style="font-size:15px;"> Taffendale, surprised by the directness of her look and tone, nodded.
"Just so," he answered, with equal directness, "I am."
Rhoda put the tip of a finger on a crumb and began to move it round and round the rim of the plate.
"I always believe in saying things straight out," she said, after a brief pause. "The truth is, Mr. Taffendale, I've come to see if you'll lend me some money."
Taffendale's brows knitted, but Rhoda was quick to see that the alteration arose not from resentment but from surprise.
"Oh!" he said. "Why, what is it? What's it all about? Of course, I couldn't think why you'd called."
"No," she said. "Of course, you couldn't, Mr. Taffendale. Well, you see, it's this, to put it shortly. Perris, he hasn't the money for the rent."
Taffendale smiled quietly.
"Did he send you?" he asked.
"No," she answered quickly. "No, he didn't, Mr. Taffendale. Perris doesn't know that I'm here. I'm not asking you to help him—I'm asking you to help me. I wouldn't ask anybody to help Perris. He's—he's—well, he's not fit to be trusted with money."
Taffendale frowned, and began to rub his chin with the back of his hand—a habit of his when he was puzzled.
"Make it clear, Mrs. Perris," he said. "Take your time, but make it clear."
Rhoda put her plate on the table and faced her host.
"Well, it's like this, Mr. Taffendale," she said. "I'll make it as clear as I can. You see, when we came there to Cherry-trees, two years ago, Perris and me had just been married, and he said he'd five hundred pounds, and he could do well on that bit of farm, and of course I believed him. But it didn't take so long to see that he wasn't doing well—I knew that plain enough, because I come of farming folk. All the same, I never knew that he was doing as badly as it turns out he was. I thought he'd some—a good deal—of that five hundred pounds left in the bank. Then the other day he went off, saying that he'd business with some of his relations, and last night, after you'd gone away, he came home, and he out with the truth. He'd been to try to borrow money for the rent, and he couldn't borrow it, and he's naught but a pound or two in the bank. That's where it is, Mr. Taffendale."
"Aye," said Taffendale. "Aye—I see. And the rent-day's early next week."
"And the rent-day's early next week," repeated Rhoda. "And what's more, Mr. Taffendale, the steward 'll have no mercy on Perris. You saw what there was about the place."
Taffendale laughed softly and nodded.
"I saw," he said. "Um! And if I did lend you the money for the rent, Mrs. Perris, you'd be no better off than before. You'd—"
Rhoda interrupted him with a quick turn of her head.
"Wait a bit, Mr. Taffendale," she exclaimed. "I said I'd ask you to lend the money to me, not to Perris. I've considered matters. I've been considering all day long. I've talked matters over with Mr. Marriner, the minister. It was Mr. Marriner advised me to come to you. He wrote me this letter to give to you. Perhaps you'll read it, Mr. Taffendale." Taffendale took the note which Rhoda held out to him, and read its contents carelessly.
"Yes," he said, laying the note on the table, "I know Mr. Marriner, of course. But supposing I lend you this money, Mrs. Perris, what are you going to do afterwards?—after the rent-day, I mean?"
Rhoda involuntarily straightened her figure, and Taffendale, covertly watching her, gained an impression of strength and purpose.
"Do?" she exclaimed. "Do? I know what I'd do, Mr. Taffendale. I'd keep a tight hand on Perris. I said—I've been considering matters all day, and I've explained my notions to Mr. Marriner. That Cherry-trees farm can be made to pay, and I can make it pay—if only I'm master! If I'd had the management of the money it would have been paying now, and there'd have been no need to ask help from anybody. Once let me get that rent paid, and perhaps have a bit of money to go on with, and then I shall have Perris under my thumb, and there I'll keep him. Oh, he's a good farmer, and a good worker, is Perris, so long as he's made to work, and I can make him. I made him work like a nigger to-day, I can assure you, Mr. Taffendale."
Taffendale laughed delightedly. His neighbour's wife was beginning to amuse, as well as interest, him.
"How?" he asked.
"I told him if there wasn't so much work done by dinner-time there'd be no dinner," answered Rhoda, with a flash of her grey eyes and her white teeth; "and if there wasn't so much more done by supper-time there'd be no supper. He worked right enough, did Perris, after that, for he knew I meant what I said. But that's Perris all over. He wants a master. Let me get the chance, and I'll master him: I'll keep him at it till he's made that farm pay, or I'll know why. He's weak, is Perris, and he's let things slide, and I was that silly that I didn't see how it was all going. But I see now, and I see how I can right 'em. It's never too late to mend, Mr. Taffendale."
Taffendale laughed again. He had risen from his chair, and, hands plunged in his breeches pockets, was standing at an angle of the fire-place, looking down at his visitor with the amused eyes of a man to whom something new and entertaining is presented. And suddenly he blurted out the thought that was in his mind.
"However came a woman like you to marry a man like Perris?" he exclaimed. "How was it?"
Rhoda looked quickly up and met his inquiring gaze with eyes of childlike candour.
"Well, you see, Mr. Taffendale, it was like this," she answered. "My poor father, he had the foolishness to have a very big family—there's eleven of us, all alive, and I was the eldest of the lot. And he's naught but a little farmer, and, as you know, Mr. Taffendale, little farmers is sore put to it to make ends meet, and to scratch a living, at the best of times; and, of course, when there's a family as big as that you can guess what it's like—shameful, I call it, for folk to have such families! However, that's neither here nor there—eleven of us there was, and eight of us girls, which made it all the worse; and, of course, it was about all we could do to scrape along And then when I grew up it came to it that the older ones had to go out to work. And what can such-like as we do, Mr. Taffendale? We never had any education, except such as there was at the village school, so there was naught for it but going to service. Well, I was in service at the Squire's for three or four years, and I didn't like it because I wanted to be my own mistress—I've a good deal of pride about me, Mr. Taffendale. And then when I was nineteen, Perris yonder came along, and he said he'd taken this Cherry-trees farm at Martinsthorpe here, and he'd five hundred pounds in the bank, and he wanted a wife, and—and so, well, I married him, Mr. Taffendale. That's how it was."
Taffendale, who had watched Rhoda closely while she gave him this history of her career, nodded his head.
"Aye, I see, I see," he said. "You've never had any children?"
Rhoda, who had kept her eyes fixed on his while she talked, turned them swiftly away, and he saw a curious flicker play for an instant around the corner of her lips.
"No," she answered quietly. "We've had no children, Mr. Taffendale."
Taffendale took his hands out of his pockets and his pipe out of his mouth, and moved across the room to an old bureau which stood, filled with books and papers, in one corner. He sat down, turning the papers over.
"Let's
