Aurora Floyd (Feminist Classic). Mary Elizabeth Braddon
in close cottage chambers and talk to rheumatic old women. Lucy distributed little parcels of tracts prepared by Mrs. Alexander, and flannel garments made by her own white hands; but Aurora gave the half-sovereigns and the old sherry; and I’m afraid these simple cottagers liked the heiress best, although they were wise enough and just enough to know that each lady gave according to her means.
It was in returning from a round of these charitable visits that an adventure befell the little party which was by no means pleasing to Captain Bulstrode.
Aurora had driven farther than usual, and it was striking four as her ponies dashed past Beckenham church and down the hill toward Felden Woods. The afternoon was cold and cheerless; light flakes of snow drifted across the hard road, and hung here and there upon the leafless hedges, and there was that inky blackness in the sky which presages a heavy fall. The woman at the lodge ran out with her apron over her head to open the gates as Miss Floyd’s ponies approached, and at the same moment a man rose from a bank by the road-side, and came close up to the little carriage.
He was a broad-shouldered, stout-built fellow, wearing a shabby velveteen cut-away coat, slashed about with abnormal pockets, and white and greasy at the seams and elbows. His chin was muffled in two or three yards of dirty woollen comforter, after the fashion of his kind; and the band of his low-crowned felt hat was ornamented with a short clay pipe, colored of a respectable blackness. A dingy white dog, with a brass collar, bow legs, a short nose, bloodshot eyes, one ear, a hanging jaw, and a generally supercilious expression of countenance, rose from the bank at the same moment with his master, and growled ominously at the elegant vehicle and the mastiff Bow-wow trotting by its side.
The stranger was the same individual who had accosted Miss Floyd in Cockspur street three months before.
I do not know whether Miss Floyd recognized this person; but I know that she touched her ponies’ ears with the whip, and the spirited animals had dashed past the man, and through the gates of Felden, when he sprang forward, caught at their heads, and stopped the light basket carriage, which rocked under the force of his strong hand.
Talbot Bulstrode leaped from the vehicle, heedless of his stiff leg, and caught the man by the collar.
“Let go that bridle!” he cried, lifting his cane; “how dare you stop this lady’s ponies?”
“Because I wanted to speak to her, that’s why. Let go my coat, will yer?”
The dog made at Talbot’s legs, but the young man whirled round his cane and inflicted such a chastisement upon the snub nose of that animal as sent him into temporary retirement, howling dismally.
“You are an insolent scoundrel, and I’ve a good mind to —”
“You’d be hinserlent, p’raps, if yer was hungry,” answered the man, with a pitiful whine, which was meant to be conciliating. “Such weather as this here’s all very well for young swells such as you, as has your dawgs, and guns, and ‘untin’; but the winter’s tryin’ to a poor man’s temper when he’s industrious and willin’, and can’t get a stroke of honest work to do, or a mouthful of vittals. I only want to speak to the young lady: she knows me well enough.”
“Which young lady?”
“Miss Floyd — the heiress.”
They were standing a little way from the pony carriage. Aurora had risen from her seat and flung the reins to Lucy; she was looking toward the two men, pale and breathless, doubtless terrified for the result of the encounter.
Talbot released the man’s collar, and went back to Miss Floyd.
“Do you know this person, Aurora?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“He is one of your old pensioners, I suppose?”
“He is; do not say anything more to him, Talbot. His manner is rough, but he means no harm. Stop with Lucy while I speak to him.”
Rapid and impetuous in all her movements, she sprang from the carriage, and joined the man beneath the bare branches of the trees before Talbot could remonstrate.
The dog, which had crawled slowly back to his master’s side, fawned upon her as she approached, and was driven away by a fierce growl from Bow-wow, who was little likely to brook any such vulgar rivalry.
The man removed his felt hat, and tugged ceremoniously at a tuft of sandyish hair which ornamented his low forehead.
“You might have spoken to a cove without all this here row, Miss Floyd,” he said, in an injured tone.
Aurora looked at him indignantly.
“Why did you stop me here?” she said; “why could n’t you write to me?”
“Because writin’s never so much good as speakin’, and because such young ladies as you are uncommon difficult to get at. How did I know that your pa might n’t have put his hand upon my letter, and there’d have been a pretty to do; though I dessay, as for that, if I was to go up to the house, and ask the old gent for a trifle, he would n’t be back’ard in givin’ it. I dessay he’d be good for a fi-pun note, or a tenner, if it came to that.”
Aurora’s eyes flashed sparks of fire as she turned upon the speaker. “If ever you dare to annoy my father, you shall pay dearly for it, Matthew Harrison,” she said; “not that I fear anything you can say, but I will not have him annoyed — I will not have him tormented. He has borne enough, and suffered enough, Heaven knows, without that. I will not have him harassed, and his best and tenderest feelings made a market of by such as you. I will not!”
She stamped her foot upon the frosty ground as she spoke. Talbot Bulstrode saw and wondered at the gesture. He had half a mind to leave the carriage and join Aurora and her petitioner; but the ponies were restless, and he knew it would not do to abandon the reins to poor timid Lucy.
“You need n’t take on so, Miss Floyd,” answered the man, whom Aurora had addressed as Matthew Harrison; “I’m sure I want to make things pleasant to all parties. All I ask is, that you’ll act a little liberal to a cove wot’s come down in the world since you see him last. Lord, wot a world it is for ups and downs! If it had been the summer season, I’d have had no needs to worrit you; but what’s the good of standin’ at the top of Regent street such weather as this with tarrier pups and such likes? Old ladies has no eyes for dawgs in the winter; and even the gents as cares for rat-catchin’ is gettin’ uncommon scarce. There ain’t nothink doin’ on the turf whereby a chap can make an honest penny, nor won’t be, come the Craven Meetin’. I’d never have come anigh you, miss, if I had n’t been hard up, and I know you’ll act liberal.”
“Act liberally!” cried Aurora; “good Heavens! if every guinea I have, or ever hope to have, could blot out the business that you trade upon, I’d open my hands and let the money run through them as freely as so much water.”
“It was only good-natured of me to send you that ’ere paper, though, miss, eh?” said Mr. Matthew Harrison, plucking a dry twig from the tree nearest him, and chewing it for his delectation.
Aurora and the man had walked slowly onward as they spoke, and were by this time at some distance from the pony carriage.
Talbot Bulstrode was in a fever of restless impatience.
“Do you know this pensioner of your cousin’s, Lucy?” he asked.
“No, I can’t remember his face. I don’t think he belongs to Beckenham.”
“Why, if I had n’t have sent you that ’ere Life, you would n’t have know’d, would you, now?” said the man.
“No, no, perhaps not,” answered Aurora. She had taken her porte-monnaie from her pocket, and Mr. Harrison was furtively regarding the little morocco receptacle with glistening eyes.
“You don’t ask me about any of the particulars?” he said.
“No. What should I care to know of them?”
“No,