Angels Ministers | Page 2

wee mon, and tak' your walk!
(_And while his Royal Mistress resumes her writing, taking Mop by his "lead" he prepares for departure._)
Have ye seen the paper this morning yet? Ma'am.
(_The address of respect is thrown in by way of afterthought, or, as it were, reluctantly. Having to be in character, his way is to tread heavily on the border-line which divides familiarity from respect._)
QUEEN. Not yet.
MR. J.B. (_departing_). I'll bring it for ye, now.
QUEEN. You had better send it.
J.B. (_turning about_). What did ye say? ... Ma'am.
QUEEN. "Send it," Brown, I said. Mop mustn't be hurried. Take him round by the stables.
(_He goes: and the Queen, with a soft, indulgent smile, that slowly flickers out as the labour of composition proceeds, resumes her writing_.)
(Presently ENTERS _a liveried Footman, who stands at attention with the paper upon a salver. Touching the table at her side as an indication, the Queen continues to write. With gingerly reverence the man lays down the paper and goes. Twice she looks at it before taking it up; then she unfolds it; then lays it down, and takes out her glasses; then begins reading. Evidently she comes on something she does not like; she pats the table impatiently, then exclaims_:)
Most extraordinary!
(_A wasp settles on the peaches._)
And I wish one could kill all wicked pests as easily as you.
(_She makes a dab with the paper-knife, the wasp escapes._)
Most extraordinary!
(_Relinquishing the pursuit of wasps, she resumes her reading_.)
(_In a little while Mr. John Brown returns, both hands occupied. The chair he deposits by the tent door, and hitches Mop's "lead" to the back of that on which the Queen is sitting. With the small beginnings of a smile she lowers the paper, and looks at him and his accompaniments_.)
QUEEN. Well, Brown? Oh, yes; that's quite a nice one.... I'm sure there's a wasps' nest somewhere; there are so many of them about.
J.B. Eh, don't fash yourself! Wasps have a way of being aboot this time of year. It's the fruit they're after.
QUEEN. Yes: like Adam and Eve.
J.B. That's just it, Ma'am.
QUEEN. You'd better take it away, Brown, or cover it; it's too tempting.
J.B. (_removing the fruit_). Ah! Now if God had only done that, maybe we'd still all be running aboot naked.
QUEEN. I'm glad He didn't, then.
J.B. Ye're right, Ma'am.
QUEEN. The Fall made the human race decent, even if it did no good otherwise. Brown, I've dropped my glasses.
(He picks them up and returns them.)
QUEEN. Thank you, Brown,
J.B. So you're expecting a visitor, ye say?
QUEEN. Yes. You haven't seen Lord Beaconsfield yet, I suppose?
J.B. Since he was to arrive off the train, you mean, Ma'am? No: he came early. He's in his room.
QUEEN. I hope they have given him a comfortable one.
J.B. It's the one I used to have. There's a good spring-bed in it, and a kettle-ring for the whisky.
QUEEN. Oh, that's all right, then.
J.B. Will he be staying for long? Ma'am.
QUEEN. Only for a week, I'm afraid. Why?
J.B. It's about the shooting I was thinking: whether it was the deer or the grouse he'd want to be after.
QUEEN. I don't think Lord Beaconsfield is a sportsman.
J.B. I know that, Ma'am, well enough. But there's many who are not sportsmen that think they've got to do it--when they come north of the Tweed.
QUEEN. Lord Beaconsfield will not shoot, I'm sure. You remember him, Brown, being here before?
J.B. Eh! Many years ago, that was; he was no but Mr. Disraeli then. But he was the real thing, Ma'am: oh, a nice gentleman.
QUEEN. He is always very nice to me.
J.B. I remember now, when he first came, he put a tip into me hand. And when I let him know the liberty he had taken, "Well, Mr. Brown," he said, "I've made a mistake, but I don't take it back again!"
QUEEN. Very nice and sensible.
J.B. And indeed it was, Ma'am. Many a man would never have had the wit to leave well alone by just apologising for it. But there was an understandingness about him, that often you don't find. After that he always talked to me like an equal-just like yourself might do. But Lord, Ma'am, his ignorance, it was surprising!
QUEEN. Most extraordinary you should think that, Brown!
J.B. Ah! You haven't talked to him as I have, Ma'am: only about politics, and poetry, and things like that, where, maybe, he knows a bit more than I do (though he didn't know his Burns so well as a man ought that thinks to make laws for Scotland!). But to hear him talking about natural facts, you'd think he was just inventing for to amuse himself! Do you know, Ma'am, he thought stags had white tails like rabbits, and that 'twas only when they wagged them so as to show, that you could shoot them. And he thought that you