The Buccaneer Farmer - Harold Bindloss
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THE BUCCANEER FARMER
BY HAROLD BINDLOSS
1918
PUBLISHED IN ENGLAND UNDER THE TITLE "ASKEW'S VICTORY"
CONTENTS
PART I--AT ASHNESS
CHAPTER
I THE LEASE
II THE OTTER HOUNDS
III A COUNCIL OF DEFENSE
IV THE PEAT CUTTERS
V RAILTON'S TALLY
VI BLEATARN GHYLL
VII THE RECKONING
VIII GRACE FINDS A WAY
IX THE PLAN WORKS
X JANET MEDDLES
XI OSBORN'S PRIDE GETS HURT
XII OSBORN INTERFERES
PART II--ON THE CARIBBEAN
I THE OLD BUCCANEER
II THE PRESIDIO
III THE GOLD ONZA
IV THE PRESIDENT'S BALL
V OLSEN'S OFFER
VI THE PRESIDENT'S WATCHERS
VII ADAM RESUMES CONTROL
VIII THE MANGROVE SWAMP
IX ADAM'S LAST REQUEST
X THE ROAD TO THE MISSION
XI KIT KEEPS HIS PROMISE
XII THE LAST CARGO
PART III--KIT'S RETURN
I KIT'S WELCOME
II A DANGEROUS TALENT
III THE HORSE SHOW
IV THE FLOOD
V KIT TELLS A STORY
VI THORN MAKES A PLAN
VII GERALD'S RETURN
VIII GRACE'S CONFIDENCE
IX KIT GOES TO THE RESCUE
X GRACE'S CHOICE
XI OSBORN'S SURRENDER
PART I--AT ASHNESS
CHAPTER I
THE LEASE
The morning was bright after heavy rain, and when Osborn looked out of
the library window a warm, south-west breeze shook the larches about
Tarnside Hall. Now and then a shadow sped across the tarn, darkening the
ripples that sparkled like silver when the cloud drove on. Osborn
frowned, for he had meant to go fishing and it was a morning when the
big, shy trout would rise. His game-keeper was waiting at the boathouse,
but the postman had brought some letters that made him put off his sport.
This was annoying, because Osborn hated to be balked and seldom allowed
anything to interfere with his amusements. One letter, from a housemaster
at a famous public school, covered a number of bills, which, the writer
stated somewhat curtly, ought to have been paid. Another announced that
Hayes, the agent for the estate, and a tenant would wait upon Osborn, who
knew what they meant to talk about. He admitted that a landlord had
duties, but his generally demanded attention at an inconvenient time.
Osborn was fifty years of age. He had a ruddy skin and well-proportioned
figure, and was, physically, a rather fine example of the sporting
country gentleman. For all that, there were lines on his forehead and
wrinkles about his eyes; his mouth was loose and sensual, and something
about him hinted at indulgence. His manner, as a rule, was abrupt and
often overbearing.
The library was spacious, the furniture in good taste but getting shabby.
In fact, a certain look of age and shabbiness was typical of the house.
Although the windows were open, the room had a damp smell, and the rows
of books that Osborn never read were touched with mildew. Rain was
plentiful in the north-country dale, coal was dear, and Mrs. Osborn was
forced to study economy, partly because her husband would not.
By and by Osborn turned his glance from the window and fixed it on his
son, who stood waiting across the big oak table. Gerald was a handsome
lad, like his father, but marked by a certain refinement and a hint of
delicacy. Although he felt anxious, his pose was free and graceful and
his look undisturbed. Osborn threw the bills on the table.
"This kind of thing must stop," he said. "I haven't grumbled much,
perhaps not as much as I ought, about your extravagance, but only a fool
imagines he can spend more than he has got."
"We have had such fools in our family," the boy remarked, and stopped
when he saw Osborn's color rise.
"It's a pity it's true," the latter agreed, with a patience he did not
often use. "I'm paying for it now and you will pay a higher price, if you
go on as you promise. You must pull up; I've done enough and am getting
tired of self-denial."
Gerald's smile faded. He had inherited his extravagance from his father,
but felt he must be cautious, although Osborn sometimes showed him a
forbearance he used to nobody else.
"I'm sorry, sir," he said. "Perhaps I was extravagant, but if you don't
want to be an outsider, you must do like the rest, and I understood you
expected me to make friends among our own set. We can't be shabby."
He struck the right note, for Osborn was not clever and perhaps his
strongest characteristic was his exaggerated family pride.
