Description

Sheer Off, A Tale by A. L. O. E.

157 pages

“Why, there are the church-bells a-ringing! as if it wasn’t enough to have all the school-boys
going in procession with their garlands, and nosegays, and nonsense!” exclaimed Nancy
Sands, the wife of the Clerk of Colme, as she stood in the shop of Ben Stone the carpenter,
with her arms a-kimbo, and an expression anything but amiable upon her flushed face.
“One might fancy that our new young baronet was a-coming home, or bringing a bride, or
that the queen and all the royal family were a-visiting Colme, instead of this fuss being for
nothing but the christening of a school-master’s brat!”
“Ned Franks is a prime favorite with all the village,” observed the stout, good-humored
carpenter, as he went on with his occupation of planing a bit of mahogany, which his visitor
wanted for a shelf in her cottage.
“A broken-down sailor, with only one arm!” exclaimed Nancy, with a snort of disdain.
“But with a good head and a better heart,” observed the carpenter. “Ned Franks manages so
well to keep his lads in order without thrashing them, that one arm is one too many for all
that they need in that way. Not but that the wooden affair which I knocked up for him
myself, with an iron hook for fingers and thumb, might serve well enough on a pinch to
knock a little wit into a blockhead, if that were Ned Franks’s fashion of teaching,” added
Ben Stone with a little chuckle.
“Teaching! he has no more learning in him than my mangle,” muttered the scornful Nancy.
“But, like your mangle, he has a wonderful knack of getting things smooth and straight. I
don’t know what we’d have done in Colme without him, now our poor vicar has been tied
up so long; it’s Ned as has kept everything going like clockwork. Of course the young curate
isn’t just at once up to the ways of the place, letting alone that he looks as young as a boy,
and as shy as a girl; he does his best, no doubt, but he couldn’t get on without Ned Franks
showing him the ins and outs of everything.”
Nancy gave another contemptuous snort, but without specifying for whom it was intended.
Ben Stone went on with his planing of the shelf and his praise of the school-master, his
hand having a very different effect from his tongue; for the more he planed, the smoother
grew the wood; while the more he praised, the rougher grew the temper of Nancy. Ben
Stone saw this, and took a little malicious pleasure in stirring up the envy and jealousy of
his customer; for, though he was not one to break the peace himself, and had never been
known to be either out of spirits or out of temper, Ben Stone was certainly not a man to be
reckoned amongst the peacemakers. He rather enjoyed “poking the fire in a neighbor’s
grate,” as he once jestingly observed to his wife, and there was always plenty of dry fuel in
Nancy’s.