The Scarlet Pimpernel: A Daring Tale of Courage - Chapter 02

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Dream Audio Books presents The Scarlet Pimpernel by baroness or Z,
Chapter two, Dover the Fisherman's Rest. In the kitchen, Sally
was extremely busy. Saucepans and frying pans were standing in
rows on the gigantic hearth. The huge stockpot stood in
a corner, and the jack turned with slow deliberation and

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presented alternately to the glow every side of a noble
surloin of beef. The two little kitchen maids bustled around,
eager to help, hot and panting, with cotton sleeves well
tucked up above the dimpled elbows, and giggling over some
private jokes of their own. Whenever Miss Sallie's back was
turned for a moment, and old Jemima, stolid in temper

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and solid in bulk, kept up a long and subdued
grumble while she stirred the stock pot methodically over the fire.
What o, Salie came in cheerful if none to melodious
accents from the coffee room close by. God bless my soul,
exclaimed Sallie, with a good humor laugh. What be they
all wanting? Now? I wonder beer? Of course, grumbled Jemima,

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you don't suspect Jimmy Pitkin to have done with one
tanker do yer, mister Aarry, He looked uncommon, thirsty too,
simpered Martha, one of the little kitchen maids, and her
beady black eyes twinkled as they met those of her companion,
whereupon both started on a round of short and suppressed giggles.
Sallie looked cross for a moment and thoughtfully rubbed her

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hands against her shapely hips. Her palms were itching, evidently
to come in contact with Martha's rosy cheeks, but inherent
good humor prevailed, and with a pout and a shrug
of the shoulders, she turned her attention to the fried potatoes.
What oh, Sallie, Hey Salie, and a chorus of pewter
mugs tapped with impatient hands against the oak tables of

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the coffee room, accompanied the shouts for mine host's buxom daughter.
Sallie shouted a more persistent voice, Are you going to
be all night with that there beer? I do think
father might get the beer for them, muttered Sallie, as
Jemimah stolidly and without further comment, took a couple of
foam crowned drugs from the shelf, and began filling a

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number of pewter tankards with some of that home brewed
ale for which the Fisherman's Rest had been famous since
the days of King Charles. He knows how busy we
are in here. Your father is too busy discussing politics
with mister Empsey to worry herself about you and the kitchen,
grumbled Jemimah under her breath. Sallie had gone to the
small mirror which hung in a corner of the kitchen,

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and was hastily smoothing her hair and setting her frilled
cap at its most becoming angle over her dark curls.
Then she took up the tankards by their handles, three
in each, strong brown hand, and laughing, grumbling, blushing, carried
them through into the coffee room. There there was certainly
no sign of that bustle and activity which kept four

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women busy and hot in the glowing kitchen. Beyond the
coffee room of the Fisherman's Rest is a show place
now at the beginning of the twentieth century, at their
end of the eighteenth. In the year of Grace seventeen
ninety two, it had not yet gained the notoriety and
importance which a hundred additional years and the craze of
the age have since bestowed upon it. Yet it was

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an old place even then, for the oak rafters and
beams were already black with age, as were the paneled
seats with their tall backs, and the long polished tables
between on which innumerable pewter's hankards had left fantastic patterns
of many sized rings. In the leaded window. High up,
a row of pots of scarlet geraniums and blue larkspur

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gave the bright note of color against the dull background
of the oak. That mister Jellyband, landlord of the Fisherman's
Rest at Dover, was a prosperous man, was of course
clear to the most casual observer. The pewter on the
fine old dressers, the brass on the gigantic hearth shone
like silver and gold. The red tiled floor was as
brilliant as the scarlet geranium on the window sill. This

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meant that his servants were good and plentiful, that the
custom was constant and of that order which necessitated the
keeping up of the coffee room to a high standard.
Of elegance and order. As Sally came in, laughing through
her frowns and displaying a row of dazzling white teeth,
she was greeted with shouts and chorus of applause. Why here, Sallie, what,
oh Salie, Hurrah for pretty Salie. I thought you'd grown