"You had enough and I paid your debts not long since," he said. "In fact,
you have had more than your share, with the consequence that Grace gets
less than hers." He knitted his brows as he indicated the house-master's
curt letter. "Then, you have given a stranger an opportunity for writing
to me like this."
Gerald, knowing his father's humor, saw he was getting on
dangerous ground.
"Brown's a dry old prig, sir. Nothing sporting about him; he's hardly a
gentleman."
Osborn was seldom logical and now his annoyance was rather concentrated
on the master who had written to him with jarring frankness than on the
extravagant lad.
"His letter implies it," he agreed and then pulled himself up. Gerald was
clever and no doubt meant to divert his thoughts. "After all, this
doesn't matter," he went on. "I'll pay these bills, but if you get into
debt at Woolwich, you had better not come home. I have enough trouble
about money, and your allowance is going to be a strain. There's another
thing: Carter, who hasn't had your advantages, got in as a prize cadet."
Gerald smiled. "He hasn't got his commission. Old Harry means well, but
he's not our sort, and these plodding, cramming fellows seldom make good
officers."
"An officer must pay his mess bills, whether he's good or bad," Osborn
rejoined. "If you go into the Horse Artillery, there won't be much money
left when you have settled yours, so it might be prudent to begin some
self-denial now. Anyhow, if you get into debt again, you know the
consequences."
He raised his hand in dismissal and walked to the window when the lad
went out. He had not taken the line he meant to take, but Gerald
often, so to speak, eluded him. The lad had a way of hinting that they
understood one another and Osborn vaguely suspected that he worked
upon his prejudices; but he was a sportsman. He had pluck and knew
what the Osborn traditions demanded. In fact, Gerald might go far, if
he went straight.
Then Osborn thought he needed a drink, and after ringing a bell he sat
down by the window with the tray and glass a servant brought. It was
significant that he had given no order; the servants knew what the bell
meant. When he had drained the glass he vacantly looked out. Boggy
pasture and stony cornfields ran back from the tarn. Here and there a
white farmstead, surrounded by stunted trees, stood at the hill foot;
farther back a waterfall seamed the rocks and yellow grass with threads
of foam; and then a lofty moor, red with heather, shut off the view.
The land was poor at the dale head, but there was better below, where the
hills dropped down to the flat country, and, with the exception of
Ashness farm, all was Osborn's, from Force Crag, where the beck plunged
from the moor, to the rich bottoms round Allerby mill. Unfortunately, the
estate was encumbered when he inherited it, and he had paid off one
mortgage by raising another. He might perhaps have used other means,
letting his sporting rights and using economy, but this would have
jarred. The only Osborn who bothered about money was his wife, and Alice
was parsimonious enough for both. Money was certainly what his agent
called tight; but as long as he could give his friends some shooting and
a good dinner and live as an Osborn ought to live, he was satisfied.
Still, Gerald must have his chance at Woolwich and this needed thought.
Osborn felt he would like another drink, but glanced at his watch and saw
that his visitors would arrive in a few minutes.
They were punctual and Osborn got up when his agent and another man came
in. Hayes was tall, urbane, and dressed with rather fastidious neatness;
Bell was round-shouldered and shabby. He had a weather-beaten skin, gray
hair, and small, cunning eyes. Osborn indicated chairs and sat down at
the top of the big table. He disliked business and knew the others meant
to persuade him to do something he would sooner leave alone. This would
have been impossible had he not needed money.
"Mr. Bell wishes to know if his tender for the Slate Company's haulage
is approved," Hayes began. "His traction engine is suited for the work
and he is prepared to buy a trailer lurry, which we would find useful
in the dale. Mechanical transport would be a public advantage on our
hilly roads."
"It needs a good horse to bring half a load from station," Bell
interposed. "T'lurry would move as much in yan day as farmers'
carts in four."
Osborn agreed. He was not much of an economist, but it was obvious that
time and labor were wasted when a farmer took a few sacks of potatoes to
the railway and another a sack of wool. There was no difficulty about the
tender, because Osborn was chairman of the small Slate Company; the
trouble was that the contract would help Bell to carry out another plan.
The fellow was greedy, and was getting a rather dangerous control; he had
already a lease of the limekilns and Allerby mill. But his rents were
regularly paid, and it was an advantage to deal with one prosperous
tenant instead of several who had not his punctuality and capital.
