'I am sending you a copy, painted by a pal of mine, of the Mediæval Portrait of Queen Ediva. I expect you never heard of the lady, Little 'un, but she was the second wife of Edward the Elder, A.D. 961. Do try to remember that date. She was a great benefactress to Christ Church Priory, which I suppose you know is Canterbury Cathedral. In the picture you will see she is dressed in her royal robes and crown. Notice the beautiful jewelled and enamelled morse which fastens her ermine-lined cloak. The original is painted on wood and is presumably of the latter part of the fourteenth century. It is signed I.P.F., and if he's the chap I think he is, the date will be about 1392. You can hang it in the dining room of your ridiculous cottage. Why don't you say what the date of it is, instead of jawing about the creepers and leaded windows, which I expect are modern.'Alas, there are no old deeds, so I do not know the date.There was a letter from Aunt Constance, such a sad one. She asks me if I would like the Manor House nursery furniture for the Gidger. She has been saving it for her grandchildren, but now that Eustace has finally decided, there will never be any little folk to use the pretty things. Ross ejaculates at intervals, after reading the letter,—'Oh, my hat! I simply couldn't, and when he could fight, too!'No, I don't think the monastic life is the one for Ross.So poor Aunt Constance, being a soldier's daughter, eats her heart out because her Eustace cannot see his way to fight and pray. Well, it's a funny throw-back.Aunt Amelia acknowledged my letter telling her of my plans in thoroughly characteristic fashion. There is a good bit about the Devil in her epistle. She thinks 'one's days might better be occupied these solemn times than in amassing possessions and lands, marrying and giving in marriage'; but Michael and I are married, and it's only one house, and as to land, two acres and a cow is considered a minimum, and I've left out the cow. She 'hopes that the Vicar is faithful, and wears a black gown,' that the Gidger is showing signs of grace, and that I have been able to purge from the child's young mind the recollection of that dreadful recitation, taught her by some ungodly friend of her poor afflicted nephew.'Does she mean me?' asked Ross indignantly.'Yes, you're the afflicted one, and Captain Everard is the person who——''Well, old Everard does know some tales, I admit,' said Ross, 'but go on.''Oh, I can't bear to read any more of it out.' I threw the letter at him.'Why does she always spell devil with a capital "D"? I should have thought the smallest she could write was good enough for that old beast,' remarked my brother as he handed the missive back.CHAPTER XIVI don't know if the day in London was too much for Ross, but he had a bad 'go' of pain in the night and cussed with great enthusiasm after breakfast because he couldn't light his own pipe. Somehow he cannot strike a match with his left hand, though heaps of men do it, I believe. Half an hour after the outburst Sam appeared with a vase filled with spills.'Why these funny things?' said Ross, picking one up.'Spills, sir, light them at the fire, sir; can't get matches.''Oh,' said Ross, and tried one. 'Why, Sam, this is a brain wave. I can light my own pipe.''Can you, sir,' said Sam, going away contented. He is so thoughtful in those little ways. He gives Ross such a very perfect service. Sam never attempts to serve two masters. He is wholehearted for his one.After lunch Ross said that he didn't feel up to going out, and that his "Rev. Mother" wanted him to lie down and take some soothing syrup.'And are you going to?' I asked.'Of course I'm not. Do you think I always do what Brown says. The 'Rev. Mother's' the one that will do the lying down,' said my brother grimly.So I went over to the Gidger's cottage and found it full of ladders, paint-pots, pails of white-wash, workmen knocking down partitions, while 'Uncle John,' his hair and whiskers bristling like a wild man of the woods, whirls in and out like a dog at a fair, glorying in all the mess and confusion. Now that the house is mine, I go round anxiously and point out the flaws and cracks in the walls, and 'Uncle John' says soothingly, 'Oh, yes, mum, it only wants a bit o' mortar, it won't cost you much,' 'a bit o' mortar' is his panacea for all ills. He says the roof is sound except over the powdering closet, which may give trouble, no doubt 'a bit o' mortar will set it right.'The two partitions are down and the doorways unblocked so that I can now walk through my entire domain without going out in the garden, over the fence and in at the other front door. All the rooms have had one coat of distemper and the drawing-room is finished. The pale cream walls are quite delightful and cry out for water-colours in gold mounts and frames, the oak floors have been beautifully polished, and joy, there are three Persian rugs in the Depository. To-day I bought a pair of plain old iron dogs to rest the logs on in the open fireplace. The casement curtains are to be made of the anemone besprinkled chintz with frills along the top. But, alas, the little curtains cut into more yards of stuff than one would think, and so I must have others in the bedrooms. I went into a shop to-day and asked the man to show me dimity.'Dimity,' said he with a supercilious stare, 'dimity, why, good gracious, it's a hundred years old, madam.''But my house,' I said with quiet scorn, 'must be at least two hundred and fifty.'I bought a seventeenth century settee and some deep chairs when I was up in town. They have loose covers made of chintz with a design of birds and baskets printed from the original old wood blocks.The drawing-room is such a jolly room, very light and bright, with three big windows facing north and east and south. It has only one