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deaf in that kitchen of yours, muttered Jimmy Pitkin, as
he passed the back of his hand across his very
dry lips. All Right, all right, laughed Sallie, as she
deposited the freshly filled tankins upon the tables. Why what
are we to be sure? And is your grandmother a dying?
And you wanted to see the poor soul afore shehim gone?
I never seed such a mighty Russian. A chorus of

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good humored laughter greeted this witticism, which gave the company
their present food for many jokes. For some considerable time,
Salie now seemed in less of a hurry to get
back to her pots and pans. A young man with fair,
curly hair and eager, bright blue eyes was engaging most
of her attention and the whole of her time, whilst
broad witticisms. And then Jimmy Pitkin's fictitious grandmother flew from

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mouth to mouth, mixed with heavy puffs of pungent tobacco smoke,
facing the hearth, his legs wide apart, a long clay
pipe in his mouth, stood mine host, himself worthy, mister Jellyband,
landlord of the fisherman's rest, as his father had before him,
I and his grandfather and great grandfather too, for that matter,
portly and billed, jovial in countenance, and somewhat bald of pate,

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Mister Jellyband was indeed a typical rural john Bull of
those days, the days when our prejudiced insularity was at
its height, when to an Englishman be he lord, yeomen
or peasant, the whole of the continent of Europe was
a den of immorality, and the rest of the world
an unexploited land of savages and cannibals. There he stood

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mine worthy, host, firm and well set up on his limbs,
smoking his long churchwarden, and caring nothing for nobody at home,
and despising everybody abroad. He wore the typical scarlet waistcoat
with shiny brass buttons, the corduroy brushes, and the gray
worsted stockings and smart buckled shoes that characterized every self
respecting innkeeper and Great Britain in these days. And while

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pretty motherless Sally had need of four pairs of brown
hands to do all the work that fell on her
shapely shoulders, worthy Jellyband discussed the affairs of nations with
his most privileged guests. The coffee room, indeed, lighted by
two well polished lamps which hung from the rafted ceiling,
looked cheerful and cozy in the extreme. Through dense clouds

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of tobacco smoke that hung about in every corner, the
faces of mister Jellyband's customers appeared red and pleasant to
look at, and on good terms with themselves, their host,
and all the world. From every side of the room,
loud guffours accompanied pleasant, if not highly intellectual conversation, while
Sally's repeated giggles testified to the good use mister harry

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Waite was making of the short time she seemed inclined
to spare him. They were mostly fisherfolk who patronized mister
Jellyband's coffee room, but fishermen are known to be very
thirsty people, the sort which they breathe in when they
are on the sea, accounts for their parched throats when
on shore. But the fisherman's rest was something more than
a rendezvous for these humble folk. The London and Dover

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coach started from the hostel daily, and passengers who had
come across the Channel and those who started for the
Grand Tour all became acquainted with mister Jellyband, his French
wines and his home brewed ales. It was towards the
close of September seventeen ninety two, and the weather, which
had been brilliant and hot throughout the month, had suddenly

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broken up. For two days. Torrents of rain had deluged
the south of England, doing its level best to ruin
what chances the apples and pears and late plums had
of becoming really fine, self respecting fruit. Even now it
was beating against the leaded windows and tumbling down the chimney,
making the cheerful wood fire sizzle in the hearth, yud,

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did you ever see such a wet September? Mister Jellyband
asked mister Hempseed. He sat in one of the seeds
inside the hearth, did mister hempseed, for he was an authority,
an important personage, not only at the Fisherman's Rest, where
mister Jellyband always made a special selection of him as
a foil for political arguments, but throughout the neighborhood, where
his learning, and notably his knowledge of the scriptures, was

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held in the most profound awe in respect. With one
hand buried in the capacious pockets of his corduroys underneath
his elaborately worked, well worn smock, the other holding his
long clay pipe, mister Hempseed sat there, looking dejectedly across
the room at the rivulets of moisture which trickled down
the window panes. No, replied mister Jellyband sententiously, I don't know,

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mister Empseed, as I ever did, and I've been in
these parts nihon sixty years. I you wouldn't recollect the
first three years of them sixty, mister Jellyband quietly interposed,
mister Hempseed, I don't know, as I ever seed an
infant take much note of the weather, at leastways not
in these parts. And I've lived here nigh on seventy
five years, mister Jellyband. Superiority of this wisdom was so