"The trailer would be useful if you decided to make the new terrace you
thought about," Hayes suggested. "The cost of carting the gravel and the
slabs for the wall would be heavy; but I have no doubt Mr. Bell would
undertake the work with the trailer on very reasonable terms."
"I might forget to send in t' bill. Yan good turn deserves another,"
Bell remarked.
Hayes frowned. He had meant to imply something like this, but Bell was
too blunt. For all that, Osborn was not very fastidious and had long
meant to make the terrace when funds permitted. In fact, he hardly saw
the thing as a bribe; it was rather a graceful recognition of his
authority.
"Very well," he said, "I'll sign the contract."
"There is another matter," Hayes resumed. "Mr. Bell is willing to take up
Harkness' tenancy of the coal yard and seed store at the station. He
hopes you will grant him a long lease."
Osborn pondered. Harkness had been drunken, careless, and often behind
with his rent. He had let his business fall away and it was understood
that Bell, who managed the opposition coal yard, had lent him small sums
and until recently kept him on his feet. This was not because Bell was
charitable, but because if Harkness came down while he had any trade
left, a capable rival might take his place. In the meantime, his
customers gradually went to Bell, and now Harkness had failed there was
no business to attract a newcomer.
"I don't know," said Osborn, "I had thought of advertising the yard
and store."
"You'll get nobody to pay what I'm offering," Bell replied. "A stranger
would want to see Harkness' books and there's nowt in them as would tempt
him to pay a decent rent. Then, with trailer going back from station, I
could beat him on the haulage up the dale. He'd niver get his money back
if he bowt an engine like mine."
This was plausible, but Osborn hesitated. He saw that Bell wanted a
monopoly and had a vague notion that he ought to protect his tenants.
"It's sometimes an advantage to have two traders in a place," he
remarked. "A certain amount of competition is healthy."
"I don't know if it would be an advantage to the estate, and imagine you
would not get a tenant to pay what Bell offers," Hayes replied. "Besides,
rival traders sometimes agree to keep up prices, and competition does not
always make things cheap."
"That's one of the ridiculous arguments people who want the Government to
manage everything sometimes use," said Osborn with a scornful gesture.
Hayes smiled, "It is very well known that I am not an advocate of State
ownership. All the same, unnecessary competition would be wasteful in the
dale. For example, if you have two tenants at the station, the farmers
who deal with the new man must use their carts, each coming separately
for the small load a horse can take up Redmire bank, while Bell's
trailer, after bringing down the slate, would go back empty. Then I hear
some talk about a fresh appeal to the council to make the loop road round
the hill."
For a moment or two Osborn did not answer. Redmire bank was an obstacle
to horse traffic, and the road surveyor had plans for easing the gradient
that would necessitate cutting down a wood where Osborn's pheasants found
shelter. He had refused permission, and the matter had been dropped; but,
if the farmers insisted, the council might be forced to use their powers.
He was obstinate, and did not mean to let them have the wood unless he
could get his price.
"You know my opinion about that?" he said.
"Yes," said Hayes; "I imagine it would be prudent not to have the matter
brought up. However, if Bell can send back his lurry full, the economy is
plain. It will enable him to sell his coal and seed at a moderate price
and pay a higher rent."
"That's so," Osborn agreed, and knitted his brows.
He doubted if Bell would give his customers the benefit of the cheaper
haulage, but the advantage of getting a higher rent was obvious. Osborn
knew he was being persuaded to do a shabby thing and hesitated. Money,
however, was needed and must be got.
"Very well," he said, "Mr. Bell can have the lease."
They talked about something else, and when Osborn went fishing after the
others left the wind had dropped, the sun was bright, and the trout would
not rise. He felt rather injured, because he had paid for his attention
to duty, when he joined his wife and daughter at tea on the lawn.
A copper beech threw a cool shadow across the small table and basket
chairs; the china and silver were old and good. Beyond the belt of
wavering shade, the recently mown grass gave out a moist smell in the hot
sun. The grass grew fine and close, for the turf was old, but there were
patches of ugly weeds. The borders by the house were thinly planted and
the color plan was rude, but one could not do much with a rheumatic
gardener and a boy. There used to be two men, but Mrs. Osborn had
insisted on cutting wages down.
Across the yew hedge, the tarn sparkled like a mirror and on its farther
side, where a clump of dark pines overhung a beach of silver sand, the
hillslopes shone with yellow grass, relieved by the green of fern and
belts of moss. The spot was picturesque; the old house, with its low,
straight front and mullioned windows, round which creepers grew, had a
touch of quiet beauty. Osborn was proud of Tarnside, although he
sometimes chafed because he had not enough money to care for it as he
ought.
