THE LITTLE JACK

AT THE HANYARDS STAFFORDSHIRE August 9th, 1757

Margaret and I had a hot dispute this morning. True she went away, singing happily, to rebuild the masses of yellow hair that had fallen all over her shoulders and mine, for the dreadful stuff seems to tumble down if I look at it, but still we had disputed, and vigorously, too. The plain fact is she had sniffed at Aristotle.

The trouble arose out of this story of mine which I have been busy writing for the last twenty months. It has been hard work, for I was new to the business, and had to learn how to do it, but it has been a pleasant task and a labour of love. Now we disputed about it. I said it was finished. She said it wasn't. I said I ought to know. She replied not necessarily, since I was such a great goose. Then I loaded my big gun and thought to blow her clean out of the water.

"My dear Margaret," said I, "Aristotle lays it down that every work of art has a beginning, a middle, and an end. The beginning of our story was the catching of the great jack, the middle of it was the fight at the 'Red Bull,' and the end of it was the kiss you gave me. You see, dear, how exactly I have done what Aristotle says I ought to do."

"Bother Aristotle! What does he know about us?" It was here that she sniffed, not figuratively but actually. That is to say she held up her nose, on pretence of looking at me, and audibly ... well, sniffed. There's no other word for it. Then she cried triumphantly, "What is the use, Noll, of telling our story and not saying a single word about the most important people in it?"

To this question I made no reply. I was beaten. Aristotle, had he been in my place, would have been beaten too. If we had been in town I would have run round to Mr. Johnson's and asked him to assist me, but I feel sure he would have been as helpless as I was. There was no reply, so I contented myself with playing with her gorgeous hair till it was all a-tumble to the floor.

Bother Aristotle! I must do as Margaret bids.

The Colonel and Master Freake were in the house-place when, at last, that memorable Christmas Eve, I proudly took my Margaret there.

"Sir," said I to the former, before he had ceased his hearty handshake, "I love Margaret dearly and Margaret loves me. May we be married?"

"You young dog! What d'ye say to that, John?" he said.

"Nothing is nearer to my heart," said the great merchant of London, giving me his hand in turn.

"Nor to mine, so that settles it," cried the Colonel, fishing out his snuff-box, while I led Margaret up to mother.

We spent a happy Christmas as lovers, and were married on New Year's Day by the vicar.

Jack and Kate were married in the spring, by which time he was as well and strong as ever. For years I feared lest his severe wound should have left some permanent source of weakness, but happily my fears were ill-founded. Jack, having had enough of soldiering, took to business at Master Freake's suggestion. He has developed all his father's shrewdness while retaining all his own boyish charm. He is now Master Freake's right hand, in the great London house of Freake & Dobson. Kate is Kate still, ardent, busy, level-headed, and loving, and the happy mother of three girls and a boy. Jack and I are as twins to one another.

In the summer after our wedding, Margaret and I went our journey over again. We saw Cherry-Cheeks, and made sure that Sim should have not only a good wife but a good business of his own to keep her on. We found out sweet Nance Lousely, and filled her pinner full of guineas after all, and left her tearful and happy. We knelt together by a simple grave in the Catholic burial-ground at Leek, and on the top of Shap we stood, with tears in our eyes, beside the great stone that marked the resting-place of Donald and his chief.

I did become a Parliament man, as Master Faneuil had said I should, and am a strong supporter of Mr. Pitt. We spend part of each year in London, where the Marquess is our great friend. He married the nabobess after all, and she loved him well enough to make it her business to reform him. He vows she is the finest woman in England, with a head on her shoulders as good as Mr. Freake's. She makes a good marchioness, too, for she always had sense, and has developed dignity.

But most of our time we spend at the Hanyards, which I have made into a fine house by careful changes. Master Joe Braggs and Mistress Jane Braggs are our loyal, willing servants and our friends, and are as happy as sandboys together. They have now quite a large family.

To-day we are all together again for a long stay at the Hanyards. The Archdeacon of Lichfield, once our beloved vicar, is with us, simple, fatherly, and learned as of old. I can see his white head when I lift mine up from my writing. He is sunning himself in the garden and talking with mother, who turns her eyes now and again to look at the road, for Kate and Jack are coming in from Stafford with their children.

All these are familiar names, but it is fit that the record should be given before I go back to Margaret's sniff at Aristotle. For while I was busying myself with her hair, who should come in sight, walking through the orchard from the river, but the Colonel and Master Freake. They stopped to join mother and the Archdeacon in their talk, and we, looking at them, were proud and happy in the knowledge of their love for us.

Then there was a great clatter and chattering and excited shouting without. Margaret had left the door of my study open, and in raced the most important people in our story. They had a tale too big for coherent talk, and they gabbled away, one after the other or both together, to tell us all about it.

It was Oliver who had done it. He held up with a pride that made him splutter a little jack about fourteen inches long, which he had just caught. They say he is his father over again. At any rate, he will fish morning, noon, and night, if he can coax one of us elders to go with him to take care of him.

There he stood, the fish dangling at arm's length, telling his mother exactly how he had done it. I do not pretend to be impartial, but a finer boy than mine is not to be found. He drops the fish to the floor to rush into his mother's arms to be kissed and praised.

I am busy, too; busy as I love best of all to be. For on my knee, her arms round my neck and her great mane of glorious wheat-coloured hair tickling my face, is the dearest little creature on God's earth, my other Margaret. If you want to see me when I am intensely proud and happy, you must see me with her at my side walking in the Park or down the Green Gate at Stafford, with all eyes turning on her because of her surpassing childish beauty.

"I helped him catch it, daddy," she says, lifting up her face to be kissed.

So does history repeat itself, and it is settled at once that Noll's jack is to be put by Master Whatcot in the same case as dad's, for all the world to know that he is as good a fisherman as his father before him. Joe is to send it to Stafford at once, and the two rush off eagerly to give it to him, leaving us alone.

To the glowing beauty of her maidenhood Margaret has added the serene beauty of motherhood. That is all the change I can see in her, as I put my arms round her and draw her to me.

When she could speak she said happily, "Well done fisherman!"