CHAPTER VI

THE GOLDTRAP ARMS

“YOU were out of luck,” observed Esau Broadback, Tom’s host, or rather his horse’s host, as Tom arrived on foot on the morning after the Ecclesford Green day, with the intention of getting his horse to go home.

“Yes,” grunted Tom, with the tone of a man who doesn’t want to be questioned.

“You might get a day to-morrow,” observed Broadback, with the sagacity of an innkeeper towards his own interest. “The Stout-as-steel hounds are within reach.”

“Where are they?” inquired Tom.

“At the Bridge of Bevis Mount, about ten miles from here,” replied Broadback.

“Ten miles!” hiccuped a drunken voice, “it’s more like twenty!”

This was Tom’s friend the horse-breaker, who had been drinking ever since they parted, and had got through a half-crown Tom gave him, and several of his own to boot.

“It won’t be above fifteen, anyhow,” resumed Broadback, amending his geography.

Fifteen’s as good as fifty, in Tom’s estimation at least, in so far as sending on in the morning is concerned, and if a man has to move his horse from one country inn to another, he may as well be sociable, and go too.

It so happened that our friend Tom had a great desire to see the Stout-as-steel hounds, having heard no little of them in his early days. They were originally a miner’s pack, hunting the beautiful but hilly region so favourably known to all tourists and scenery hunters as the Kiss-sky mountains. The pack has been in existence above a century, not exactly as an advertising one, with a huntsman and whips, but a good useful cry of dogs, never under five, and sometimes as high as ten couple. After towling about the valleys, and the bases, and the middles, and the summits of the mountains, with the usual pony and pedestrian fields of “peep-o’-day packs,” they got a piece of vale country, which they gradually extended, and in the course of time came out in type, looking (upon paper) as big as the best. At length they got weaned from the view-hallos and cow-horns of the miners, and under the mastership of Tom’s late cousin, Simon Squander, who in the handsomest manner ruined himself by keeping them, they acquired considerable renown.

After his death (which took place some ten years ago, and was caused, as many of our readers will recollect, by his drinking a glass of oxalic acid in mistake for gin, being at the time rather overcome with brandy), the hounds floundered on for some time in the hands of a committee, and at length passed into those of Captain Cashbox; a gentleman who, we believe, was caught at the “Corner,” and most likely adopted on the strength of his name, though, if he was, it has turned out a failure, the captain’s talent consisting in walking into other people’s cash-boxes, and saving his own.

This little episode will explain why it was that Tom was anxious to see the Stout-as-steel hounds; an anxiety that caused him to ponder in the stable, and consider whether, now that he had got so far, he had not better go a little further, and gratify his inclination.

The meet, the bridge at Bevis Mount, sounded quite familiar to his ear, or rather, perhaps, looked quite familiar to his eyes—just as familiar as the “Devil’s Dyke” or “Telscombe Tye” of the old Brighton or Brookside harriers, look to the eye of a Sussex squire. Indeed, the column of “Hunting Appointments” is not the least interesting one in the papers, and through its medium one establishes a sort of hunting acquaintance with all the packs in the kingdom, assigning to each meet such a country as we think the name indicates, and not unfrequently indulging in an imaginary run from it. If the mesmerisers would only invent a process for taking off one’s thoughts when half asleep, we could produce some astonishing runs, far better than anything we can write.

But to our friend Tom.

Having taken a look at the map in the traveller’s room of the Lazytong Arms, and run his eye from the great greasy thumb-mark denoting the “here we are” of Dawdle Court into the intricacies of the hills, Scott saw that Bevis Mount was quite beyond distance for a morning’s start; but observing the town of Sludgington on the line, which he remembered to have heard his late cousin extol, our independent friend determined to dispense with the services of Sleekpow, and go “bags and all,” feeling that it would never do to return to Hawbuck Grange without being able to tell Mr. Neville and “their chaps” what sort of dogs either the Tear Devil or the Stout-as-steel ones were.

That point being settled, he was very soon on the back of the old mare, and after divers twistings, and turnings, and crossings, and missings, and askings, the curtailed proportions of a winter’s day found him gazing at the chubby tower of Sludgington Church.

Having cleared the toll-bar, he presently entered the town.

It consisted of one long, narrow street, formed of all sorts of houses, and cottages, and shops, and premises ranged in a most higgledy-piggledy state of confusion—a good house here, a bad one there, a dirty cottage next, a public-house after it; then a coy freestone-faced mansion, retiring within its own iron railings, followed by a smithy adjoining a cowshed. The street was one continued bed of hard, loose whinstone, whose roughness and sharpness was only relieved by a plentiful covering of cold, bleak-looking mud.

In passing along Tom could not help thinking if the old mare was to fall, what a state her knees and his clothes would be in. Fortunately no such catastrophe befell Mr. Scott, and a ragged urchin with a ladder having lighted a glow-worm sort of oil lamp, a little in advance of where he rode, he deciphered the words “Goldtrap Arms” below one of those resplendent shields that indicate the great man of the country.