By and by he glanced at his wife, who had silently filled the cups and
was cutting cake. She was a thin, quiet woman, with a hint of reserve in
her delicately molded face. Sometimes she tactfully exercised a
restraining influence, but for the most part acquiesced, for she had
found out, soon after her marriage, that her husband must not be opposed.
Grace, who sat opposite, had recently come home from school, and was
marked by an independence somewhat unusual at Tarnside. She argued
with Osborn and was firm when he got angry. Then she had a fresh
enthusiasm for change and improvement and a generous faith in what she
thought was good. Since Osborn was obstinately conventional, this
sometimes led to jars.
"After all, I'm going to have the terrace made," he remarked, and waited
for his wife's approval.
"Is it prudent?" she asked hesitatingly. "If I remember, you thought the
work would cost too much when we talked about it last."
"It will cost very little. In fact, I imagine the haulage of the gravel
and the slabs for the wall will cost nothing," Osborn replied. "Bell has
promised to bring me all the stuff we'll need with his new trailer."
"Oh," said Grace, rather sharply, "I suppose this means you have given
him the lease of the station coal yard? No doubt he offered to bring the
gravel before you agreed. He's cunning and knew you wanted the terrace."
"I can't remember if he offered before or afterwards," Osborn replied,
with a touch of embarrassment. "Anyhow, I don't think it's important,
because I did not allow his offer to persuade me. For all that, it's some
satisfaction to get the work done cheap."
Grace pondered. She was intelligent; contact with her school companions
had developed her character, and she had begun to understand Osborn since
she came home. She knew he was easily deceived and sometimes
half-consciously deceived himself.
"No," she said, "I don't think the work will really be cheap. It's often
expensive to take a favor from a man like Bell. He will find a means of
making you pay."
"Ridiculous! Bell can't make me pay."
"Then he will make somebody else pay for what he does for you, and it's
hardly honest to let him," Grace insisted.
Mrs. Osborn gave her a warning glance and Osborn's face got red.
"It's a new thing for a young girl to criticize her father. This is what
comes of indulging your mother and making some sacrifice to send you to
an expensive modern school! If I'd had my way, you would have gone to
another, where they teach the old-fashioned virtues: modesty, obedience,
and respect for parents."
Grace smiled, because she knew the school Osborn meant and the type it
produced. She was grateful to her mother for a better start.
"I'm sorry," she said quietly, but with a hint of resolution. "I
don't want to criticize, but Bell is greedy and cunning, and now he
has got both coal yards will charge the farmers more than he ought.
He has already got too large a share of all the business that is done
in the dale."
"It's obvious that you have learned less than you think," Osborn
rejoined, feeling that he was on safer ground. "You don't seem to
understand that concentration means economy. Bell, for example, buys and
stores his goods in large quantities, instead of handling a number of
small lots at different times, which would cost him more."
"I can see that," Grace admitted, "But I imagine he will keep all he
saves. You know the farmers are grumbling about his charges."
Osborn frowned. "You talk too much to the farm people; I don't like it.
You can be polite, but I want you to remember they are my tenants, and
not to sympathize with their imaginary grievances. They're a grumbling
lot, but will keep their places if you leave them alone."
He got up abruptly and when he went off across the lawn Mrs. Osborn gave
the girl a reproachful glance.
"You are very rash, my dear. On the whole, your father was
remarkably patient."
Grace laughed, a rather strained laugh, as Osborn's angry voice rose from
behind a shrubbery.
"He isn't patient now, and I'm afraid Jackson is paying for my fault.
However, I really think I was patient, too. To talk about people keeping
their places is ridiculous; in fact, it's piffle! Father's notions are
horribly out of date. One wonders he doesn't know."
"Things change. Perhaps we don't quite realize this when we are getting
old. But you mustn't argue with your father. He doesn't like it, and when
he's annoyed everybody suffers."
"It's true; but how illogical!" Grace remarked, and mused while she
looked dreamily across the grass.
She was romantic and generous, and had learned something about social
economy at the famous school; in fact, Osborn would have been startled
had he suspected how much she knew. Nevertheless, she was young; her
studies were half digested, and her theories crude. She had come home
with a vague notion of playing the part of Lady Bountiful and putting
things right, but had got a jar soon after she began. Her father's idea
of justice was elementary: he resented her meddling, and was sometimes
tyrannical. When it was obvious that he had taken an improper line he
blamed his agent; but perhaps the worst was he seldom knew when he was
wrong. Then the agent's main object was to extort as much money from the
tenants as possible.
