The Drummers Coat | Page 8

had turned his back to the window, and set before him an old steel morion of the time of Queen Elizabeth; and with this to inspire him, Dick was struggling with the ballad of the Brave Lord Willoughby.
"Come, Dick," Lady Eleanor was saying, "we can do better than that. Try again. 'For seven hours to all men's view--'"
But just at this moment the Corporal came in.
"If you please, my Lady, Betsy Fry's just come up. She's in a terrible taking about her boy, and she's brought him up to see you."
"Very well. I'll come out and see her directly," said Lady Eleanor. "Come, Dick,"--but Dick had turned half round and was smiling at the Corporal.
"Come, sir," said the Corporal returning, "heels together. Little fingers on the seams of the overalls. Eyes to the front," and he placed the boy's hands gently in position by his sides, and went out.
"Now, Dick," said Lady Eleanor. "'For seven hours--'" and the boy began, with much prompting,
"For seven hours to all men's view This fight endured sore, Until our men so feeble grew That they could fight no more."
Then his memory seemed to return, and he went on with great gusto:
"And then upon dead horses Full savourly they eat, And drank the puddle water-- They could no better get."
Then there was a dead stop. "'When they--'" said Lady Eleanor. "Oh, Dick."
"I always remember the puddle water, mother," said Dick reproachfully.
"Elsie," said Lady Eleanor; and Elsie folded her hands over her work and began:
"When they had fed so freely, They kneeled upon the ground, And praised God devoutly For the favour they had found."
"Then," broke in Dick triumphantly--
"Then beating up their colours The fight they did renew, And turning on the Spaniards, A thousand more they slew."
"There, I know it now, mother, mayn't I go now and tell the Corporal to saddle Prince for me? And mayn't Elsie come too?"
So away the children ran, and there was the Corporal waiting outside the door, as anxious to be off as themselves; while Lady Eleanor made her way to see Betsy Fry, who was waiting by the old gate-house a few yards away from the front door.
"Well, Betsy, what is it?" she said kindly, coming up to a woman of rather hard features, who stood patiently in the shade with her sun-bonnet fluttering in the breeze.
"'Tis about my Tommy, my Lady," said the woman curtseying. "Here, Tommy, come 'vor, and take off your hat to her Ladyship," and she pulled forward a frightened shrinking boy in a suit of corduroy, who had hidden himself behind her. "Look to mun, my Lady, he that was the most rompageous boy in Ashacombe, so quiet as a snail. And he can't spake, my Lady, he can't spake."
"Can't speak?" said Lady Eleanor.
"I can't make mun spake, my Lady. I don't know if your Ladyship was to try--"
"Why, Tommy," said Lady Eleanor, bending down towards the boy, in her sweet winning tones, "what's the matter with you? Come along and tell me, like a good boy."
The lad came forward, for no one could resist Lady Eleanor's smile, and opened his mouth confidently to speak; but he made only a few inarticulate sounds, and then thrust his knuckles into his eyes and began to cry.
"Come, come, don't be frightened. Try again," said Lady Eleanor kindly; but the boy only continued sobbing and remained speechless. Nor could all her endeavours succeed in making him utter a word.
"He must recover his speech presently," she said, much puzzled. "He has not lost the power of uttering sound."
"No, no, my Lady," said Mrs. Fry very confidently. "He can scream and holly loud enough. I bate mun last night, poor soul, because he wouldn't spake, and he scritched so loud that Mrs. Mugford come in, and asked me what I was 'bout killing a pig at that time o' night; though she knows very well that it was my pig that was drownded in the mill-leat back along in the spring. So I says to her, 'Mrs. Mugford,' I says, 'if those that talks about pigs would look to their own boys, they wouldn't run off to sea and come home with the shakums,' I says; 'and if they would keep their fowls from scratting about in their neighbours' gardens,' I says, 'they wouldn't run about crying for lost chimases.' For there's hardly a day but I drive her fowls from my garden, my Lady. And you mind her son, my Lady, him that went for a marine, and what terrible shakums he had when he comed back from the Injies. And I consider that they stolen chimases is a jidgment, my Lady, a jidgment for the mischief her fowls have done in my garden--"
"Stop, stop," said Lady Eleanor, whose eye had wandered to a shady spot under