Jacob arrived in the evening at Downside with a basket of shells. May could not help asking him whether he had seen young Gaffin, and again entreated him not to interfere.
"I have not seen him, but I know where he is," answered Jacob; "and I don't think he will show his nose outside the house without having me at his heels."
Every day before going off for the night's fishing in the _Nancy_, Jacob managed to find time to get up to Downside.
He would have been a bold man who would have ventured to encounter the young fisherman with any intention of annoying Maiden May. Honest love, when the object loved is to be benefited, wonderfully sharpens the wits. Jacob, who would never have thought of such a thing under other circumstances, had set a boy to watch the inn, and bring him word of Miles's movements. When he was away, the lad was to inform his mother.
Miles, either in obedience to his father's directions, or because he had found out that he was watched, kept himself a prisoner, and did not venture beyond the precincts of the garden at the back of the house, where he spent most of the day sauntering up and down, smoking his pipe, and forming plans for winning the young lady in spite of the obstacles in his way. Though unable to appreciate any higher qualities, he had been really struck by her beauty, and was as much in love as it was in his nature to be. He was thus perfectly ready to enter into any scheme which his father might propose for gaining her, either by fair means or foul.
"I would not hurt her feelings if I could help it," he said to himself; "but I am pretty sure I have a rival in that young fellow Halliburt. I guessed that when she took his arm and ran off from me. She knows well enough that he is not her brother, though they have been brought up together, and girls are generally apt to admire those big, sturdy-looking chaps who have done them a service, more than well-dressed, gentlemanly young men like myself," and Miles glanced approvingly on his new and fashionable costume. "If she still turns a cold eye upon me that worthy dad of mine must manage to get the young fisherman out of the way--it won't do to have him interfering--and with a clear stage I shall not have insuperable difficulties to overcome, I flatter myself."
Still Miles had to remain inactive some days longer. At last he received a note from his father telling him to go, if he pleased, to the fete at Texford, and simply state, if asked, that he was the son of a tenant, saying that he was spending a few days at Hurlston, and had come instead of his father, who was unable to attend. "I find that Dame Halliburt is going, and I have no doubt she will take her daughter, as she calls her, with her," he added. "You will thus have an opportunity of meeting the girl under more favourable circumstances than before, and if you mind your P's and Q's it will be your own fault if you do not work yourself into her good graces."
Miles received this communication with intense satisfaction. Having a thoroughly good opinion of himself, he had now little doubt that he should succeed in his enterprise. _