Cranford Page #18

Cranford is an episodic novel by the English writer Elizabeth Gaskell. It first appeared in instalments in the magazine Household Words, then was published with minor revisions as a book with the title Cranford in 1853.

• Novel

								

hall, just near enough the study-door, to catch the tone of my father’s
voice.  I could tell in a moment if all was going right, by her face.
And it did go right for a long time.”

“What went wrong at last?” said I.  “That tiresome Latin, I dare say.”

“No! it was not the Latin.  Peter was in high favour with my father, for
he worked up well for him.  But he seemed to think that the Cranford
people might be joked about, and made fun of, and they did not like it;
nobody does.  He was always hoaxing them; ‘hoaxing’ is not a pretty word,
my dear, and I hope you won’t tell your father I used it, for I should
not like him to think that I was not choice in my language, after living
with such a woman as Deborah.  And be sure you never use it yourself.  I
don’t know how it slipped out of my mouth, except it was that I was
thinking of poor Peter and it was always his expression.  But he was a
very gentlemanly boy in many things.  He was like dear Captain Brown in
always being ready to help any old person or a child.  Still, he did like
joking and making fun; and he seemed to think the old ladies in Cranford
would believe anything.  There were many old ladies living here then; we
are principally ladies now, I know, but we are not so old as the ladies
used to be when I was a girl.  I could laugh to think of some of Peter’s
jokes.  No, my dear, I won’t tell you of them, because they might not
shock you as they ought to do, and they were very shocking.  He even took
in my father once, by dressing himself up as a lady that was passing
through the town and wished to see the Rector of Cranford, ‘who had
published that admirable Assize Sermon.’  Peter said he was awfully
frightened himself when he saw how my father took it all in, and even
offered to copy out all his Napoleon Buonaparte sermons for her—him, I
mean—no, her, for Peter was a lady then.  He told me he was more
terrified than he ever was before, all the time my father was speaking.
He did not think my father would have believed him; and yet if he had
not, it would have been a sad thing for Peter.  As it was, he was none so
glad of it, for my father kept him hard at work copying out all those
twelve Buonaparte sermons for the lady—that was for Peter himself, you
know.  He was the lady.  And once when he wanted to go fishing, Peter
said, ‘Confound the woman!’—very bad language, my dear, but Peter was not
always so guarded as he should have been; my father was so angry with
him, it nearly frightened me out of my wits: and yet I could hardly keep
from laughing at the little curtseys Peter kept making, quite slyly,
whenever my father spoke of the lady’s excellent taste and sound
discrimination.”

                      [Picture: Confound the woman]

“Did Miss Jenkyns know of these tricks?” said I.

“Oh, no!  Deborah would have been too much shocked.  No, no one knew but
me.  I wish I had always known of Peter’s plans; but sometimes he did not
tell me.  He used to say the old ladies in the town wanted something to
talk about; but I don’t think they did.  They had the St James’s
Chronicle three times a week, just as we have now, and we have plenty to
say; and I remember the clacking noise there always was when some of the
ladies got together.  But, probably, schoolboys talk more than ladies.
At last there was a terrible, sad thing happened.”  Miss Matty got up,
went to the door, and opened it; no one was there.  She rang the bell for
Martha, and when Martha came, her mistress told her to go for eggs to a
farm at the other end of the town.

“I will lock the door after you, Martha.  You are not afraid to go, are
you?”

“No, ma’am, not at all; Jem Hearn will be only too proud to go with me.”

Miss Matty drew herself up, and as soon as we were alone, she wished that
Martha had more maidenly reserve.

“We’ll put out the candle, my dear.  We can talk just as well by
firelight, you know.  There!  Well, you see, Deborah had gone from home
for a fortnight or so; it was a very still, quiet day, I remember,
overhead; and the lilacs were all in flower, so I suppose it was spring.
My father had gone out to see some sick people in the parish; I recollect
seeing him leave the house with his wig and shovel-hat and cane.  What
possessed our poor Peter I don’t know; he had the sweetest temper, and
yet he always seemed to like to plague Deborah.  She never laughed at his
jokes, and thought him ungenteel, and not careful enough about improving
his mind; and that vexed him.

“Well! he went to her room, it seems, and dressed himself in her old
gown, and shawl, and bonnet; just the things she used to wear in
Cranford, and was known by everywhere; and he made the pillow into a
little—you are sure you locked the door, my dear, for I should not like
anyone to hear—into—into a little baby, with white long clothes.  It was
only, as he told me afterwards, to make something to talk about in the
town; he never thought of it as affecting Deborah.  And he went and
walked up and down in the Filbert walk—just half-hidden by the rails, and
half-seen; and he cuddled his pillow, just like a baby, and talked to it
all the nonsense people do.  Oh dear! and my father came stepping stately
up the street, as he always did; and what should he see but a little
black crowd of people—I daresay as many as twenty—all peeping through his
garden rails.  So he thought, at first, they were only looking at a new
rhododendron that was in full bloom, and that he was very proud of; and
he walked slower, that they might have more time to admire.  And he
wondered if he could make out a sermon from the occasion, and thought,
perhaps, there was some relation between the rhododendrons and the lilies
of the field.  My poor father!  When he came nearer, he began to wonder
that they did not see him; but their heads were all so close together,
peeping and peeping!  My father was amongst them, meaning, he said, to
ask them to walk into the garden with him, and admire the beautiful
vegetable production, when—oh, my dear, I tremble to think of it—he
looked through the rails himself, and saw—I don’t know what he thought he
saw, but old Clare told me his face went quite grey-white with anger, and
his eyes blazed out under his frowning black brows; and he spoke out—oh,
so terribly!—and bade them all stop where they were—not one of them to
go, not one of them to stir a step; and, swift as light, he was in at the
garden door, and down the Filbert walk, and seized hold of poor Peter,
and tore his clothes off his back—bonnet, shawl, gown, and all—and threw
the pillow among the people over the railings: and then he was very, very
angry indeed, and before all the people he lifted up his cane and flogged
Peter!

“My dear, that boy’s trick, on that sunny day, when all seemed going
straight and well, broke my mother’s heart, and changed my father for
life.  It did, indeed.  Old Clare said, Peter looked as white as my
father; and stood as still as a statue to be flogged; and my father
struck hard!  When my father stopped to take breath, Peter said, ‘Have
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