Grace did not see what she could do, although she felt that something
ought to be done. She had a raw, undisciplined enthusiasm, and imagined
that she was somehow responsible. Yet when she tried to use some
influence her father got savage and she felt hurt. Well, she must try to
be patient and tactful. While she meditated, Mrs. Osborn got up, and they
went back to the house.
CHAPTER II
THE OTTER HOUNDS
Grace's tweed dress was wet and rather muddy when she stood with Gerald
on a gravel bank at the head of a pool, where the beck from the tarn
joined a larger stream that flowed through a neighboring dale. There had
been some rain and the water was stained a warm claret-color by the peat.
Bright sunshine pierced the tossing alder branches, and the rapid close
by sparkled between belts of moving shade. Large white dogs with black
and yellow spots swam uncertainly about the pool and searched the bank; a
group of men stood in the rapid, while another group watched the tail of
the pool. Somewhere between them a hard-pressed otter hid.
A few of the men wore red coats and belonged to the hunt; the rest were
shepherds and farmers whom custom entitled to join in the sport. All
carried long iron-pointed poles and waited with keen expectation the
reappearance of the otter. Grace was perhaps the only one to feel a touch
of pity for the exhausted animal and she wondered whether this was not a
sentimental weakness. There was not much to be said for the otter's right
to live; it was stealthy, cruel, and horribly destructive, killing many
more fish and moorhens than it could eat. Indeed, before she went to
school, she had followed the hunt with pleasant excitement, and was now
rather surprised to find the sport had lost its zest.
The odds against the otter were too great, although it had for some hours
baffled men who knew the river, and well-trained dogs. It had stolen up
shallow rapids, slipping between the watchers' legs, dived under swimming
dogs, made bold dashes along the bank, and hidden in belts of reeds. Its
capture had often looked certain and yet it had escaped. At first Grace
had noticed the animal's confidence, beauty of form, and strength; but it
had gradually got slack, hesitating, and limp. Now, when it lurked,
half-drowned, in the depths of the pool while its pitiless enemies waited
for it to come up to breathe, she began to wish it would get away.
Thorn, the master of the hounds, was talking to his huntsman not far
off. He was a friend of Osborn's, and Grace had once thought him a
dashing and accomplished man of the world, but had recently, for no
obvious reason, felt antagonistic. Alan was not as clever as she had
imagined; he was smart, sometimes cheaply smart, which was another
thing. Then he was beginning to get fat, and she vaguely shrank from the
way he now and then looked at her. On the whole, it was a relief to note
that he was occupied.
For a few moments Grace let her eyes wander up the dale to the crags
where the force leaped down from the red moor at Malton Head. Belts of
dry bent-grass shone like gold and mossy patches glimmered luminously
green. The fall looked like white lace drawn across the stones. A streak
of mist touched the lofty crag, and above it a soft white cloud trailed
across the sky. Then she turned as her brother spoke.
"Alan has given us a good hunt and means to make a kill. He's rather a
selfish beast and a bit too sure of himself; but he runs the pack well
and knows how to get the best out of life. No Woolwich and sweating as a
snubbed subaltern for him! He stopped at home, saw his tenants farmed
well, and shot his game. That's my notion of a country gentleman!"
"Father can look after Tarnside and a duty goes with owning land,"
Grace remarked. "A landlord who need not work ought to serve the State.
That idea was perhaps the best thing in the feudal system and it's not
altogether forgotten yet. Father was right when he decided to make you
a soldier."
"He can send me to Woolwich, but after all that's as far as he can go.
You're not at your best when you're improving," Gerald rejoined; and
added with a grin, "You don't like old Alan, do you? I thought you
snubbed him half an hour since."
Grace colored, but did not answer. She had hurt her foot by falling from
a mossy boulder and Thorn had come to help as she floundered across a
shallow pool. She was draggled and her hair was loose, and Thorn's faint
amusement annoyed her. Somehow it hinted at familiarity. She would not
have resented it once, for they had been friends; but when she came home
and he had tried to renew the friendship she had noted a subtle
difference. Alan was forty, but now she had left school the disparity of
their ages was, in a sense, much less marked. Then a shout roused her and
she looked round.