CHAPTER XXVIII.

BOUNDER GIVES WARNING.

There was another personage to whom the unconventional ways of "the Golden Shoemaker" gave great offence; and that was Mr. Bounder, the coachman. As a coachman, Bounder was faultless. His native genius had been developed and matured by a long course of first-cla.s.s experience. In matters of etiquette, within his province, Bounder was precise. Right behaviour between master and coachman was, in his opinion, "the whole duty of man."

He held in equal contempt a presuming coachman and a master who did not keep his place.

Bounder soon discovered that, in "Cobbler" Horn, he had a master of whom it was impossible to approve. Bounder "see'd from the fust as Mr. Horn warn't no gentleman." It was always the way with "them as was made rich all of a suddint like." And Bounder puffed out his red cheeks till they looked like two toy balloons. It was "bad enough to be kept waiting outside the station, while your master stood talking to a little feller as looked as like a rag and bone man as anythink; but when you was required to stop the kerridge and pick up every tramp as you overtook on the road, it was coming it a little too strong." This last was a slight exaggeration on the part of Bounder. The exact truth was that, on one occasion, his master had stopped the carriage for the purpose of giving a lift to a respectable, though not well-to-do, pedestrian, and in another instance, a working-cla.s.s woman and her tired little one had been invited to take their seats on Bounder's sacred cushions, Bounder's master himself alighting to lift the bedusted child to her place.

But this was not the worst. The woman who lived in the little cottage past which Marian had trotted so eagerly, on the morning of her disappearance so long ago, had a daughter who was a cripple from disease of the spine.

She was the only daughter, and, being well up in her teens, would have been a great help to her mother if she had been well. "Cobbler" Horn was deeply moved by the pale cheeks and frail bent form of the invalid girl.

He induced his sister to call at the cottage, and they took the poor suffering creature under their care. It was not unnatural that the young secretary should also be enlisted in this kindly service. First she was sent to the cottage with delicacies to tempt the appet.i.te of the sick girl; and then she began to go there of her own accord. During one of her visits, the mother happened to say:

"You see, miss, what she wants is fresh air. But how's she to get it? She can't walk only a few yards at a time; and even a mild winter's not the time for sitting out."

The woman spoke without any special design; but her words suggested to the mind of Miss Owen a happy thought. The young secretary was so firmly established, by this time, in the regard of her employer that she was able to approach him with the least degree of reserve. So she spoke out her thought to him with the frankness of a favourite daughter. An actual daughter would have thrown her arms around his neck, and emphasized her suggestion with a kiss. Miss Owen did not do this; but the tone of respectful yet affectionate confidence in which she spoke served her purpose just as well.

"Mr. Horn"--they were in the midst of their daily grapple with the correspondence--"the doctor says poor Susie Martin ought to have a great deal of fresh air. Don't you think a carriage drive now and then would be a good thing?"

Her knowledge of "Cobbler" Horn a.s.sured her that her suggestion would be adopted. Otherwise she would have hesitated to throw it out.

"Cobbler" Horn laid down the pen with which he had been making some jottings for the guidance of his secretary, and regarded her steadfastly for a moment or two. Then his face lighted up with a sudden glow.

"To be sure! Why didn't I think of that? My dear young lady, you are my good angel!"

That evening Miss Owen was desired to take a message to the cottage; and the next day Bounder was confounded by being ordered to convey Miss Owen and the invalid girl for a country drive, in the pony carriage. Bounder stared, became apoplectic in appearance, and stutteringly asked to have the order repeated. His master complied with his request; and Bounder turned away, with haughty mien, to do as he was bid. He was consumed with fierce mortification. He would bear it this time, but not again. He was like the proverbial camel, which succ.u.mbs beneath the last straw. Very soon the point would be reached at which long-suffering endurance must give way.

It was a deep grievance with Bounder that he was seldom ordered to drive to big houses. He was required to turn the heads of his horses into many strange ways. He was almost daily ordered to drive down streets where he was ashamed to be seen, and to stop at doors at which he felt it to be an indignity to be compelled to pull up his prancing steeds. Bounder hailed with relief the occasions on which he was required to take Miss Jemima out. Then he was sure of not receiving an order to obey which would be beneath the dignity of a coachman who, until now, had known no service but of the highest cla.s.s. Such occasions supplied salve to his wounded spirit.

But his wound was reopened every day by some fresh insult at the hands of his master. He had submitted to the odious necessity of driving out in his carriage the crippled girl, and that not only once or twice. But the tide of rebellion was rising higher and higher in his breast, and gathering strength from day to day; and, at length, Bounder resolved to give his master "warning," and remove himself from so uncongenial a sphere. He did not quite like to make his master's kindness to the poor invalid girl his ostensible reason for desiring a change; and, while he was looking around for a plausible pretext, the course of events supplied him with exactly such an occasion as he sought.

