It was a smug young cousin of Eliza’s who finally opened her eyes, at one of those family feasts which Simon and Sarah were always expected to attend. Eliza was never at her brightest and best without them, as she very rightly said—the organ-grinder without his necessary monkey, the circus-master without his jumping clown. As usual, the Simon Thornthwaites heard their belongings catalogued and found utterly wanting, and, as usual, for the time being, shared the general sentiment that they were beneath scorn. The comparisons, passing in and out of shippon and parlour, leaping from featherbed to sofa, and over root-crops and stacks of hay, arrived finally at the missing sons.
“Our Harry’s for learning the violin,” Eliza informed the tea-party, swelling with conscious pride. “Master wouldn’t hear tell o’ such a thing at first, but me and the girls talked him round between us. I reckon he’ll be suited all right, though, when he hears our Harry play. Ah, now, Sarah, but wouldn’t that ha’ been just the thing for Geordie-an’-Jim? They were that fond o’ music, the poor lads, though they’d no more tune to the pair on ’em than a steam-whistle. Eh, well, poor things, fiddle-playing and suchlike wouldn’t ha’ been no use to ’em where they’re at. Brass wasted, that’s what it would ha’ been, so it’s just as well. …”
Harry, also swelling with pride, looked for some sign of admiration from his aunt, but did not get it. Eliza soothed him with a meaning glance.
“The trouble is you’ve got to keep your hands terble nice for the violin. Our Harry’s terble set on keeping his hands nice. … Geordie-an’-Jim would never ha’ come to suchlike quality ways, would they, Sarah? I never see such hands as the two on ’em used to show at meals! I mind you said they got sent home that often from school, at last the folks took to washing ’em on the spot! I used to be right sorry for you, Sarah, I was that, wi’ their gert fingermarks all over the walls and the chair-backs. It’s queer how different folk shape, I’m sure, even when they’re as you might say near-bred. Our Harry frames rarely at folding tablecloths and the like, and no more dirt to ’em when he’s finished than if he was a lass!”
The town-bred cousin gazed complacently at his hands, and observed that, if Geordie-an’-Jim were in Canada, as he understood, from all accounts it was much the best place for them. Eliza nodded lugubriously, the tail of her eye on Sarah’s unstirred face.
“Ay, they’re in Canada right enough, and like to be—aren’t they, Sarah?—for a goodish while yet. They wrote home as they’d sworn to make their fortunes afore they crossed the pond again, but fortunes isn’t as easy come by as some folk seem to think. Me and Will likely know as much about it as most, having managed middlin’ well, but even for the best o’ folk it isn’t as simple as it sounds. There’s always somebody at you one way or another, wanting to share what you’ve earned wi’ your own hands. You’ve just got to keep lifting your feet right high off the ground, or you’ll have folk hanging on to your shoe-wangs all the time. Ay, Geordie-an’-Jim’ll find as fortunes don’t come that slape off the reel! ’Tisn’t as if it was our Harry and Tom here, ay, and Bill and Fred an’ all, as’ll find everything ready for ’em when they want to start on their own. They’ll step into good farms as if it was stepping out o’ bed, and they’ll have Blindbeck behind them and its brass as well. They’ll have a bit o’ their own, come to that; I started ’em saving-books myself. Eh, yes, they’ll do right well, but I doubt there’s never farm nor Post Office book as’ll come to Geordie-an’-Jim!”
Later in the day, the smug cousin, trying to be kind, had enquired of Sarah whether Geordie-an’-Jim were twins. She was too angry at first to answer him at all, and by the time she managed to get her breath her mood had changed. They were alone at the time, and even Sarah could sometimes laugh at herself when Eliza was out of sight. The touch of humour freed her heart for an instant, and at once it rose up and stood by the lad whose mother had cast him off. Jim was suddenly before her, with his tricks of affection and his borrowed face, his constant cry that he had only been born at Blindbeck by mistake. “I’m your lad, really, Aunt Sarah,” she heard him saying, as of old. “I’m your lad really, same as Geordie is!” Jim was forty by now, but it was a child’s voice that she heard speaking and couldn’t deny. The cousin repeated his question, and she smiled grimly.
“Twins? Ay … and as like as a couple o’ peas. As like as a couple o’ gulls on the edge o’ the