beam going across the ceiling and none of the sombre dark beauty of the dining-room, so I feel I may be flippant there. I shall have heaps of colour in the covers and curtains. There are a few delightful things of daddy's for this room—a lovely old mahogany corner cupboard with latticed doors, and some bits of china to go in it, bowls and jugs and funny old cups without handles. There are also three beautiful chairs with rounded backs filled in with lattice work painted in black and gold; the gold is very faint and worn in places. The seats are cane and the front legs very spindly, the kind of chair one's heaviest male visitor will inevitably choose. I think they must be French, they are so elegant. No one should sit in them but an old gentleman with powdered hair, delicate lace ruffles, and a little cane, and his lady opposite must have a small patch box, there is one that I can lend her if she likes. None of my men folk will look well in them, unless perhaps my father, in his robes and full lawn sleeves. And I bought an old mahogany bureau with deep drawers and little hidy holes and secret places in it. It was really most expensive, but I asked Ross, and he said Michael's balance at the bank was so indecent that he thought I really must. I don't think we shall want much else; I like space and Michael needs plenty; he will only fall over things if I crowd the rooms too much, and complain that there is nowhere for his legs.I forgot to say there is a great cupboard in this room with battened shelves for fruit. (I told you the domestic offices were all mixed up), and there are Cox's orange apple trees in the garden. I seem to see a man who will get up suddenly and leave the fire on a winter's night and hie him to the cupboard 'for a map,' but his pockets will bulge suspiciously on his return, and there will be a kind of 'ain't going to be no core' look in his eyes. Then he will lean back in the chair covered with the bird and basket chintz and blatantly and vulgarly eat a Cox's, skin and all, regardless of the fact that he's already had at least one properly at dinner with finger bowls and silver knives and plates. Then I shall say in righteous indignation, 'Where's the map?' and he will say, 'Why, in my pocket, can't you see it sticking out?' 'I can see something round,' I say severely. 'Well, what would you have?' he drawls, 'the world's round, isn't it? It follows that the maps should be round, too.' And he picks up his book again and reads. But I, because the flesh is weak and the man tempted me too far, and because his second apple looks so good, I shall shriek out, 'Oh, now I know how Adam felt, Michael, you old serpent, give me one.' 'You can't eat maps,' he says. 'Oh, yes, I can,' I say, and snuggle down beside the fire and lean against his knee and munch in jolly comradeship, while the tale of cores mounts steadily and sizzles with delightful splutterings in the fire. Ah, well!CHAPTER XVEverything now is signed, sealed, and delivered. Gidger's cottage really belongs to me.I have engaged a most enchanting charwoman: she cleans silver and brass better than any one else in the world, and polishes furniture till it dazzles, but she can't scrub, she has an 'inside.' It is of deep and lasting interest to her, and must be such a consolation on a wet day when one wants a hobby in the house. She is never tired of talking of it. It has a way of cropping up in every conversation, like the head of Charles the First in Mr Dick's memorial. Ross calls her 'Our Lady of Ventre,' which sounds more like a Belgian cathedral than it really is! She is very emaciated and her looks are more 'delicate' than her conversation.'You see, mum, it's my inside,' she says; 'what I've suffered no one don't know but those what 'as it; why, one hoperation alone they took out——' but I spare you. So I have a second woman to scrub, and between them they are getting the house like a new pin, and it will burst upon the staff in all its pristine and primeval cleanness. I am a little afraid of the staff. I understand that English servants in these days need 'standing up to.' I can manage a man all right, having had a vast experience, and Ross keeps my hand in, but a woman—how does one stand up to her?To-day the saucepans and baking tins arrived. I was thrilled, so was 'Our Lady of Ventre,' she helped me to unpack them while the other lady scrubbed the shelves.'Could you wash them, do you think?' I asked.'Oh, yes, mum, as long as I don't do no scrubbing; you see, it's my——' but I changed the conversation quickly by asking how her husband was.'I 'ad a field card yesterday' (I wish I had), she answered, ''e was all right then; my 'usband's in the calvery, in the calvery 'e is, always was a one for 'orses.''So is mine,' I said.'Fond of hall dumb hanimals, my 'usband is.''Ah, a kind man,' I answered.''E is that,' she said, waving the lid of a saucepan at me, 'never laid a 'and on me or any of the children, and what I've cost 'im in doctors you never would believe; you see, it's my inside, mum,' and she took a header into it, which I was powerless to prevent. 'Why, when I first went out walkin' with 'im, mum, only nineteen I was at the time, I got such a hawful pain in my inside they took me to the 'orsepital, took me kidney right out they did, never thought I would 'ave lived they didn't. Me young man, 'im what's me 'usband now, you understand, mum, 'e come to see me when I began to git over it a bit; fair upset 'e was when the sister told 'im about me kidney. I says to 'im, "Alb," I says, "I'm sure if we gets married I shall cost you a hawful lot in doctors, and as I lay 'ere," I said, "I've thought it's 'ardly fair to expect a man to feel the same to 'is young woman when she ain't got all 'er orgins, and if you feel you'd rather 'ave some other young lady, why, say so now," I says, and I cried, I did, I was that weak and low, for I thought a deal of Alb, I did, and I didn't want to lose 'im, mum.''"Liza," 'e says, "don't never talk like that again, my gal, I'd rather 'ave you with no hinside than any other young lady what's got all her guts." Always one was Alb to speak 'is mind, and 'e fair blubbed, 'e did, 'e was that upset, and then the nurse come along again and sent 'im off, but I never forgot it, mum' (I shouldn't have either), 'and, as I say, I've never 'ad an unkind word from 'im. 