Bounder had not as yet become aware of the daily visits of his master to his old workshop. He had been kept in ignorance of the matter merely because there was no special reason why he should be informed. One afternoon, on leaving home, "Cobbler" Horn had left word with Miss Jemima for the coachman to come to the old house, with the dog-cart, at three o'clock. Bounder received the order with a feeling of apathetic wonder as to what new freak he was expected to countenance and aid. At the entrance of the street in which the old house stood, he involuntarily pulled up his horse. Then, with an air of ineffable disdain, he drove slowly on, and proceeded to the number at which he had been directed to call.

Summoning a pa.s.sing boy, he ordered him to knock at the door. The boy contemplated disobedience; but a glance at Bounder's whip induced him to change his mind, and he gave the door a sounding rap. The door speedily opened, and Bounder's master appeared. But such was his disguise that Bounder was necessitated to rub his eyes. Divested of his coat, and enfolded in a leathern ap.r.o.n, "the Golden Shoemaker" stood in the doorway, with bare arms, holding out a pair of newly-mended hob-nailed boots.

"That's right," he said; "I'm glad you're punctual. Will you kindly take these boots to No. 17, Drake Street, round the corner; and then come back here;" and, stepping out upon the pavement, he placed the boots on the vacant cushion of the dog-cart, close to Bounder's magnificent person.

Bounder touched his hat as usual; but there was an evil fire in his heart, and, as he drove slowly away, a lava-tide of fierce thought coursed through his mind. That he, Bounder, "what had drove real gentlemen and ladies, such as a member of Parliament and a _barrow-knight_," should have been ordered to drive home a pair of labourer's boots! This was "the last straw," indeed!

Arrived at No. 17, Drake Street, Bounder altogether declined to touch the offending boots. He simply indicated them with his whip to the woman who had come to the door in some surprise, and ignoring her expression of thanks, turned the head of his horse, and drove gloomily away.

That night, "Cobbler" Horn's outraged coachman sought speech with his master.

"I wish to give you warning, sir," he said, touching his hat, and speaking in tones of perfect respect.

Bounder's master started. He had intended to make the best of his coachman.

"Why so, Bounder?" he asked. "Don't I give you money enough, or what?"

"Oh," replied Bounder, "the money's all right; but, to make a clean breast of it, the service ain't ezactly what I've been used to. I ain't been accustomed to drive about in back streets, and stop at cottages and such; and to take up every tramp as you meets; and to carry labourer's boots on the seat of the dog-cart."

"I'm afraid, Mr. Bounder," said "Cobbler" Horn, with a broad smile, "that I've hurt your dignity."

"Well, as to that, sir," said the coachman, uneasily, "all as I wishes to say is that I've been used to a 'igh cla.s.s service; and I took this place under a mis-happrehension."

"Very well, Bounder," rejoined "Cobbler" Horn, more gravely, "then we had better part. For I can't promise you any different cla.s.s of service, seeing it is my intention to use my carriages quite as much for the benefit of other people as for my own; and it is not at all likely that I shall drive about much amongst fashionable folks. When do you wish to go, Mr. Bounder?"

This was business-like indeed. Bounder was in no haste to reply.

"Because," resumed his master, "I will release you next week, if you wish."

"Well, sir," replied Bounder slowly, "I shouldn't wish to go under the month."

"Very well. But, you must know, Bounder, that I have no fault to find with you. It's you who have given me notice, you know."

Bounder drew himself up to his full height. "Fault to find" with him! The mere suggestion was an insult. But Bounder put it into his pocket.

"If you are in want of a character, now," resumed "Cobbler" Horn, "I shall----"

"Thank you, sir," interposed Bounder with hauteur, "I am provided as to that. There's more than one gentleman who will speak for me," and Bounder faced about, and marched away with his nose turned towards the stars.

CHAPTER XXIX.

VAGUE SURMISINGS.

The feeling of familiarity with the previous abode of her employer, and its surroundings, of which Miss Owen had been conscious at first, had become modified as the weeks went by. The removal to the new house had, no doubt, in part contributed to this result; and, very soon, if she did not forget the impression of revived remembrance of which she had been aware at first, she ceased to be conscious that any trace of it remained. She did not, indeed, forget that it had been; she remembered vividly the fact that, when she first entered the old house, she had almost felt as if she had come home. That feeling had now almost pa.s.sed away. But she was beginning to ponder certain things which seemed to be connected with it in some vague way.

Though she had often been told of the circ.u.mstances under which she had been rescued from a life of poverty and possible shame, her own recollection of the matter was very dim. She seemed to remember a time of great trouble, and then a sudden change, since which all had been happy and bright; and certainly, if she had not been definitely informed of the fact, she would never have suspected that the kind friends to whom she owed so much were not her actual parents. That vague reminiscence of early distress would have lingered with her as the memory of a troubled dream, and nothing more.

