第20章

The Malthouse - The Chat - News Warren's

Malthouse was enclosed by an old wall in wrapped with ivy, and though not much of the exterior was visible at this hour, the character and purposes of the building were clearly enough shown by its outline upon the sky. From the walls an overhanging thatched roof sloped up to a point in the centre, upon which rose a small wooden lantern, fitted with louvre-boards on all the four sides, and from these openings a mist was dimly perceived to be escaping into the night air. There was no window in front; but a square hole in the door was glazed with a single pane, through which red, comfortable rays now stretched out upon the ivied wall in front. Voices were to be heard inside.

Oak's hand skimmed the surface of the door with fingers extended to an Elymas-the-Sorcerer pattern, till he found a leathern strap which he pulled. This lifted a Wooden latch, and the door swung open.

The room inside was lighted only by the ruddy glow from the kiln, mouth, which shone over the floor with the streaming horizontality of the setting sun, and threw upwards the shadows of all facial irregularities in those assembled around. The stone-flag floor was worn into a path from the doorway to the kiln, and into undulations everywhere. A curved settle of unplaned oak stretched along one side, and in a remote corner was a small bed and bedstead, the owner and frequent occupier of which was the maltster.

This aged man was now sitting opposite the fire, his frosty white hair and beard overgrowing his gnarled figure like the grey moss and lichen upon a leafless apple tree. He wore breeches and the laced-up shoes called ankle-jacks; he kept his eyes fixed upon the fire.

Gabriel's nose was greeted by an atmosphere laden with the sweet smell of new malt. The conversation (which seemed to have been concerning the origin of the fire) immediately ceased, and every one ocularly criticized him to the degree expressed by contracting the flesh of their foreheads and looking at him with narrowed eyelids, as if he had been a light too strong for their sight. Several exclaimed meditatively, after this operation had been completed:--`Oh, 'tis the new shepherd, 'a b'lieve.'

`We thought we heard a hand pawing about the door for the bobbin,' but weren't sure 'twere not a dead leaf blowed across,' said another.

`Come in, shepherd; sure ye be welcome, though we don't know yer name.'

`Gabriel Oak, that's my name, neighbours.'

The ancient maltster sitting in the midst turned at this - his turning being as the turning of a rusty crane.

`That's never Gable Oak's grandson over at Norcombe - never!' he said, as a formula expressive of surprise, which nobody was supposed to take literally.

`My father and my grandfather were old men of the name of Gabriel,' said the shepherd placidly.

`Thought I knowed the man's face as I seed him on the rick! thought I did! And where be ye trading o't to now, shepherd?'

`I'm thinking of biding here,' said Mr Oak.

`Knowed yer grandfather for years and years!' continued the maltster, the words coming forth of their own accord as if the momentum previously imparted had been sufficient.

`Ah - and did you!'

`Knowed yer grandmother.'

`And her too!'

`Likewise knowed yer father when he was a child. Why, my boy Jacob there and your father were sworn brothers - that they were sure - weren't ye Jacob?'

`Ay, sure,' said his son, a young man about sixty-five, with a semi-bald head and one tooth in the left centre of his upper jaw, which made much of itself by standing prominent, like a milestone in a bank. `But 'twas Joe had most to do with him. However, my son William must have knowed the very man afore us - didn't ye, Billy, afore ye left Norcombe?'

`No, 'twas Andrew,' said Jacob's son Billy, a child of forty, or thereabouts, who manifested the peculiarity of possessing a cheerful soul in a gloomy body, and whose whiskers were assuming a chinchilla shade here and there.

`I can mind Andrew,' said Oak, `as being a man in the place when I was quite a child.'

`Ay - the other day I and my youngest daughter, Liddy, were over at my grandson's christening,' continued Billy. `We were talking about this very family, and 'twas only last Purification Day in this very world, when the use-money is gied away to the second-best poor folk, you know, shepherd, and I can mind the day because they all had to traypse up to the vestry - yes, this very man's family.'

`Come, shepherd, and drink. 'Tis gape and swaller with us - a drap of sommit, but not of much account,' said the maltster, removing from the fire his eyes, which were vermilion-red and bleared by gazing into it for so many years. `Take up the God-forgive-me, Jacob. See if 'tis warm, Jacob.'

Jacob stooped to the God-forgive-me, which was a two-handled tall mug standing in the ashes, cracked and charred with heat: it was rather furred with extraneous matter about the outside, especially in the crevices of the handles, the innermost curves of which may not have seen daylight for several years by reason of this encrustation thereon - formed of ashes accidentally wetted with cider and baked hard; but to the mind of any sensible drinker the cup was no worse for that, being incontestably clean on the inside and about the rim. It may be observed that such a class of mug is called a God-forgive-me in Weatherbury and its vicinity for uncertain reasons; probably because its size makes any given toper feel ashamed of himself when he sees its bottom in drinking it empty.

Jacob, on receiving the order to see if the liquor was warm enough, placidly dipped his forefinger into it by way of thermometer, and having pronounced it nearly of the proper degree, raised the cup and very civilly attempted to dust some of the ashes from the bottom with the skirt of his smock-frock, because Shepherd Oak was a stranger.

`A clane cup for the shepherd,' said the maltster commandingly.

`No - not at all,' said Gabriel, in a reproving tone of considerateness.