Chapter 14 | A Life's Eclipse

The days glided by and John Grange’s powers developed in a wonderful way. He busied himself about the glass-houses from morning to night, but he did not return to the bothy in the grounds, preferring to go on lodging with old Hannah and her husband.

At first the men used to watch him, leaving off their work to talk together when he passed down the garden, and first one and then another stood ready to lend him a helping hand; but this never seemed to be needed, Grange making sure by touching a wall, fence, shrub, or some familiar object whose position he knew, and then walking steadily along with no other help than a stick, and finding his way anywhere about the grounds.

“It caps me, lads!” said old Tummus; “but there, I dunno: he allus was one of the clever ones. Look at him now; who’d ever think that he was blind as a mole? Why, he walks as upright as I do.”

There was a roar of laughter at this.

“Well, so he do,” cried old Tummus indignantly.

“That ain’t saying much, old man,” said one of the gardeners; “why, you go crawling over the ground like a rip-hook out for a walk.”

“Ah, never mind,” grumbled old Tummus, “perhaps if you’d bent down to your work as I have, you’d be as much warped. Don’t you get leaving tools and barrers and garden-rollers all over the place now.”

“Why not?”

“’Cause we, none on us, want to see that poor lad fall over ’em, and break his legs. Eh?”

No one did; and from that hour a new form of tidiness was observed in Mrs Mostyn’s garden.

Daniel Barnett said very little, but quite avoided Grange, who accepted the position, divining as he did the jealous feeling of his new superior, and devoted himself patiently to such tasks as he could perform, but instinctively standing on his guard against him whom he felt to be his enemy.

A couple of months had gone by when, one day, Mrs Mostyn came upon Grange in the conservatory, busily watering various plants which a touch had informed him required water.

“Do you think it would hurt some of the best orchids to make a good stand full of them here for a couple of days, Grange?” said his mistress. “I have a friend coming down who takes a great deal of interest in these plants.”

“There is always the risk of giving them a check, ma’am,” said Grange quietly; “but if you wouldn’t mind the place being kept rather close, and a little fire being started to heat the pipes, they would be quite right.”

“Oh, do what you think best,” said Mrs Mostyn, “and make me a good handsome show by the day after to-morrow. Just there, between these two windows.”

“If you’ll excuse me, ma’am, they would be better on the other side against the house. They would show off better, and be less likely to get a check if a window was opened, as might happen.”

“Of course, John Grange. Then put them there. I want a good, brilliant show, mind, to please my friend.”

“They shall be there, ma’am. I’ll get a stand cleared at once, ma’am, and put the orchids on to-morrow.”

By that evening one of the large stands was clear, all but a few flowers to keep it from looking blank, and late on the next afternoon Daniel Barnett encountered old Tummus.

“Hullo, where are you going with that long barrow?”

“Orchid-house, to fetch pots.”

“What for?”

“Muster Grange wants me to help him make up a stand in the zervyturry.”

Daniel Barnett walked off muttering—

“I’m nobody, of course. It ain’t my garden. Better make him head at once.”

“Beautiful! Lovely!” cried Mrs Mostyn, as she stood in front of the lovely bank of blossoms; “and capitally arranged, John Grange. Why, it is quite a flower show.”

That evening the guest arrived to dinner in the person of a great physician, whose sole relaxation was his garden; and directly after breakfast the next morning, full of triumph about the perfection of her orchids, Mrs Mostyn led the way into the conservatory, just as John Grange hurried out at the garden entrance, as if to avoid being seen.

“A minute too late,” said the doctor, smiling; “but I thought you said that the man who attends to this place was quite blind?”

“He is! That is the man, but no one would think it. Now you shall see what a lovely stand of orchids he has arranged by touch. It is really wonderful what a blind man can do.”

“Yes, it is wonderful, sometimes,” replied the visitor. “I have noticed many cases where Nature seems to supply these afflicted people with another sense, and—”

“Oh, dear me! Oh, you tiresome, stupid man! My poor flowers! I wouldn’t for a hundred pounds have had this happen, and just too when I wanted it all as a surprise for you. That’s why he hurried out.”

“Ah, dear me!” said the great physician, raising his glasses to his eye. “Such lovely specimens, too. Poor fellow! He must have slipped. A sad accident due to his blindness, of course, while watering, I presume.”

For there, on the red-tiled floor of the conservatory, lay an overturned watering-can, whose contents had formed a muddy puddle, in which were about a dozen broken pots just as they had been knocked down from the stand, the bulbs snapped, beautiful trusses of blossom shivered and crushed, and the whole display ruined by the gap made in its midst.

The tears of vexation stood in Mrs Mostyn’s eyes, but she turned very calm directly as she walked back into the drawing-room and rang, looking white now with anger and annoyance.

“Send John Grange to the conservatory directly,” she said to the butler, and then walked back with her guest.

Five minutes later John Grange came in from the garden, and the great physician watched him keenly, as the young man’s eye looked full of trouble and his face twitched a little as he went towards where he believed his mistress to be.

“What is the meaning of this horrible destruction, Grange?” she cried.

“I don’t know, ma’am,” he replied excitedly. “I came in and found the pots all down only a few moments ago.”

“That will do,” she said sternly, and she turned away with her guest. “Even he cannot speak the truth, doctor. Oh, what cowards some men can be!”