by Thomas Hardy
CHAPTER II: THE TRANTER'S
It was a long low cottage with a hipped roof of thatch, having dormerwindows breaking up into the eaves, a chimney standing in the middle ofthe ridge and another at each end. The window-shutters were not yetclosed, and the fire- and candle-light within radiated forth upon thethick bushes of box and laurestinus growing in clumps outside, and uponthe bare boughs of several codlin-trees hanging about in variousdistorted shapes, the result of early training as espaliers combined withcareless climbing into their boughs in later years. The walls of thedwelling were for the most part covered with creepers, though these wererather beaten back from the doorway--a feature which was worn andscratched by much passing in and out, giving it by day the appearance ofan old keyhole. Light streamed through the cracks and joints ofoutbuildings a little way from the cottage, a sight which nourished afancy that the purpose of the erection must be rather to veil brightattractions than to shelter unsightly necessaries. The noise of a beetleand wedges and the splintering of wood was periodically heard from thisdirection and at some little distance further a steady regular munchingand the occasional scurr of a rope betokened a stable, and horses feedingwithin it.
The choir stamped severally on the door-stone to shake from their bootsany fragment of earth or leaf adhering thereto, then entered the houseand looked around to survey the condition of things. Through the opendoorway of a small inner room on the right hand, of a character betweenpantry and cellar, was Dick Dewy's father Reuben, by vocation a"tranter," or irregular carrier. He was a stout florid man about fortyyears of age, who surveyed people up and down when first making theiracquaintance, and generally smiled at the horizon or other distant objectduring conversations with friends, walking about with a steady sway, andturning out his toes very considerably. Being now occupied in bendingover a hogshead, that stood in the pantry ready horsed for the process ofbroaching, he did not take the trouble to turn or raise his eyes at theentry of his visitors, well knowing by their footsteps that they were theexpected old comrades.
The main room, on the left, was decked with bunches of holly and otherevergreens, and from the middle of the beam bisecting the ceiling hungthe mistletoe, of a size out of all proportion to the room, and extendingso low that it became necessary for a full-grown person to walk round itin passing, or run the risk of entangling his hair. This apartmentcontained Mrs. Dewy the tranter's wife, and the four remaining children,Susan, Jim, Bessy, and Charley, graduating uniformly though at widestages from the age of sixteen to that of four years--the eldest of theseries being separated from Dick the firstborn by a nearly equalinterval.
Some circumstance had apparently caused much grief to Charley justprevious to the entry of the choir, and he had absently taken down asmall looking-glass, holding it before his face to learn how the humancountenance appeared when engaged in crying, which survey led him topause at the various points in each wail that were more than ordinarilystriking, for a thorough appreciation of the general effect. Bessy wasleaning against a chair, and glancing under the plaits about the waist ofthe plaid frock she wore, to notice the original unfaded pattern of thematerial as there preserved, her face bearing an expression of regretthat the brightness had passed away from the visible portions. Mrs. Dewysat in a brown settle by the side of the glowing wood fire--so glowingthat with a heedful compression of the lips she would now and then riseand put her hand upon the hams and flitches of bacon lining the chimney,to reassure herself that they were not being broiled instead of smoked--amisfortune that had been known to happen now and then at Christmas-time.
"Hullo, my sonnies, here you be, then!" said Reuben Dewy at length,standing up and blowing forth a vehement gust of breath. "How the blooddo puff up in anybody's head, to be sure, a-stooping like that! I wasjust going out to gate to hark for ye." He then carefully began to winda strip of brown paper round a brass tap he held in his hand. "This inthe cask here is a drop o' the right sort" (tapping the cask); "'tis areal drop o' cordial from the best picked apples--Sansoms, Stubbards,Five-corners, and such-like--you d'mind the sort, Michael?" (Michaelnodded.) "And there's a sprinkling of they that grow down by the orchard-rails--streaked ones--rail apples we d'call 'em, as 'tis by the railsthey grow, and not knowing the right name. The water-cider from 'em isas good as most people's best cider is."
"Ay, and of the same make too," said Bowman. "'It rained when we wrungit out, and the water got into it,' folk will say. But 'tis on'y anexcuse. Watered cider is too common among us."
"Yes, yes; too common it is!" said Spinks with an inward sigh, whilst hiseyes seemed to be looking at the case in an abstract form rather than atthe scene before him. "Such poor liquor do make a man's throat feel verymelancholy--and is a disgrace to the name of stimmilent."
"Come in, come in, and draw up to the fire; never mind your shoes," saidMrs. Dewy, seeing that all except Dick had paused to wipe them upon thedoor-mat. "I am glad that you've stepped up-along at last; and, Susan,you run down to Grammer Kaytes's and see if you can borrow some largercandles than these fourteens. Tommy Leaf, don't ye be afeard! Come andsit here in the settle."
This was addressed to the young man before mentioned, consisting chieflyof a human skeleton and a smock-frock, who was very awkward in hismovements, apparently on account of having grown so very fast that beforehe had had time to get used to his height he was higher.
"Hee--hee--ay!" replied Leaf, letting his mouth continue to smile forsome time after his mind had done smiling, so that his teeth remained inview as the most conspicuous members of his body.
"Here, Mr. Penny," resumed Mrs. Dewy, "you sit in this chair. And how'syour daughter, Mrs. Brownjohn?"
"Well, I suppose I must say pretty fair." He adjusted his spectacles aquarter of an inch to the right. "But she'll be worse before she'sbetter, 'a b'lieve."
"Indeed--poor soul! And how many will that make in all, four or five?"
"Five; they've buried three. Yes, five; and she not much more than amaid yet. She do know the multiplication table onmistakable well.However, 'twas to be, and none can gainsay it."