'Elped with the 'ousework, too, many a time, and always lights the kitchen fire and brings me up a cup of tea, 'e does, of a morning, suppose that's why I miss 'im so now 'e's in France,' and a tear splashed down into the saucepan she had started washing.Oh, it was really very sweet: the little woman's eyes were all alight with love at the remembrance of her Alb's renunciation of her 'orgin,' which, after all, was inspired by the same divine spark which caused Dante to adore his Beatrice, Jacob to serve fourteen years for Rachel, and Elizabeth to cry out to Robert,—'How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.. . . . . . I love thee with the breath,Smiles, tears of all my life! and if God choose,I shall but love thee better after death.'I nearly forgot to say that the workpeople are out of all the rooms, except the servants' bedrooms, so we are able to make a start arranging furniture. Really, there isn't time to breathe, but when it is finished Michael will perhaps come home. Oh, the happiness of seeing him walk up to the front door, of taking him round the rooms, of introducing him to all the dear old things, of showing him the garden. I can't think about it, I cannot bear the separation bravely if I do—and for five days I have had no letter.The weather is delightful for going to and fro from Fernfold. It is warmer, and there is a shade of green over the garden. Snowdrops and a few early primroses make a show of bloom and great fat buds are coming on the lilac trees. Soon there will be violets under the hedges. My lines are fallen unto me in pleasant places. Each morning Ross and I walk over to the cottage with sandwiches and Cornish pasties, eggs and things, and coffee hot as hot in thermos flasks. The two chars meet us there and Nannie and the Gidger come sometimes for tea. We all go home tired but happy in the bus at five o'clock. The General Public will be relieved to know that up to now the horse has not succumbed to any other fits on my account!To-day we arranged the hall. Three sides of it are panelled with black oak. There are large red flagstones for a floor and a wide window looking out across a bit of lawn into a little wood already pierced with bluebell spikes. Amongst the family things there is an old deal settle painted black, and this and a spinning wheel now stand beside the open fire, and where there is no panelling on the walls, I've stood an ancient dresser and filled its shelves with plates and dishes, made of stoneware, blue and gold. There are cups to match as well upon the hooks, and on the board below a naval copper rum jug Ross dug up from somewhere, and some copper bowls and pans. The carved oak chest now stands beneath the window, and there are other things besides which you shall see if you like to come and call on me! And then, although it looked so nice it lacked the feel of Michael, and because I am a very foolish woman I hung some caps and a coat of his upon the hooks just by the door, and flung a pipe and matches and a riding whip upon the table, and pretended that he had just come in and said, 'Lunch ready, old lady, what's the pudden?' and was gone upstairs for a moment followed by a trail of dogs. Then because he hadn't, and his things only increased the desolation, and because I have not had a letter for five days, I wept copiously into the aforesaid coat, and made a wet patch on the sleeve. Ross, passing unexpectedly, caught me with wet eyes, so I told him that the smell of Harris tweed always had, did, and would make my eyes water, which was the best excuse I could make at such short notice. This statement my brother received with the tact of an archangel, merely remarking as he went out that he knew exactly what I meant. Some things made his eyes run, for example, pepper and onions, and measles in the early stages. He returned soon after and said,—'Meg, I want my lunch.''But you can't possibly eat your lunch at half-past twelve, Ross.''Can't I? You try me. Nature abhors a vacuum, come on, I'm starving. Now,' said he, as he stood, a great tall thing with his back to the fire, 'you're going to have a long rest this afternoon.''Indeed, I'm not, I've simply stacks to do.''This afternoon and every afternoon,' continued Ross, ignoring my remark. 'Michael says I'm letting you do too much, you're tired out and it's got to be stopped, I've got to read the Riot Act and then the list of crimes.''I should have thought the crimes came first,' I said.'They have,' replied my brother grimly. 