The Mill on the Floss by George Eliot (good novels to read in english .txt) 📕

“But I can turn a bit o’ money for you, an’ welcome, mum,” said Bob, “if you’d like to risk it,—not as there’s any risk to speak on. But if you’d a mind to lend a bit o’ money to Mr. Tom, he’d pay you six or seven per zent, an’ get a trifle for himself as well; an’ a good-natur’d lady like you ‘ud like the feel o’ the money better if your nephey took part on it.”

“What do you say, Mrs. G.?” said Mr. Glegg. “I’ve a notion, when I’ve made a bit more inquiry, as I shall perhaps start Tom here with a bit of a nest-egg,—he’ll pay me int’rest, you know,—an’ if you’ve got some little sums lyin’ idle twisted up in a stockin’ toe, or that–-”

“Mr. Glegg, it’s beyond iverything! You’ll go and give information to the tramps next, as they may come and rob me.”

“Well, well, as I was sayin’, if you like to join me wi’ twenty pounds, you can—I’ll make it fifty. That’ll be a pretty good nest-egg, eh, Tom?”

“You’re not counting on me, Mr. Glegg, I hope,” said his wife. “You could do fine things wi’ my money, I don’t doubt.”

“Very well,” said Mr. Glegg, rather snappishly, “then we’ll do without you. I shall go with you to see this Salt,” he added, turning to Bob.

“And now, I suppose, you’ll go all the other way, Mr. Glegg,” said Mrs. G., “and want to shut me out o’ my own nephey’s business. I never said I wouldn’t put money into it,—I don’t say as it shall be twenty pounds, though you’re so ready to say it for me,—but he’ll see some day as his aunt’s in the right not to risk the money she’s saved for him till it’s proved as it won’t be lost.”

“Ay, that’s a pleasant sort o’risk, that is,” said Mr. Glegg, indiscreetly winking at Tom, who couldn’t avoid smiling. But Bob stemmed the injured lady’s outburst.

“Ay, mum,” he said admiringly, “you know what’s what—you do. An’ it’s nothing but fair. You see how the first bit of a job answers, an’ then you’ll come down handsome. Lors, it’s a fine thing to hev good kin. I got my bit of a nest-egg, as the master calls it, all by my own sharpness,—ten suvreigns it was,—wi’ dousing the fire at Torry’s mill, an’ it’s growed an’ growed by a bit an’ a bit, till I’n got a matter o’ thirty pound to lay out, besides makin’ my mother comfor’ble. I should get more, on’y I’m such a soft wi’ the women,—I can’t help lettin’ ‘em hev such good bargains. There’s this bundle, now,” thumping it lustily, “any other chap ‘ud make a pretty penny out on it. But me!—lors, I shall sell ‘em for pretty near what I paid for ‘em.”

“Have you got a bit of good net, now?” said Mrs. Glegg, in a patronizing tone, moving from the tea-table, and folding her napkin.

“Eh, mum, not what you’d think it worth your while to look at. I’d scorn to show it you. It ‘ud be an insult to you.”

“But let me see,” said Mrs. Glegg, still patronizing. “If they’re damaged goods, they’re like enough to be a bit the better quality.”

“No, mum, I know my place,” said Bob, lifting up his pack and shouldering it. “I’m not going t’ expose the lowness o’ my trade to a lady like you. Packs is come down i’ the world; it ‘ud cut you to th’ heart to see the difference. I’m at your sarvice, sir, when you’ve a mind to go and see Salt.”

“All in good time,” said Mr. Glegg, really unwilling to cut short the dialogue. “Are you wanted at the wharf, Tom?”

“No, sir; I left Stowe in my place.”

“Come, put down your pack, and let me see,” said Mrs. Glegg, drawing a chair to the window and seating herself with much dignity.

“Don’t you ask it, mum,” said Bob, entreatingly.

“Make no more words,” said Mrs. Glegg, severely, “but do as I tell you.”

“Eh mum, I’m loth, that I am,” said Bob, slowly depositing his pack on the step, and beginning to untie it with unwilling fingers. “But what you order shall be done” (much fumbling in pauses between the sentences). “It’s not as you’ll buy a single thing on me,—I’d be sorry for you to do it,—for think o’ them poor women up i’ the villages there, as niver stir a hundred yards from home,—it ‘ud be a pity for anybody to buy up their bargains. Lors, it’s as good as a junketing to ‘em when they see me wi’ my pack, an’ I shall niver pick up such bargains for ‘em again. Least ways, I’ve no time now, for I’m off to Laceham. See here now,” Bob went on, becoming rapid again, and holding up a scarlet woollen Kerchief with an embroidered wreath in the corner; “here’s a thing to make a lass’s mouth water, an’ on’y two shillin’—an’ why? Why, ‘cause there’s a bit of a moth-hole ‘i this plain end. Lors, I think the moths an’ the mildew was sent by Providence o’ purpose to cheapen the goods a bit for the good-lookin’ women as han’t got much money. If it hadn’t been for the moths, now, every hankicher on ‘em ‘ud ha’ gone to the rich, handsome ladies, like you, mum, at five shillin’ apiece,—not a farthin’ less; but what does the moth do? Why, it nibbles off three shillin’ o’ the price i’ no time; an’ then a packman like me can carry ‘t to the poor lasses as live under the dark thack, to make a bit of a blaze for ‘em. Lors, it’s as good as a fire, to look at such a hankicher!”