Mrs. Dewy resigned Mr. Penny. "Wonder where your grandfather James is?"she inquired of one of the children. "He said he'd drop in to-night."
"Out in fuel-house with grandfather William," said Jimmy.
"Now let's see what we can do," was heard spoken about this time by thetranter in a private voice to the barrel, beside which he had againestablished himself, and was stooping to cut away the cork.
"Reuben, don't make such a mess o' tapping that barrel as is mostly madein this house," Mrs. Dewy cried from the fireplace. "I'd tap a hundredwithout wasting more than you do in one. Such a squizzling and squirtingjob as 'tis in your hands! There, he always was such a clumsy manindoors."
"Ay, ay; I know you'd tap a hundred beautiful, Ann--I know you would; twohundred, perhaps. But I can't promise. This is a' old cask, and thewood's rotted away about the tap-hole. The husbird of a feller SamLawson--that ever I should call'n such, now he's dead and gone, poorheart!--took me in completely upon the feat of buying this cask. 'Reub,'says he--'a always used to call me plain Reub, poor old heart!--'Reub,'he said, says he, 'that there cask, Reub, is as good as new; yes, good asnew. 'Tis a wine-hogshead; the best port-wine in the commonwealth havebeen in that there cask; and you shall have en for ten shillens,Reub,'--'a said, says he--'he's worth twenty, ay, five-and-twenty, ifhe's worth one; and an iron hoop or two put round en among the wood oneswill make en worth thirty shillens of any man's money, if--'"
"I think I should have used the eyes that Providence gave me to use aforeI paid any ten shillens for a jimcrack wine-barrel; a saint is sinnerenough not to be cheated. But 'tis like all your family was, so easy tobe deceived."
"That's as true as gospel of this member," said Reuben.
Mrs. Dewy began a smile at the answer, then altering her lips andrefolding them so that it was not a smile, commenced smoothing littleBessy's hair; the tranter having meanwhile suddenly become ob
livious toconversation, occupying himself in a deliberate cutting and arrangementof some more brown paper for the broaching operation.
"Ah, who can believe sellers!" said old Michael Mail in acarefully-cautious voice, by way of tiding-over this critical point ofaffairs.
"No one at all," said Joseph Bowman, in the tone of a man fully agreeingwith everybody.
"Ay," said Mail, in the tone of a man who did not agree with everybody asa rule, though he did now; "I knowed a' auctioneering feller once--a veryfriendly feller 'a was too. And so one hot day as I was walking down thefront street o' Casterbridge, jist below the King's Arms, I passed a'open winder and see him inside, stuck upon his perch, a-selling off. Ijist nodded to en in a friendly way as I passed, and went my way, andthought no more about it. Well, next day, as I was oilen my boots byfuel-house door, if a letter didn't come wi' a bill charging me with afeather-bed, bolster, and pillers, that I had bid for at Mr. Taylor'ssale. The slim-faced martel had knocked 'em down to me because I noddedto en in my friendly way; and I had to pay for 'em too. Now, I hold thatthat was coming it very close, Reuben?"
"'Twas close, there's no denying," said the general voice.
"Too close, 'twas," said Reuben, in the rear of the rest. "And as to SamLawson--poor heart! now he's dead and gone too!--I'll warrant, that if sobe I've spent one hour in making hoops for that barrel, I've spent fifty,first and last. That's one of my hoops"--touching it with hiselbow--"that's one of mine, and that, and that, and all these."
"Ah, Sam was a man," said Mr. Penny, contemplatively.
"Sam was!" said Bowman.
"Especially for a drap o' drink," said the tranter.
"Good, but not religious-good," suggested Mr. Penny.
The tranter nodded. Having at last made the tap and hole quite ready,"Now then, Suze, bring a mug," he said. "Here's luck to us, my sonnies!"
The tap went in, and the cider immediately squirted out in a horizontalshower over Reuben's hands, knees, and leggings, and into the eyes andneck of Charley, who, having temporarily put off his grief under pressureof more interesting proceedings, was squatting down and blinking near hisfather.
"There 'tis again!" said Mrs. Dewy.
"Devil take the hole, the cask, and Sam Lawson too, that good cidershould be wasted like this!" exclaimed the tranter. "Your thumb! Lendme your thumb, Michael! Ram it in here, Michael! I must get a biggertap, my sonnies."
"Idd it cold inthide te hole?" inquired Charley of Michael, as hecontinued in a stooping posture with his thumb in the cork-hole.
"What wonderful odds and ends that chiel has in his head to be sure!"Mrs. Dewy admiringly exclaimed from the distance. "I lay a wager that hethinks more about how 'tis inside that barrel than in all the other partsof the world put together."
All persons present put on a speaking countenance of admiration for thecleverness alluded to, in the midst of which Reuben returned. Theoperation was then satisfactorily performed; when Michael arose andstretched his head to the extremest fraction of height that his bodywould allow of, to re-straighten his back and shoulders--thrusting outhis arms and twisting his features to a mass of wrinkles to emphasize therelief aquired. A quart or two of the beverage was then brought totable, at which all the new arrivals reseated themselves with wide-spreadknees, their eyes meditatively seeking out any speck or knot in the boardupon which the gaze might precipitate itself.
"Whatever is father a-biding out in fuel-house so long for?" said thetranter. "Never such a man as father for two things--cleaving up olddead apple-tree wood and playing the bass-viol. 'A'd pass his lifebetween the two, that 'a would." He stepped to the door and opened it.
"Father!"
"Ay!" rang thinly from round the corner.
"Here's the barrel tapped, and we all a-waiting!"
A series of dull thuds, that had been heard without for some time past,now ceased; and after the light of a lantern had passed the window andmade wheeling rays upon the ceiling inside the eldest of the Dewy familyappeared.