'Been reading in bed?' he asked abruptly.'Yes, I haven't been able to sleep the last three nights, and it's no good, I simply must work, I can't do nothing with the news so bad and Michael in the thick of all that hell. Work all day and reading at night stop me thinking, and keeps me sane, so don't ask me to do less, Ross.''I don't "ask" you,' he said, and there was a horrid little silence.One of the masters at Harrow once said to daddy, 'Don't mistake your boy, in spite of his wild spirits, his fun and charm and fascination, there's iron underneath.' The iron has a way of slipping up at times; it was uppermost just then, floating merrily, like the borrowed axe, and where was the prophet to whom I could go for rescue and say, 'Alas, Master.''You're too thin,' he began again, and then he pulled a letter out of his pocket and said, 'I don't really know any one who can express himself more clearly than Michael, once he really starts. I've had a regular jawing to-day from him for letting you get overtired—he——''Oh, Ross,' I interrupted, getting up hurriedly and clutching at his sleeve, 'have you had a letter from Michael to-day?''Yes, and another yesterday; why, what's the matter, kid?''Oh, why didn't you tell me?''It never occurred to me,' he said, 'Michael only wrote yesterday about money matters, and about you to-day; you hear from him every day yourself, don't you?''But I haven't had a letter for nearly a week, Ross.''Why on earth didn't you tell me, then,' he said, sitting down beside me on the settle.'It's such a small worry compared with other people's, but I've been so dreadfully anxious.''You poor little scrap,' he said, and the cry which he had interrupted earlier in the morning I finished on his shoulder comfortably.'What ridiculous handkerchiefs women use,' he remarked presently, exchanging my wet crumpled ball for his nice big, cool, dry one. 'Some chap said that men must work and women must weep, and you'd think that the sex that did the weeping would go in for the larger handkerchiefs, but I suppose you can't expect a female thing to be consistent. I shall have to ask our Lady of Ventre to bring a mop if you don't stop soon, and it'll be so bad for her inside, Meg.''How can you be so absurd,' I said, cheering up a bit, 'and I'm not a female thing.''You're a very provoking one,' he replied, 'and if there's another interval in Michael's letters, I'm to be told.''What does Michael say?' I asked.'I'm to be told,' he repeated, tilting up my chin.'So you said before,' I answered, trying to take his hand away, 'but I don't want to worry you with all my woes, you've got enough of your own.''My dear child, I could have told you two days ago that as I had heard from Michael his letters to you were only hung up in the post, and you would have been spared all this needless worry. Are you going to tell me in future, or must I order Nannie to bring me all your letters first?' and he tilted my chin still higher.'I will tell you,' I said weakly, leaning up against him, it seemed the only way to stop him looking at me, 'What does Michael say?''That the Power of Attorney he gave me to manage his affairs is now extended to his wife, that there's to be no more reading in bed, no more rackety days in London. Blows me up sky high for letting you work all day and sew miles of little frills at night. Here, I'll read you out the last bit: "Yes, it's all right about the shares. You take quite decent care of my goods, why can't you of my chattel? I'll scrag you if you let her get knocked up; don't take the slightest notice of anything she says, make her obey orders."''The audacity of the man, the cheek,' I exclaimed, 'to call me a "chattel," to talk of "orders"—to a person who by Act of Parliament has been put on an equality with himself—to a woman with the vote—to a householder—the autocracy of it!''Good word that,' said my aggravating brother, 'but then, you see, Michael isn't exactly Mr Jellaby, and I'm going to see that you do obey orders, and chuck in a few extras of my own—milk and things,' said Ross vaguely. 'Here, get outside this sandwich and have some more coffee for a start, and then up you go to get a rest.''It's so nice by the fire,' I remarked rebelliously, and then he remembered the old joke and said whimsically, 'You know what you promised in the harness-room that day, darling,' and he gave me one of his rare kisses.So I hope Michael the caveman is satisfied—that black beast—out there. All my plans upset, all the crockery still in straw, no curtains up, and not a picture hung. Oh, I had planned to have the cave so nice for his return, to sprinkle all the floor with fine sea sand, to hang up the skin of that big tiger that he killed, to keep away the draught, and over the driftwood fire to set a pot of rabbit stew (he always is so hungry), and then perhaps with a new necklace for myself I should have been ready.Just as we were getting in the bus to-night our Lady of Ventre came running out to ask me if she might come two hours late to-morrow. She said that an old woman in the village was dying, and was sure to be dead by the morning, and she had been asked to lay her out, there being no nieces or daughters who could do it. 'Can't say I like the job, mum, but one can't 'ardly refuse to perform the last horfice for the dead seeing as 'ow we've all got to come to it; it's different if you know a person; if it was you now, mum, or the capting, I'd do it with pleasure.' Ross's guffaw nearly took the roof off.When we got back to Fernfold there were three letters from Michael, but I only liked two of them. If he gives another man a Power of Attorney to row his wife, he oughtn't to do it himself as well. It's not cricket. Oh, well, I read the third one through again and liked it better, because I left out all the written part and only read between the lines—my darling!CHAPTER XVIAnother week has passed. The workpeople have gone and taken all their pots and pails. Gidger's cottage is almost finished. It will be quite completed by to-night and we are going to sleep in it.At the moment the two chars are working in the kitchen: Brown with his leg up is unpacking china, Ross ordering every one about, Nannie and the Gidger very busy in the nursery (the Poppet giving much advice about her own department), while the only person who really matters is doing 'nothing much' for a day or two, except cussing her male relatives in her heart.The day-nursery is rather pretty—soft green walls, so that there may be no glare to strain the precious eyes: white furniture, just big enough for tiny folk: cupboards