In truth the sign was a perfect extinguisher on the house, making it look like a boy in a man’s hat. However, there it was, and being about the centre of the town, there was no doubt about its being the head inn, even if Tom’s friend with the ladder had not proclaimed it.

He did more, he rang the bell for the ostler.

There was no saying, if our friend was advertising in “Grandmama,” the “Sunday Times,” or any of the matrimonial mediums of communication, what compliments he might pay to his person, but in this bit of confidence with our numerous readers, we don’t care admitting that it isn’t everybody that takes Tom for a gentleman.

So on this occasion Sam Beer, the ostler, answered the summons in a way that plainly showed he thought our traveller and he were about equals—at least would be, if the latter had his Sunday clothes on, instead of a pair of rotten-looking fustian trousers, a tattered waistcoat, and a very dirty shirt. Top-boots having about devolved entirely upon fox-hunters and servants, a man perhaps may be excused not knowing “which is which,” without the red coat; at all events, Tom consoled himself with that supposition.

“Stop all night!” said Sam, laying hold of the reins, as Tom rode under the wretched low archway (filled with unwashed gigs, empty barrels, and hens) leading into the close contracted passage of a stable-yard.

“Yes,” replied Tom, adding, “You’ve room I suppose?”

“Plenty of room!” replied the man; and truly when Tom lighted on a veteran dung heap at one stable door, and saw the broken panes and gaping deals of the other, he didn’t wonder at it; and he almost wished he’d brought Sleekpow, when he saw the place, as well to relieve him from the trouble of superintendence, as to teach Sleekpow not to grumble unnecessarily in future.

Having loosened the saddle-bags and chucked them over on the far side, in the way that guards and other disinterested parties deal with luggage, Beer gave Tom the mare to hold, while he slunk into the kitchen in search of a candle.

After two unsuccessful attempts to bring it past the draught of the gateway in his hands, he had recourse to an old hat, and at last succeeded in planting it triumphantly against the wall in a holder formed of its own grease.

He then led in the old mare, and commenced the usual chilling, temper-trying fistling and fumbling of the slovenly, slatternly stableman.

We have often thought, when at places of this sort, of Nimrod’s account of the metamorphose—a pair of boot-trees turning out of his buggy, effected in the manners of the landlord and servants of an inn he drove up to in Scotland—Kelso, we think, —during his “Northern tour,” and the tip of a scarlet coat-lap peeping out of the corner of the saddle-bags, which we omitted to mention were taken into the kitchen when Beer went for the candle, operated similarly in Tom Scott’s favour.

Cornelius Cake, the landlord, having been a gentleman’s servant—a baronet’s we should say—butler to Sir Digby Goldtrap, whose arms his house bears, thought himself a judge of gentlemen; and, being struck with the cloth, came into the stable to see who had brought it.

Tom saw as plainly as if Cake said it, that he was bothered with his appearance, not knowing whether he was master or man.

He glanced first at Tom’s boots, then at his bottle-green cut-away, with bright buttons, and having carried his observations up to his hat, without having come to a satisfactory conclusion, he turned his attention to the old mare.

“Nice nag you’ve got there,” said Cake, in a careless sort of way—“could hunt a little, I should think, that nag.”

“A good deal,” replied Tom, adding, “that’s just what I keep her for.”

“Indeed!” replied Cake, with a touch of his hat, and a low bow.

“I want to see the Stout-as-steel hounds to-morrow—how far is the Bridge of Bevis Mount from here?”

“Bridge of Bevis Mount—Bridge of Bevis Mount,” muttered Cake quickly, as if he knew the place so well that he quite forgot it. “How far is the Bridge of Bevis Mount from here, Beer?” asked he of the ostler.

“Bevis M-o-u-n-t, Bevis M-o-u-n-t,” drawled the dawdler; “Bevis M-o-u-n-t?” repeated he—“W-h-o-y, it’ill be up ’mong hills, l-o-i-k-e, away by Gussingen,” wagging a hand in the air as if pointing to it.

“Ah, I know,” replied Tom, walking away in search of the saddler.

Having found that functionary, and learned all about it, he was presently stamping the cold, slaty mud of his boots in the door-way, beneath the blazing sign of the Goldtrap Arms.

“This way, sir, if you please,” exclaimed Cornelius Cake, rushing out of the little back parlour commanding a view of the entrance, throwing open the black door of the little parlour on the right, in whose pittance of a grate smoked and spluttered some white-ashed, slaty-looking coals.

Though the best room, it was small and low, papered with a tasteless, repulsive-looking, dark-green paper, carried half-way down the wall, the part below the skirting-board being whitewashed. We sometimes see papers so hideously ugly as to look as if they had been made for a premium.

On the wall opposite the windows, and above the wooden mantel-piece, which latter was decorated with paper fans, spars, card-racks, china poodles, and other dust-catching articles, were portraits of Tom’s host and hostess—Cornelius and Mrs. Cake.

They were evidently by the same hand, most likely acquired in the usual way of inn portraiture, —some travelling artist painting out his bill. On no other supposition can we account for the wonderful tendency publicans have to “run to portrait.”

