The Slowcoach

CHAPTER 21

COLLINS'S PEOPLE

They resumed their journey the next morning, a little depressed in spirits, for the end was so near. It was now Monday, and they had to be home again—that is to say, in their home without wheels—to-morrow night, and the thought was not exhilarating. Moreover, as Robert's compass only too plainly showed, they were now for the first time since they started moving due east, or towards Chiswick, instead of away from it, as theretofore.

Holidays of a fortnight always go faster in the second week than the first; but the last two days absolutely fly.

They were now bound for Faringdon through Fairford; and the night—the last night—was to be spent, if possible, on the farm of Collins's brother, near Lechlade.

At Fairford they had their lunch and explored the church, which is one of the most remarkable in England. It was built, they learned from Robert's "Road Book," by a rich merchant in the reign of Henry VII. named John Tame. Being something of a privateer too, he had the good fortune to capture a vessel on its way from Belgium to Italy laden with stained glass, and, having secured this booty, he erected the church in order to make use of it.

Horace admired this story immensely, and set John Tame with his other heroes—Raffles and Robin Hood—forthwith.

Then came the hunt for Lycett's Farm, where Collins's people now lived, of which they knew no more than that Lechlade was the postal address. It might be this side of Lechlade, and it might be far on the other. Collins had had the map placed before her, but could make nothing of it. (Cooks never can read maps.)

After about two miles out of Fairford Robert began to ask. There were no people on the road—indeed, one of the things that they had noticed throughout their travels was how few persons were to be met; and they had therefore to knock at a door here and there, or approach labourers in the fields. Their ignorance of the name either of Lycett's or of Collins was amazing.

"Never heard tell of such a place," said one.

"Not hereabouts," said another.

"Collins?" said a third. "There's a stone-mason of that name over at Highworth; but I don't know of no farmer."

"Maybe you're thinking of Sadler's," another suggested.

Robert, who was getting testy, asked why. "Sadler's doesn't sound a bit either like Collins or Lycett's," he said.

"No," the man agreed, "it doesn't."

But at last a butcher's boy on a bicycle came along, and Janet stopped him.

"Lycett's?" he said. Then he brightened. "Lickets, perhaps you mean. That's up the next turning to the left. I don't know who's got it, because I'm a stranger here, but I've heard that Lickets lies that way."

So Robert was recalled from a distant meadow where he had seen a man working, and they hurried on.

The turning was not a main road, but a long lane, which was so narrow that nothing else could possibly have passed by had they met anything; and for a while nothing did come. And then suddenly at a bend there was a fat farmer driving a dogcart straight at them.

He pulled up at once, and roared out: "Where be you coming to, then? We don't want no gipsies here."

Kink stopped too, and the farmer and he glared at each other.

"You must back down to the next gate," said the farmer.

"Back yourself," said Kink. "Your load's lighter than mine."

"But it's my land you're on," said the farmer.

"It's a public road," said Kink.

It looked as though they might stay there for ever, but suddenly the farmer began to laugh. "Why, you're not gipsies," he said. "I believe you're Avories."

"That's so," said Kink.

"Well, I'm blessed!" the farmer cried. "And to think we should be falling out when I've been waiting to see you these many days! My name's Pescod. My halfsister's your cook."

Mr. Pescod climbed out of his cart and shook hands with all the children. "Now I'll turn," he said, with a smile to Kink, and he led his horse up the lane, talking all the while, while the Slowcoach followed. They told him about their difficulty in finding any trace of him, and he called Collins a donkey for not directing them better, and forgetting to say that her name and his were different.

"Never mind," he said; "here you are at last. We've been looking out for you for a long time. My missis never hears wheels nowadays but what she runs to the door to see if it's you."

Lycett's farm was a long, low, white house with a yew hedge leading from the garden gate to the front door. This hedge, of which Collins had told them, was famous in the neighbourhood; for it was enormously old, and as thick almost as masonry, and it was kept so carefully clipped that it was as smooth also as a wall. At the gate itself the yews were cut into tall pillars with a pheasant at the top of each, and then there were smaller pillars at intervals all the way up the path, about twenty yards, with a thick joining band of yew between them. They were so massive that very little light could get into the front windows or the doorway; but, as Mr. Pescod said, "anyone can have light, few yew hedges like that in the world."

Mrs. Pescod was a comfortable, smiling woman whose one idea was that everyone must either be hungry or in need of feeding up. All of the children in turn she looked at anxiously, saying that she was sure that they had not had enough to eat. As a matter of fact, they had not perhaps eaten as much as they would have done at Chiswick, and they had, of course, worked harder; but they were all very well, and said so. But it made no difference to Mrs. Pescod.

"Ah, my dear," she said to Janet, "you're pale. I shouldn't like you to go back to your ma looking like that. No, while you're here you must have three good meals. A good tea, and a good supper, and a good breakfast. I wish you'd stay longer, and let me have a real go at you; but if you can't, you can't, and there's an end of it."

Mrs. Pescod's notion of a good tea was terrific. Eggs for everyone to begin with (to Gregory's great pleasure, for an egg with his tea was almost his favourite treat). Freshly baked hot cakes soaking in butter. Hot toast. Three kinds of jam. Bread and butter. Watercress. Mustard and cress. This was at five o'clock, and as supper was at half-past eight, Janet urged the others to explore as much as possible, or they would have no appetite, and then Mrs. Pescod would be miserable.

It was a delightful farm. There was everything that one wants in a farm,—a pond with ducks; a haystack half cut, so that one might jump about on it; straw ricks on stone posts; cowsheds smelling so warm and friendly, with swallows darting in and out of the doorway to their nests in the roof; stables with gentle horses who ate the green stuff you gave them without biting you; guinea-pigs, the property of Master Walter Pescod, who was a weekly boarder at Cirencester; fantail pigeons; bantams; ferrets, very frightening to everyone but Kink, who knew just how to hold them; and a turnip-slicer, which Gregory turned for some time, munching turnip all the while.

Mrs. Pescod led the girls round with her on an egg-hunt, which is always one of the most interesting expeditions in life; and Mr. Pescod, as the evening drew on, allowed the boys to accompany him with his gun to get a rabbit or two under the hedge, and he permitted Jack to fire it off. Nothing happened except that Jack was nearly knocked backwards by the "kick"; but he was very proud of the bruise, and when he returned to Chiswick showed it to his father and to William in triumph.

It was getting purple then, with green edges, and Dr. Rotheram pronounced it one of the best bruises he had ever seen. "Good enough," he said, "to have killed a lion with."

"Yes," said William, "instead of missing a rabbit."

Mrs. Pescod, of course, wanted the children to sleep indoors, but they would not. "It is our very last night in the caravan," said Janet, "and we couldn't give it up." So Mrs. Pescod instead made them promise to come to breakfast, and gave them each a large cake of her own making in case they felt hungry in the night.