with shelves, low enough for little hands to reach the toys and that lovely 'Masque of Flowers' for pictures.There is a window seat with cushions, where big people can tell small ones fairy stories in the dusk. There's a comfy chair for Nannie and a rocking-horse and doll's house, all presents from Aunt Constance, sent 'with love.'Then in the Gidger's other room the same soft green, and all the pictures the small owner loves: that perfect Madonna of Andrea del Sarto, and a copy of Watts' 'Whence—Whither?' Do you remember that perfect baby, who runs out of the sea toward you, whichever way you stand and look at it. By special request, hung where she can always see them, are the two great favourites, 'The Good Shepherd' with a lamb, and the other—five Persian fluffy kittens sitting in a row.'Because I like,' explained the Gidger to Uncle Woss, 'to see Jesus and the tittens when I get into my byes.''Would you call King George by his Christian name, Gidger?' Ross asked.'Course not, Uncle Woss.''Why?''Because it would be most fwightful cheek.''Then don't you see it's much more cheek to call Him by His, darling?''But I didn't mean to be wude to Him,' said the Poppet tearfully, 'I'm fond of Him.''Of course, darling, so if you just say "Sorry, Sir," it'll be all right.'So the Gidger said, 'Sorry, Sir,' and the conversation changed to kittens.'I wish I had a titten, Uncle Woss, just like the one in the miggle.'Ross said he would see what could be done, with which my daughter seemed contented.But, ah, why is there only one little bed in the nursery, why is there no little son? Yes, of course, Michael is 'better to me than ten sons,' only he's so 'normous, the other would be so cuddley.The Gidger does so want a long clothes baby doll. She's got a mother hunger for it, and I won't give her one. Shall I tell you why? If I should ever have the joy to hope about a little son, I shall hunt the garden for a nest, and let the Gidger peep at it with all the soft, downy things inside. Then I shall say, 'I made a little nest for you once, darling, just underneath my heart,' and I shall take her up in the nursery and open a drawer and show her all the small robes and garments that I made for her, and then she'll say, 'Oh, muvver, why won't you let me have a long clothes baby dolly?' And I shall tell her about the second nest that I've begun to make, and then I shall give her a most perfect baby doll that I've got waiting in a box just now. I shall ask her sometimes if she'd like to come and learn to sew some clothes for her baby while I sew some for mine: and if she pricks her little fingers, and makes a tiny spot of blood upon the narrow hem, and looks at me with eyes like drowned forget-me-nots (as she does if she is going to cry), I shall say, 'But, darling, don't you think it's worth it for your baby?' She'll learn to know then, when she's married and she's got the mother hunger, that her baby will be worth the mother pain.And now the evening time has come. The house is finished, the last picture is up, the last curtain hung, and all the dear domestic gods arranged. Alas! the fly in the ointment has turned up also. The staff has arrived, and I am terrified of it. I feel all awash inside to think that I have to order the dinner in the morning and tell the S.P. what her work is. However, 'sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.'Tired, but happy, I wandered into the scented garden in the dusk to gather great branches of white and purple lilac, armfuls of forget-me-not and fragrant pheasant eye and the very early honeysuckle that grows over the porch. Then I filled every vase and pot that could be induced to hold water, and some that couldn't, Ross says, because I stood a leaky jar on his dressing-table and the water trickled into the drawer beneath and reduced the contents to pulp.The house is so sweet, filled with the spring, but if only I had decorated all the rooms for Michael! My heart goes out to him to-night with a great longing. The rooms are full of the peace and fragrance only found in old houses, yet, dear as it is, it can never be to me anything more than a house till he comes and transforms it intoHome.CHAPTER XVIII think 'The Staff' might be worse, though it could not be more alarming. Dulcie cooks beautifully, only she won't cook enough of anything, and the S.P. is very superior, quite appallingly so. She does her work well, but she despises me. I try to like her, but it is difficult to feel any affection for a person who looks as if you were a bad smell under her nose. She has always lived with such exclusive families that I cannot think she will stay very long with us. Her last place was a failure, she only stayed a month. 'After I got there,' she explained, 'I found the mistress was not a lady.''How did you know?' I inquired politely.'Oh, she never dressed for dinner, put the coals on with her fingers, and had tea in the dining-room. (By a merciful dispensation we have ours in the hall.) 'I was most uncomfortable,' she added, 'but I liked him. He was a real gentleman, his underclothing was all made of silk.''My 'Ilda' needs a great deal of polishing. At lunch the S.P. teaches her to wait at table, but it is a daily martyrdom for any one so perfectly genteel, so unutterably refined!Monica turned up yesterday, unexpectedly, in a motor-car. She stayed ten minutes and then dashed back to her hospital.'Oh, Meg!' she laughed as she came in, 'why didn't you tell me the truth years ago? What an utter little fool I've always been, but I've found out that I love him after all.''Well, you'd better write and tell him so,' I said, and kissed her.'I have,' she answered, blushing like a wild rose. 