How hard, and cold, and solemn, and vulgarly like himself, Cornelius looked down upon Tom from his gilt frame.

When he brought in candles, he had brushed up his hair to the picture point, and arrayed himself in the snuff-coloured coat with the velvet collar and black waistcoat of the portrait. He only wanted the amplified neckcloth, with the butterfly brooch, and red cord watchguard, to be perfect.

“I should like to have some dinner,” said Tom, after Cake had deposited the candles, and let down the scant drab window-curtains, trimmed with red gimp.

“What would you like, sir?” inquired Cake, with the air of a Lord Mayor’s cook.

“What have you in the house?” replied Tom, anticipating the usual variety—mutton chop, beef steak—beef steak, mutton-chop.

“There’s soup, sir; mutton broth, at least. Fish —fish, sir, I’m afraid’s not very fresh—not what I could recommend. You could have a fowl or a duck, and a nice little French dish to follow.”

“French dish!” exclaimed Tom, as the Dawdle Court banquet, and Louis-Philippe nightmare flashed across his mind. “French dish! what, you haven’t a French cook, have you?”

“My lady’s a Frenchwoman,” replied Cake, speaking of her in the true Debrett style; “my lady’s a Frenchwoman”; as if that was enough to constitute a cook. The fact was, Cornelius had been butler and Madame Cake lady’s maid to Sir Digby and Lady Goldtrap, and—but our readers will anticipate the rest.

“Well; I’ll have the broth, and a fowl, and a French dish to follow,” said Tom.

“Any sweets?” inquired Cake; “Sir Digby always took sweets.”

“Yes; you may let me have a nice little French dish of sweets, too,” replied Tom. So saying, Cake departed to execute the order.

Tom had revisited the stable, fed the mare, seen his bedroom, opened the window, drawn the stuffy blue check curtains, stared up the street, examined the portrait of Madame Cake, and thought how the light, tasteful spirit of French elegance must have shuddered at the harsh matter-of-fact-looking cap and brown silk gown in which she was daubed, ere the bump of the tray against the weak door announced that it was about time to take his seat:—the oaths at a dinner of this sort are frequently taken after.

Having deposited the little basin of mutton broth before Tom, Cake, with a napkin-covered thumb, lifted the little delf lid off with the flourish of a man uncovering a glittering tureen of many hundred ounces weight.

“What wine will you please to take, sir?” asked he, giving the hock glass a push against the other two to draw Tom’s attention to their presence.

It’s a fearful thing when a man’s consequence entails a variety of wine-glasses upon him at an inn.

Had Tom brought Sleekpow he would have attributed the misfortune to him, concluding he had been telling where they had come from. As it was, he was obliged to put it down to the superior refinement of his host over himself. Indeed, we know men who keep servants to teach them what they ought to do.

Tom wouldn’t give twopence a gallon for hock, so he humbly replied that he’d take a pint of sherry.

“Some of Sir Digby, I s’pose, sir,” replied Cake.

“Of course,” said Tom; and away he went for the liquid.

The mutton broth, or pot barley and water, was execrable; and Tom had dropped the spoon in the plate in despair ere Cake came back, rubbing a tiny decanter with a napkin.

“You’ll find this very fine wine, sir,” said he, holding it up to the candle, and smacking his lips as though it were most luscious.

He then helped Tom to three-quarters of a glass.

“Sir Digby always call this my golden particular,” added he, setting it down.

A bad dinner and a loquacious waiter are evils that no man can stand jointly; so Tom intimated, by a lateral motion of the spoon in the plate, that he was ready for the “follow,” as they say at the clubs. This was old Cock-a-doodle-doo!

If possible, it was worse than the broth, being black, and hard, and dry, and tough,—a very old chanticleer indeed.

Cake saw it wouldn’t do, and proposed making a grill of it. “Sir Digby was very fond of grills,” said he, as if that was enough.

Tom didn’t care much about it, having an eye to the nice little French dish that was to follow; so he said, “Perhaps you may as well bring in the next dish?”

“Certainly, sir,” replied Cake, whisking away both fowl and plate.

The precipitancy of the remove made a gap in the series, and left Tom a little time to speculate on the next “follow.”

He wondered what it would be,—“Blanquette de veau aux champignons,” “Côté de Bœuf à la Bonne Femme,” or perhaps game dressed in some peculiar way—“Escalopes de Chevreuil,” or “Faisan à la Péregueux.”

“One wouldn’t expect French cookery in a house of this sort,” observed he, looking at the most perfect public-house appearance of the little parlour and its appurtenances; but there’s no saying what one may meet with in this world.

Just then somebody threw open the door, and in rushed Cake with a round vegetable dish, encircled in a napkin, clasped in both hands.

This he set down with a noise betokening the most perfect confidence in its contents.

“Hot plate! hot plate!” exclaimed he, as if a moment’s delay might be fatal to the feast.

He lifted the lid, and, lo! four great fat, greasy mutton chops, slightly sprinkled over with bread, appeared.