This story begins on a fine autumn afternoon when, at the end of a field over which the shadows of a few wayside trees were stalking like long thin giants, a man and a boy sat side by side upon a stile.  They were not a happy-looking pair.  The boy looked uncomfortable, because he wanted to get away and dared not go.  The man looked uncomfortable also; but then no one had ever seen him look otherwise, which was the more strange as he never professed to have any object in life but his own pleasure and gratification.  Not troubling himself with any consideration of law or principle—­of his own duty or other people’s comfort—­he had consistently spent his whole time and energies in trying to be jolly; and though now a grown-up young man, had so far had every appearance of failing in the attempt.  From this it will be seen that he was not the most estimable of characters, and we shall have no more to do with him than we can help; but as he must appear in the story, he may as well be described.

If constant self-indulgence had answered as well as it should have done, he would have been a fine-looking young man; as it was, the habits of his life were fast destroying his appearance.  His hair would have been golden if it had been kept clean.  His figure was tall and strong; but the custom of slinking about places where he had no business to be, and lounging in corners where he had nothing to do, had given it such a hopeless slouch that for the matter of beauty he might almost as well have been knock-kneed.  His eyes would have been handsome if the lids had been less red; and if he had ever looked you in the face, you would have seen that they were blue.  His complexion was fair by nature and discoloured by drink.  His manner was something between a sneak and a swagger, and he generally wore his cap a-one-side, carried his hands in his pockets and a short stick under his arm, and whistled when any one passed him.  His chief characteristic, perhaps, was the habit he had of kicking.  Indoors he kicked the furniture, in the road he kicked the stones, if he lounged against a wall he kicked it; he kicked all animals and such human beings as he felt sure would not kick him again.

It should be said here that he had once announced his intention of “turning steady, and settling, and getting wed.”  The object of his choice was the prettiest girl in the village, and was as good as she was pretty.  To say the truth, the time had been when Bessy had not felt unkindly towards the yellow-haired lad; but his conduct had long put a gulf between them, which only the conceit of a scamp would have attempted to pass.  However, he flattered himself that he “knew what the lasses meant when they said no;” and on the strength of this knowledge he presumed far enough to elicit a rebuff so hearty and unmistakable that for a week he was the laughing stock of the village.  There was no mistake this time as to what “no” meant; his admiration turned to a hatred almost as intense, and he went faster “to the bad” than ever.