'Aren't I a bold, bad girl? Aren't modern women hussies? I'm so longing for his letter, Meg. Oh, you were funny! I'm not a bit patrician, am I? I adore cement!'Dear old Monica!And after she had departed like a young whirlwind I had another thrill. The curate and his wife called, and he turned out to be Mr Williams. He is still solemn, and thinner and limper even than he used to be, but he cheered up a bit at the mention of the Bishop of Ligeria. She is a frail little person with a dress like a spasm and the most desolating hat it has been my lot to meet for years. I wonder if she dresses so from choice or poverty.I was glad my brother was in London when they called. His eyes would have been fascinated by the reserve of food on Mr Williams's coat. Funny old thing I Ross is always so well-groomed himself that, like the robin, he makes all the other birds look dirty.When he came home he brought a hamper.'The one in the miggle's in there,' he said with pride.'You are famed for your lucidity,' I remarked politely.It was a kitten for the Gidger, such a purring, fluffy atom, just out of the frame and christened Fitzbattleaxe by my daughter the moment she saw it. When Nannie had whisked her away, Ross said,—'You'll have to put up with me for a bit longer, old thing. I got a big overhauling to-day. They say my arm is better, and I can have it in a sling now instead of these infernal bandages.''Well, that's something,' I observed, but Ross is not of a grateful nature.'Small something, I think,' he snorted. 'Boards are a lot of old women, said I must be content to "Make haste slowly," as if I were a schoolgirl. I want to be back with my men. Oh, what an awful time it seems since I saw anybody decent.''Well,' I ejaculated, 'if that's not the pink-edged limit!''Oh, twins don't count, Meg, but I am in a vile temper. Let's go and do something. Clean the greenhouse roof, shall we? There's just light enough. Come on!'Ross decided the plan of campaign. I was to pour the water from my bedroom window on to the glass beneath, while he, armed with a long broom borrowed from the kitchen, would stand on a pair of steps in the garden and clean the glass with the broom aforesaid.'Now, Meg, plenty of water, no stinting,' he ordered.So I got a huge canfull, and in order that Ross should have all the water he desired, I poured it out, not from the spout but from the other end, with great pride and force. Alas, 'the ways of mice and men aft gang agley.' The gutter of the beastly thing was too small to catch my Niagara, and the entire volume of water rushed over the glass, down Ross's neck, into his eyes and mouth, flooding his pockets and soaking him to the skin.He gave one awful yell and overbalanced into the water butt, the lid of which, of course, was off (it would be in my garden). In my agitation I dropped the can, which followed the water in a wild leap on to the path below, smashing two or three panes of glass in its mad career.'Well, you have done it,' said Ross, surveying the wreckage from the water tub. 'There's no doubt if you want a thing really well done, it's best to do it oneself.'Then Sam appeared and looked reproachfully at me, and spoke to Ross, and I heard the words 'arm' and something about 'taking more care.'Ross looked through Sam in that disgusting way he has when he isn't pleased, and said,—'I can't go through the house like this, Meg; why do you have your tubs lined with green. Get me a bath, Brown.''Cold, sir?''How can I get this stuff off in cold? Hot, of course,' snapped his master, 'and ask the Titmouse for the ladder, Brown, and I'll go through the bathroom window.'As I went upstairs a little later, Ross's door was slightly open; Sam was catching it. King's Regulations and the Hickley Woods wrestling for the mastery.'You'll excuse me, sir, you don't take care.'Then my brother's voice floated towards me down the passage.'No, I'll not excuse you, Brown. I've had too much cheek from you the last ten minutes! Get me a shirt. If you mention my arm again in front of Mrs Ellsley, you'll quit. Now my coat. Do you call this brushed? Now a handkerchief, and get out.'Then as he remembered that he was now promoted to a sling he added stormily,—'Understand once for all, I will not be fussed over like a schoolgirl, I'm not a sucking dove.''Oh, no, sir,' said Brown, and I caught a flicker of amusement on his impassive countenance as he closed the door behind him with the wet clothes on his arm.Just then the carrier brought a crate of hens and a box of rabbits from Aunt Constance. We felt rather like Noah when the animals began to file into the ark. The hens were the breed that have the very large combs. 'My 'Ilda' remarked as they were put into their run,—'My! you won't get many eggs from them, mum, they're all cocks.'The Gidger loved the rabbits and I told her how the mother bunny would presently have some little ones, and that she would love them very much and make a warm nest for them, and pull off her own soft fur to keep her babies warm. I want my little daughter to know of all the wonderful protective instincts God has implanted in His creatures and the sweet provision that He makes for all the tiny things.Just before dinner we flew down the village to buy some bran for the new arrivals. On our return my brother did one of his atrocious lightning changes.When Sam let us in Ross said,—'Thanks, Sam, any letters?' and then 'Knee bad?''Pretty middling, sir.''Go and put it up, then. What are you about on it for?''It'll be time enough to put it up after dinner, sir. Imustwait at table to-night, the parlour-maid is out.'The atmosphere in the hall became suddenly arctic. I shivered as the cold of it blew into me. I could feel Ross looking through Sam as he asked coldly,—'Did you intend to say "must" to me, Brown?' And Brown said,—'No, sir,' and did not appear at dinner. I sent him up a book and two Cox's oranges, so I had to continue 'My 'Ilda's' education in the art