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incontestable that for the moment mister Jellyband was not ready
with his usual flow of argument. It do seem more
like April than September, don't it? Continued mister Hempseed dolefully,
as a shower of raindrops fell with a sizzle upon
the fire. Aye that it do, assented the worthy host.
But then what can you spect, mister Empseed, I says,

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with such a government as we've got, Mister Hempseed shook
his head with an infinity of wisdom tempered by deeply
rooted mistrust of the British climate and the British government.
I don't expect nothing, mister jellyband, he said. Poor folks
like us is of no account up there in London.
I knows that, and it's not often as I do complain,

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But when it comes to such wet weather in September,
an or me fruit are rotting and a dying like
the guption mothers first born, and doing no more good
than they did poor DearS save a lot more dews,
peddlers and such with their oranges and switch like foreign
ungodly fruit which nobody'd buy if English apples and was
nicely swelled as the scriptures say that's quite right, mister Empseed,

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retorted Jellyband. And as I says, what can you spect?
There's all them frenchy devils over the channel, yonder a
murderin their king a nobility, and mister Pitt and mister
Fox and mister Burke a fightin and a wranglin between them.
If we Englishmen should allow them to go on in
their ungodly way, let em murder, says mister Pitt. Stop 'em,
says mister Burke. And let em murder, says I. And

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be dumbed to 'em, said mister Hempseed emphatically, for he
had but little liking for his friend Jellyband's political arguments,
wherein he always got out of his depth, and had
but little chance for displaying those pearls of wisdom which
had earned for him so high a reputation in the
neighborhood than so many free tankards of ale at the
fisherman's rest. Let em murder, he repeated again. But don't

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let's have such reign in September, for that is agin
the law and the scriptures, which says lad mister Aarry,
how you made me jump? It was unfortunate for Sallie
and her flirtation that this remark of hers should have
occurred at the precise moment when mister Hempseed was collecting
his breath in order to deliver himself one of those
scriptural utterances which made him famous for it brought down

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upon her pretty head the full flood of her father's wrath.
Now then, Sallie, mey girl, Now then, he said, trying
to force a frown upon his good humored face. Stop
that foolin with them, young jackanapes, and get on with
the work the works, Get on all right, father. But
mister Jellyband was peremptory. He had other views for his
buxom daughter, his only child, who would, in God's good time,

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become the owner of the fisherman's rest, than to see
her married to one of these young fellows who earned
but a precarious livelihood with their net. Did ye hear
me speak, m girl? He said, in that quiet tone
which no one inside the end dared to disobey. Get
on with my Lord Tony's supper, For if it ain't
the best we can do, any not satisfied, see what
you'll get. That's all reluctantly, Sallie obeyed. Is you expecting

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special guests? Then to night, mister Jellyband asked Jimmy Pitkin,
in a loyal attempt to divert his host's attention from
the circumstances connected with Sally's exit from the room. Ay
that I be, replied Jellyband. Friends of my Lord Tony, hisself,
Dukes and duchesses from over the water, yonder whom the
young Lord and his friend, Sir Andrew Folkes and the

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other young noblemen have helped out of the clutches of
their murdering devils. But this was too much for mister
Hempseed's querulous philosophy, Like he said, what do they do
that for? I wonder? I don't old, not with interfere
in another folk's ways, as the scriptures say, may be,
mister Empseed interrupted Jellyband with biting sarcasm. As you're a

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personal friend of mister pitt and as you says along
with mister fox let a murder says you pardon me,
mister Jellyband feebly protested mister Hempseed. I don't know, as
I ever did, But mister Jellyband had at last succeeded
in getting upon his favorite hobby horse and had no
intention of dismounting in any hurry. Or maybe you've made

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friends with some of them French chaps, who they do
say have come over here a purpose to make us
Englishmen agree with their murderin ways. I don't know what
you mean, mister Jellyband, suggested mister Hempseed. All I know
is all I know is loudly asserted mine host, that
there was my friend Peppercorn, who owns the Blue Faced Ball,

