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Updated: May 23, 2025
"Do you think Melisse would do something for you if you asked her?" I inquired. Benjy seemed hurt. "Marse Dave " he began reproachfully. "Very well, then," I interrupted, taking the letter from my pocket, "there is a lady who is ill here, Mrs. Clive " I paused, for a new look had come into Benjy's eyes.
Even as she looked, a chink of light came from his front door, which immediately enlarged itself into a full oblong. Then it went completely out. So he is expected." Miss Mapp did not at once guess that she held in her hand the key to the mystery. It was certainly Major Benjy's night for going to bed early.... Then a fierce illumination beat on her brain.
Class amusements, be they for dukes or ploughboys, always become nuisances and curses to a country. The true charm of cricket and hunting is that they are still more or less sociable and universal; there's a place for every man who will come and take his part. No one in the village enjoyed the approach of "veast day" more than Tom, in the year in which he was taken under old Benjy's tutelage.
Festus and the rest had by this time reached Uncle Benjy's door, which they were discomfited and astonished to find closed. They began to knock, and then to kick at the venerable timber, till the old man's head, crowned with a tasselled nightcap, appeared at an upper window, followed by his shoulders, with apparently nothing on but his shirt, though it was in truth a sheet thrown over his coat.
Once or twice, in order to see what the night was like, she had gone to the window of the garden-room, and been aware that there was a light in Major Benjy's house, but when half-past ten struck, she had despaired of company and gone to bed. A little carol-singing in the streets gave her a Christmas feeling, and she hoped that the singers got a nice supper somewhere.
So I says to his mother, 'I s'pose he's clever? for dang it! thinks I, he must be clever to make up for being so plain-featured as all that. 'Benjy' she'd a-called him Benjamin after me 'Benjy's the cleverest child for his age that ever you see, she says. There's a sojer now passin' the window. Make a rhyme 'pon he, and you shall have the money. What d'ye think that ghastly boy did?
Charity had appealed against old Benjy in the meantime, representing the dangers of the canal banks; but Mrs. Brown, seeing the boy's inaptitude for female guidance, had decided in Benjy's favour, and from thenceforth the old man was Tom's dry nurse. And as they sat by the canal watching their little green-and-white float, Benjy would instruct him in the doings of deceased Browns.
Never was wilder disorder of wedding-presents, and not one lost! owing, you'll own, to Uncle Benjy's two bottles of ancient Jamaica rum." Colonel De Craye concluded with an asseveration of the truth of the story. "A most provident, far-sighted old sea-captain!" exclaimed Mrs. Mountstuart, laughing at Lady Busshe and Lady Culmer. These ladies chimed in with her gingerly.
Another opening, however, again revealed it fully to view! It was a swan a hyperborean wild swan! Just as he made this discovery, the great bird, having observed Benjy, spread its enormous wings and made off with an amazing splutter. Bang! went Benjy's gun, both barrels in quick succession, and down fell the swan quite dead, with its head in the water and its feet pointing to the sky.
'If he only knew what he was sitting upon, she thought apprehensively, 'how easily he could tear up the flap, lock and all, with his strong arm, and seize upon poor Uncle Benjy's possessions! But he did not appear to know, unless he were acting, which was just possible. After a while he rose, and going to the table lifted the candle to light his pipe.
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