of waiting.As she handed the soup she decorated each plate with a beautiful scallop like a flannel petticoat. I suppose it is difficult to keep liquid level and walk at the same time. She had put no fish forks on the table, so I said reprovingly,—'What are we to eat the fish with, Hilda?''Oh, whatever you like, Mrs Ellsley,' she said brightly. Ross drank some water hurriedly. I endeavoured to make my meaning clearer and to keep my face straight at the same time, whereupon 'My 'Ilda' said,—'I do like being here; you don't mind how many mistakes I make so long as I do it right.'She shot a knife and fork into Ross's lap, mercifully they were clean or there would have been ructions, then she upset a glass of water and got the hiccoughs, and later tripped over the footstool and sent the cheese straws flying like leaves before an autumn gale.When 'My 'Ilda' brought the coffee into the hall she stepped on the kitten's tail, and as that indignant fluffy ball spat at her, she remarked,—'My! ain't Fitzbattleaxe got a temper, I don't think. Your faceisred, Mrs Ellsley; did I do it all right at dinner?'As I went to my room to fetch a book I heard her fall down the back stairs with a pail. It was the end of an imperfect meal. Ross says I ought to start a nursing home for sergeant-majors suffering from depression—they'd be cured in a week, and then he remarked,—'I wonder if Sam's got a decent supper. I must go and see.'When he came down again he tossed a little box into my lap and said,—'Why didn't you tellmethat you wanted a new necklace? I'd have loved to give you one.''Whatdoyou mean, Ross?''Michael wrote to me to-day that you had said you wanted a "new necklace for yourself" directly the cave was finished, and that I was to buy you one.'Oh, isn't he absurd and dear? So I opened the box, and inside there were two to choose from. So I chose the one of very perfect pearls, and then for some extraordinary reason of his own Ross kissed me and said,—'HowMichael spoils you, darling.'But two kisses in twelve days. He must be ill, I think.CHAPTER XVIIIIt's All Fools' Day. Perhaps that's why the Titmouse elected to get the rheumatics that come from damp attics, so that I had to tell the Stench what 'to be getting on with.'As I walked round the garden with him I asked if all the seeds were in.'In, an' coming up by the galore, mum, an' I've given the turnips a dressin' of soot, as it makes a vast difference to 'em on their first appearance through the soil, mum.'I could well believe it!'I think you'd better dig the bed in front of the kitchen window then.''How deep, mum, two spits?'I hadn't the foggiest notion how deep that is, but I said,—'Oh, yes,of course, dig down as deep as ever you can; you can't dig too deep, Stench—Tench, I mean!'Ross thinks he knows a bit about gardening, so at lunch I said,—'Ross, how big is a spit?''Depends on how bad your cold is,' he began, but I closed the conversation.Alas, alas, hear the end. Half an hour later the S.P. said would I speak to the captain in the garden? I found him in front of the kitchen window surveying some extraordinary earth-works and excavations, the Stench standing by looking particularly wooden.'What on earth——' I began.'I've dug so deep, mum, I come to a poipe; do it matter?' said the boy.I surveyed the scene of his labours and found the little wretch had dug down to the kitchen drain.'Gardening is certainly your strong point, Meg. Do you think the boy has dug this bit deep enough, or shall he take up the drains as well? By Jove,' added my brother, doubling up suddenly with laughter, 'what an acquisition you'd both be in the army. I never saw a better communication trench in my life.'At tea-time Ross gloomily surveyed the table lightly spread with thin bread and butter and minute cakes.'Well, there doesn't seem enough for Fitzbattleaxe, so let's go and have tea with Sam. He's dead down on his luck, too.''Knee bad?' I questioned.'Putrid, so's his temper since I rowed him this morning.''What did you row him for?' I asked.'Usual thing. Found him standing up brushing my clothes to-day, so I pitched into him for once in his life, hot and strong. It is rotten for him, but I really had to tell him a few home truths. He simply must stick his leg up all day.'So we went up into Sam's little sitting-room with Fitzbattleaxe.'Better?' said Ross, as he went in.'Yes, thank you, sir,' said Sam, and got up hastily as I entered.'Forgotten your orders again, Brown?' asked Ross sternly, opening the door to go out.'No, sir,' said Sam, still standing up. (I do love to see him 'fighting' Ross.) 'Orders were: "Bed at 11. Not to stand up when it were you only, between the hours of 10.30 a.m. and 7 p.m.," sir.'Quite obviously Sam was obeying the strict letter of the law, so Ross came in again, and I remarked,—'And I say, same hours when it's only me, Sam.''If you could both remember about the verb "to be,"' began my brother.'I can't,' I said.Sam dropped into a chair, looking as if he'd like to smash all clocks, and remarked he was absolutely fed up.'Well, we're not, we're half starved. That's why we've come to tea.''You want to count your mercies, Sam,' I said, which being a remark to which my Aunt Amelia is much addicted, was the most aggravating thing I could think of at the moment. When one is down on one's luck it is fatal to be sympathetic, and Sam was down on his, right on the bed-rock bottom of it.'Well, I'm counting the mercies he's got and we haven't,' said Ross; 'there's quite a respectable bit of heaven spread on this table at the moment. A whole loaf, a pound of butter, two pounds of strawberry jam and jorams of Devonshire cream, goodies with sugar on top, and a plum cake that you can cut. My hat, some people have all the luck. It's a regular Hickley Wood one.''Make the tea, Sam,' I exclaimed, 'the