Hitherto she had not been anxious for further information concerning her parentage and early life. There were times when she felt some small measure of dissatisfaction at the thought that she did not know who she really was. But this feeling was held in check by the consideration that, if her parents had been good and kind, she would probably not have been in a position to need the loving service which had been rendered to her by Mr. and Mrs. Burton; and she felt that she would a thousand times rather have them for her father and mother, than be compelled to give those dear names to such persons as it was more than likely her actual parents had been. For the most part, therefore, she had feared, rather than hoped, that her real father and mother might appear.

Now, however, vague surmisings were being awakened in the mind of the young secretary. Her kind employer had mysteriously lost a little girl.

This suggested to her a new set of possibilities as to her own past. It came to her mind that perhaps she also had been lost, and that the misery she vaguely remembered, had been inflicted by other hands than those of her parents. If, like little Marian, she had actually wandered away, it was probably no fault of theirs, and perhaps they had been mourning for her all these years. Then, almost for the first time, she was conscious of an ardent desire to know who her parents had been. Over this question she pondered often and long. She could do nothing more--except pray. And pray she did. She asked that, if it were right and best, the cloud of obscurity might be lifted from her earlier years. And yet, as day by day she persisted in this prayer, she had a feeling that the prayer itself, and the desire from which it proceeded, might, perhaps, const.i.tute a species of disloyalty to the only parents she seemed ever to have known. To this feeling her great love and strong conscientiousness gave birth. Yet she could neither repress her desire nor refrain from her prayer.

But there was another thing which "Cobbler" Horn had said. When his secretary asked him what little Marian would probably be like, if she were still alive, he, in all simplicity, and without perceiving the possible direction that might be given to her thoughts, had replied that his lost child, if living, would be not unlike what his secretary actually was. He probably intended no more than that there might be a general resemblance between the two girls; and he might be mistaken even in that. Miss Owen herself took such a view of the matter at the time, and pa.s.sed it lightly by. But, afterwards, in the course of her ponderings, it came back again.

The unpremeditated words, in which her employer had admitted the probability of a resemblance between herself and what his own lost child might most likely have become, seemed to find their place amongst the other strange things which were perplexing her mind.

Very deeply Miss Owen pondered these many puzzling things, from day to day. A momentous possibility seemed to be dawning on her view; but she was like one who, being but half-awake, cannot decide whether the brightness of coming day may not, after all, be merely a dim dream-light which will presently fade away. It appeared to her sometimes as though she were on the verge of the momentous discovery which she had often wondered whether she would ever make. Could it be that the mystery of her parentage was about to be solved, and that with a result which would be altogether to her mind? But, as often as she reached this point, she pulled herself sharply up. Her name was Mary Ann Owen: that settled the question at once.

But was it so? There came a time when she began to have doubts even as to her name. Perhaps the wish was father to the thought. At any rate, she had never liked the name by which she was known; and now she was conscious of a very definite reason for wishing that it might, in some way, turn out not to be her name after all. Was it certain that her name was Mary Ann Owen? She had a strange, weird feeling at the thought of what the question implied. And there was distinct ground for doubt. When she had been found by her adopted parents, her baby tongue, in answer to their questioning, had p.r.o.nounced her name as best it could. But, as her speech was less distinct than is usually that of a child of her apparent years, they had never felt quite sure about her name. The name by which she forthwith became known to them was the best interpretation they could put upon her broken words, and it had been accepted by the child herself without objection; but in the minds of Mr. and Mrs. Burton there had always been a lingering doubt. Miss Owen had been aware of this, but had given it little heed. Now, however, the fact that there was uncertainty as to her name came vividly to her mind. And yet, if her name was not Mary Ann Owen, it might be something else quite as far from her desires. But stay, might it not be supposed that her real name, whatever it might be, was similar in sound to the name her baby tongue had been thought to p.r.o.nounce? She had tried to tell her kind friends her name; and they had understood her to say that it was Mary Ann Owen. If they were mistaken, what other name was there of similar sound? Ah, there was one! Then she thrilled with almost a delirium of delight, which quickly gave place to a guilty feeling--as though she had put forth her hand towards that which was too sacred for her touch.

"What silly day-dreams have come into my head!" she cried.

"The Golden Shoemaker" too had his ponderings, in these days. Of late he had been thinking more about his little Marian than for many years past; and, if he had searched for the reason of this, he would have discovered it in the fact that his young girl secretary daily reminded him, in various ways, of his long lost child. Miss Owen was--or so he fancied--very much like what his darling would have become. There was, to be sure, not much in that, after all; and the same might have been the case with many another young girl. But the points of resemblance between the history of his young secretary and the early fate of his little Marian const.i.tuted another circ.u.mstance of strange import. Like his own child, Miss Owen had been an outcast. Kind friends had given her a home. Might it not be that similar happiness had fallen to the lot of his little Marian?

If he could think so, he would almost be reconciled to the prospect of never seeing her again. And every day he felt that his young secretary was making for herself a larger place in his heart.