The Paper Cap. A Story of Love and Labor

“I will speak to thy father some time to-day. I shall hev to choose both a proper way and a proper time; thou knows that. Get thy frocks ready and I will see what can be done.”

“If father will not take me, I shall write to Aunt Josepha.”

“Thou will do nothing of that kind. Thy Aunt Josepha is a very peculiar woman. We heard from the Wilsons that she hed fairly joined the radicals and was heart and soul with the Cobden set. In her rough, broad way she said to Mrs. Wilson, that steam and iron and red brick had come to take possession of England and that men and women who could not see that were blind fools and that a pinch of hunger would do them good. She even scolded father in her letter two weeks ago, and father her eldest brother. Think of that! I was shocked, and father felt it far more than I can tell thee. Why!– he wouldn’t hev a mouthful of lunch, and that day we were heving hare soup; and him so fond of hare soup.”

“I remember. Did father answer that letter?”

“I should think he did. He told Josepha Temple a little of her duty; he reminded her, in clear strong words, that he stood in the place of her father, and the head of the Annis family, and that he had a right to her respect and sympathy.”

“What did Aunt Josepha say to that?”

“She wrote a laughable, foolish letter back and said: ‘As she was two years older than Antony Annis she could not frame her mouth to ‘father’ him, but that she was, and always would be, his loving sister.’ You see Josepha Temple was the eldest child of the late squire, your father came two years after her.”

“Did you know that Dick had been staying with her for a week?”

“Yes. Dick wrote us while there. Father is troubled about it. He says Dick will come home with a factory on his brain.”

“You must stand by Dick, mother. We are getting so pinched for money you know, and Lydia Wilson told me that everyone was saying: ‘Father was paying the men’s shortage out of his estate.’ They were sorry for father, and I don’t like people being sorry for him.”

“And pray what has Lydia Wilson to do with thy father’s money and business? Thou ought to have asked her that question. Whether thou understands thy father or not, whatever he does ought to be right in thy eyes. Men don’t like explaining their affairs to anyone; especially to women, and I doan’t believe they iver tell the bottom facts, even to themselves.”

“Mother, if things come to the worst, would it do for me to ask Jane for money?”

“I wonder at thee. Jane niver gives or lends anything to anybody, but to Jane.”

“She says she is going to entertain many great people this winter and she wishes me to meet them so I think she might help me to make a good appearance.”

“I wouldn’t wonder if she asked thy father to pay her for introducing thee into the titled set. She writes about them and talks about them and I dare warrant dreams about them.”

“Oh, mother!”

“Does she ever forget that she has managed to become Lady Leyland? She thinks that two syllables before her name makes her better than her own family. Chut! Katherine! Leyland is only the third of the line. It was an official favor, too – what merit there is in it has not yet been discovered. We have lived in this old house three hundred years, and three hundred before that in old Britain.”

“Old Britain?”

“To be sure – in Glamorganshire, I believe. Ask thy father. He knows his genealogy by heart. I see him coming. Go and meet him.”

“Yes, mother, but I think I will write a short note to Aunt Josepha. I will not name business, nor money, nor even my desire to make a visit to London.”

“Write such a letter if thou wishes but take the result – whatever it is – in a good humor. Remember that thy aunt’s temper, and her words also, are entirely without frill.”

“That, of course. It is the Annis temper.”

“It is the English temper.”

“Well, mother, things seem to be ordered in a very unhappy fashion but I suppose we might as well take to them at once. Indeed, we shall be compelled to do it, if so be, it pleases them above.”

“Just so,” answered Madam. “But, Katherine, The Hands of Compulsion generally turn out to be The Hands of Compassion.”

Katherine smiled happily, the door opened, and the next moment she gave the smile in a kiss to her father, as he clasped her fondly in his arms, crying, “Eh, my joy! I am glad to see thee!” Then the two women made that charming fuss over his “tired look,” which is so consoling to men fresh from the slings and arrows of an outrageous world that will not do as they want it to do.

In his family life the squire still retained many old-fashioned customs, and his dinner at one o’clock was a settled ceremony. This day, in the very middle of it, Katherine said, “I saw you, father, this morning when you were talking to Mr. Bradley on the Green – about ten o’clock.”

“And I saw thee trailing through the low meadows with Bradley’s son.”

“Yes, he came home last night.”

“And went out t’ varry next morning, to meet thee in t’ low meadow.”

“If you say, he happened to meet me in the low meadow, it would be better.”

“Whativer hed the lad to do in my meadow so early in the morning?”

“Do you call half-past ten early, dad?”

“I call it too early for thee to be traipsing through t’ wet grass with Henry Bradley.”

“Let us keep to facts, dear father. The grass was quite dry – too dry. Joel was wishing for rain; he said, ‘Master so pampered his cattle, that they perfectly thought scorn of half-cured grass.’”

“Thou art trying to slip by my question and I’m not going to let thee do it. What was John Henry Bradley doing wi’ thee in the low meadow this morning?”

“He brought me a letter from my brother Dick. Dick and Harry have been in London together, and they stayed four days with Aunt Josepha. They liked her very much. They took her to the opera and the play and she snubbed O’Connell and some other famous men and told them to let her alone, that she had two innocent lads in her care – and so on. You know.”

“Was he making love to thee?”

“You should not ask me a question of that kind, dad.”

“Thou need not tell me, what I should, or should not do. I hed learned all that, before thou wer born. And I’ll tell thee plainly that I will not hev any lovemaking between thee and Harry Bradley.”

“Very well, father. If you are going to the stable will you tell someone to have my saddle horse at the door in half-an-hour?”

“To be sure, I will. If tha wants a ride and will go to Yoden Bridge, I’ll go with thee.”

“I would like that but I promised to help Faith Foster, who is making clothing for the naked, shivering babies in Annis village. When Oddy’s little girl died a week ago, there wasn’t a night-gown in the house to bury it in. Its mother tore a breadth out of her one petticoat and folded her baby in it.”

“Oh, Katherine Annis! Surely that tale is not true!” cried Madam.

“Alas, it is too true! The baby’s one little gown was not fit even for the grave.”

The Squire sat down and covered his face with his hands and when Katherine left the room he looked up pitifully at his wife. And she stooped and kissed him and as she did so comforted him with broken words of affection and assurances that it was not his fault – “thou hast pinched us all a bit to keep the cottage looms busy,” she said, “thou couldn’t do more than that, could thou, Antony?”

“I thought I was doing right. Is there any other way?”

“Thou could build – like the rest.”

He did not answer the remark but stood up hurriedly, saying, “I must go and order Katherine’s mount and she will expect me to put her up. After that I may go to Yoden Bridge.”

Madam sighed and turned hopelessly away. “When will he listen to reason?” she whispered, but there was no answer.