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and as true and loyal an Englishmen as you'd see
in the land, And now look at him. He made
friends with some of them frog eaters, obnobbed with them,
just as if they was Englishmen and not just a
lot of immoral, god forsaken furn spies. Well, and what
happened Peppercorn e now ups and talks of revolutions and
liberty and down with the aristocrats, just like mister empseed

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over ere. Pardon me, mister Jellyband, again, interposed mister Hempseed. Feebly,
I dunno as I ever did. Mister Jellyband had appealed
to the company in general, who were listening awestruck and
open mouth, did the recital of mister Peppercorn's defalcations. At
one table, two customers, gentlemen apparently by their clothes, had

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pushed aside their half finished game of dominoes and had
been listening for some time and evidently with much amusement
at mister Jellyband's international opinions. One of them, now, with
a quiet, sarcastic smile, still lurking round the corners of
his mobile and mouth, turned towards the center of the
room where mister Jellyband was standing. You seem to think mine,
honest friend, he said quietly, that these frenchmen spies, I

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think you called them, are mighty clever fellows who have
made mincemeat. So to speak of your friend, mister Peppercorn's opinions.
How do they accomplish that? Now, think you lads, sir?
I suppose they talked him over those Frenchies. I've heard
it said, I've got the gifted gab, and mister Rempsey
dear will tell you how it is that they just
twist some people round their little finger like indeed, and

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is that so, mister Hempseed inquired the stranger politely, nice, sir,
replied mister Hempseed, much irritated. I don'no as I can
give you the information you require. Faith, then, said the stranger.
Let us hope, my worthy host, that these clever spies
will not succeed in upsetting your extremely loyal opinions. But
this was too much for mister Jellyband's pleasant equanimity. He

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burst into an uproarious fit of laughter, which was soon
echoed by those who happened to be in his dead
ha ha. He laughed in every key, did my worthy host,
and laughed until his side ached and his eyes streamed
at me. Hark at fat Did you hear him say
that they'd be upsetting my opinions? Eh? Ad love you, sir,

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but you do say some queer things. Well, mister Jellyband,
said mister Hempstead, sententiously. You know what the scriptures say.
Let emu stands take ye lessty four. But then hark
ye mister Empseed, retorted Jellyband, still holding his son with laughter.
The scriptures didn't know me why I wouldn't so much

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as drink a glass of ale with one of them
murderin frenchmen, And nothing had made me change my opinions.
Why I've heard it said that them frog eats can't
even speak the King's English, So of course for any
of them try to speak their God's sake and lingo
to me, why I should spot them directly? See and
four warned as forearmed as the saying goes ay, my

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honest friend, assented the stranger cheerfully. I see that you
are much too sharp and a match for any twenty Frenchmen.
And here's to your very good health, my worthy host,
if you'll do me the honor to finish this bottle
of mine with me, I am sure you're very polite, sir,
said mister Jellyband, wiping his eyes, which were still streaming
with the abundance of his laughter. And I don't mind

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if I do. The stranger poured out a couple of
tankards full of wine, and having offered one to mine host,
he took the other himself. Loyal Englishmen as we all are,
he said, whilst the same humorous smile played the corners
of his thin lips. Loyal as we are, we must
admit that this at least is one good thing which
comes to us from France. I will none of us

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deny that sir, assented mine host, and here's to the
best landlord in England, our worthy host, mister Jellyband, said
the stranger in a loud tone of voice. Hip Hurrah,
retorted the whole company present. Then there was a loud
clapping of hands and mugs and tankards made of rattling
music upon the tables, to the accompaniment of loud laughter

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at nothing in particular, and of mister Jellyband's muttered exclamations.
Just fancy me being talked over by any god forsaken foreigner.
What not, love you, sir, but do say some queer things,
to which obvious fact the stranger heartily assented. It was
certainly a preposterous suggestion that anyone could ever upset mister
Jellyband's firmly rooted opinions. And then to the utter worthlessness

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of the inhabitants of the whole continents of Europe. End
of chapter two, Dream or the Books hopes you have
enjoyed this program.