Bob held it at a distance for admiration, but Mrs. Glegg said sharply:

“Yes, but nobody wants a fire this time o’ year. Put these colored things by; let me look at your nets, if you’ve got ‘em.”

“Eh, mum, I told you how it ‘ud be,” said Bob, flinging aside the colored things with an air of desperation. “I knowed it ud’ turn again’ you to look at such paltry articles as I carry. Here’s a piece o’ figured muslin now, what’s the use o’ you lookin’ at it? You might as well look at poor folks’s victual, mum; it ‘ud on’y take away your appetite. There’s a yard i’ the middle on’t as the pattern’s all missed,—lors, why, it’s a muslin as the Princess Victoree might ha’ wore; but,” added Bob, flinging it behind him on to the turf, as if to save Mrs. Glegg’s eyes, “it’ll be bought up by the huckster’s wife at Fibb’s End,—that’s where it’ll go—ten shillin’ for the whole lot—ten yards, countin’ the damaged un—five-an’-twenty shillin’ ‘ud ha’ been the price, not a penny less. But I’ll say no more, mum; it’s nothing to you, a piece o’ muslin like that; you can afford to pay three times the money for a thing as isn’t half so good. It’s nets you talked on; well, I’ve got a piece as ‘ull serve you to make fun on–-”

“Bring me that muslin,” said Mrs. Glegg. “It’s a buff; I’m partial to buff.”

“Eh, but a damaged thing,” said Bob, in a tone of deprecating disgust. “You’d do nothing with it, mum, you’d give it to the cook, I know you would, an’ it ‘ud be a pity,—she’d look too much like a lady in it; it’s unbecoming for servants.”

“Fetch it, and let me see you measure it,” said Mrs. Glegg, authoritatively.

Bob obeyed with ostentatious reluctance.

“See what there is over measure!” he said, holding forth the extra half-yard, while Mrs. Glegg was busy examining the damaged yard, and throwing her head back to see how far the fault would be lost on a distant view.

“I’ll give you six shilling for it,” she said, throwing it down with the air of a person who mentions an ultimatum.

“Didn’t I tell you now, mum, as it ‘ud hurt your feelings to look at my pack? That damaged bit’s turned your stomach now; I see it has,” said Bob, wrapping the muslin up with the utmost quickness, and apparently about to fasten up his pack. “You’re used to seein’ a different sort o’ article carried by packmen, when you lived at the stone house. Packs is come down i’ the world; I told you that; my goods are for common folks. Mrs. Pepper ‘ull give me ten shillin’ for that muslin, an’ be sorry as I didn’t ask her more. Such articles answer i’ the wearin’,—they keep their color till the threads melt away i’ the wash-tub, an’ that won’t be while I’m a young un.”

“Well, seven shilling,” said Mrs. Glegg.

“Put it out o’ your mind, mum, now do,” said Bob. “Here’s a bit o’ net, then, for you to look at before I tie up my pack, just for you to see what my trade’s come to,—spotted and sprigged, you see, beautiful but yallow,—‘s been lyin’ by an’ got the wrong color. I could niver ha’ bought such net, if it hadn’t been yallow. Lors, it’s took me a deal o’ study to know the vally o’ such articles; when I begun to carry a pack, I was as ignirant as a pig; net or calico was all the same to me. I thought them things the most vally as was the thickest. I was took in dreadful, for I’m a straightforrard chap,—up to no tricks, mum. I can only say my nose is my own, for if I went beyond, I should lose myself pretty quick. An’ I gev five-an’-eightpence for that piece o’ net,—if I was to tell y’ anything else I should be tellin’ you fibs,—an’ five-an’-eightpence I shall ask of it, not a penny more, for it’s a woman’s article, an’ I like to ‘commodate the women. Five-an’-eightpence for six yards,—as cheap as if it was only the dirt on it as was paid for.’”

“I don’t mind having three yards of it,’” said Mrs. Glegg.

“Why, there’s but six altogether,” said Bob. “No, mum, it isn’t worth your while; you can go to the shop tomorrow an’ get the same pattern ready whitened. It’s on’y three times the money; what’s that to a lady like you?” He gave an emphatic tie to his bundle.

“Come, lay me out that muslin,” said Mrs. Glegg. “Here’s eight shilling for it.”

“You will be jokin’,” said Bob, looking up with a laughing face; “I see’d you was a pleasant lady when I fust come to the winder.”

“Well, put it me out,” said Mrs. Glegg, peremptorily.

“But if I let you have it for ten shillin’, mum, you’ll be so good as not tell nobody. I should be a laughin’-stock; the trade ‘ud hoot me, if they knowed it. I’m obliged to make believe as I ask more nor I do for my goods, else they’d find out I was a flat. I’m glad you don’t insist upo’ buyin’ the net, for then I should ha’ lost my two best bargains for Mrs. Pepper o’ Fibb’s End, an’ she’s a rare customer.”

“Let me look at the net again,” said Mrs. Glegg, yearning after the cheap spots and sprigs, now they were vanishing.

“Well, I can’t deny you, mum,” said Bob handing it out.

“Eh!, see what a pattern now! Real Laceham goods. Now, this is the sort o’ article I’m recommendin’ Mr. Tom to send out. Lors, it’s a fine thing for anybody as has got a bit o’ money; these Laceham goods ‘ud make it breed like maggits.