kettle's boiling; mind you don't set the woods alight.''Have I ever set the woods alight, miss?' Sam asked indignantly.'Nor ever failed to lose your temper either, if I suggested you would,' I answered.So Sam grinned and felt better, and made a long arm for the kettle, and brewed tea, and cut up bread and cream, and we had it in the Hickley Woods, as we've had it millions of times together. It was just the same. Whenever I had finished my slice, Sam put another on my plate, with mountains of cream and jam on it. At the third I remarked,—'Sam, there really are limits.''Yes, but you ain't reached them yet, miss; four's yours.''Do you think you ought to speak to me like that, now I am married and have a daughter, Sam?''He gets you muddled up with the daughter, I expect, same as I do,' remarked Ross, 'only the Gidger is so much more sober and serious-minded than you're ever likely to be.''Four,' I called out; 'limit's reached, Sam.''Well, there isn't any more cream, anyway,' said Sam, which, of course, was the one and only reason why we stopped in Hickley Woods.'I begin to feel better,' observed my brother. 'Why don't I have enough to eat at lunch, Meg, I do at breakfast?''I see to your breakfast,' said Sam, 'and I'd see you had a good lunch if only I was allowed down.''Well, you aren't,' said my brother, 'so that's that, and I should think it would be better manners if you saw we had a good tea when we're up. Pass the cake. Here, you eat the little chaps, I'll have the plum.'So Sam ate all the small cakes with sugar on top, and Fitzbattleaxe got the cream tin to lick out. He went right inside and stuck, and had to be lugged out by the tail. Then we shoved the table back and sat round the fire, and talked about the old days. At seven o'clock Nannie looked round the door. She was promptly hauled in and sat on Ross's knee.'Sam,' she scolded, 'why do you keep them out so late? I really shall have to tell your father to wallop you. I've often threatened to, I really will to-night.''Let's run her down the passage, Sam, for cheek,' said Ross, and they were just about to do it when Brown suddenly got up and said,—'Want a bath, sir?' and Nannie said, 'Will you wear your black again, ma'am?' and, of course, it was that wretched S.P. come to clear away the tea. The smell under her nose was rather worse than usual, and the picnic broke up hurriedly. I felt as if I had been having tea with my brother's man-servant, and Ross had been nursing one of the maids. Oh, I do loathe that woman!It was a most unfortunate dinner to-night, like one of those you get at Aunt Amelia's. There didn't seem to be anything solid to eat. At the end Sam handed Ross sardines on toast. 'What a thundering lot of hors d'oeuvres we seem to be having to-night, when's the dinner coming?''Savoury, sir,' said Sam.'You don't mean to tell me,' said Ross, pushing back his chair and glaring at Sam, 'that I'vehadmy dinner?''You've had what there was of it, sir.''Well, I'm jiggered. Why on earth, Meg, don't you make them cook more food. Really——'''Tisn't her fault,' said Sam, still in the Hickley Woods, sticking up for me as he always did; 'she's told them times without number; it's no good blaming her. Shall I cut some sandwiches?''Sam, I suppose I can reprove my sister without your interfering, and I never blame, I always rule by love.''Same as you did this morning, sir,' grinned Sam, 'will you have large cups of coffee with your sandwiches?''Do you think that's a respectful remark to make to your superior officer, Brown?''No, sir, sorry.''I shall judge the measure of your repentance by the number of sandwiches you cut,' said Ross, 'and if the cups of coffee are very large, I might be inclined to overlook your cheek, otherwise——'But Sam had vanished into the kitchen, and we went into the hall to wait for supper. A few minutes afterwards, Sam dumped a tray of food on the table.We settled down comfortably for a good long evening. At 10.15, just as we were beginning to enjoy ourselves, Sam came in, he looked like milk and butter, and his voice was a caress.'Turned your bath on, sir.''Are you dotty, Brown?' asked my brother.'Certainly not, sir.''Well, what are you gassing about baths for at this hour of the afternoon, you gloomy ox, you're worse than a keeper.''Orders is orders, sir. If I've got to go to bed at 11 you'll have to go at 10.15, if I'm to see to your arm.''My hat,' ejaculated Ross, looking across at me in hopeless consternation, 'whata fool I am.''First of April, sir,' said Sam, and fled upstairs.
'I am sending you a copy, painted by a pal of mine, of the Mediæval Portrait of Queen Ediva. I expect you never heard of the lady, Little 'un, but she was the second wife of Edward the Elder, A.D. 961. Do try to remember that date. She was a great benefactress to Christ Church Priory, which I suppose you know is Canterbury Cathedral. In the picture you will see she is dressed in her royal robes and crown. Notice the beautiful jewelled and enamelled morse which fastens her ermine-lined cloak. The original is painted on wood and is presumably of the latter part of the fourteenth century. It is signed I.P.F., and if he's the chap I think he is, the date will be about 1392. You can hang it in the dining room of your ridiculous cottage. Why don't you say what the date of it is, instead of jawing about the creepers and leaded windows, which I expect are modern.'
Alas, there are no old deeds, so I do not know the date.
There was a letter from Aunt Constance, such a sad one. She asks me if I would like the Manor House nursery furniture for the Gidger. She has been saving it for her grandchildren, but now that Eustace has finally decided, there will never be any little folk to use the pretty things. Ross ejaculates at intervals, after reading the letter,—
'Oh, my hat! I simply couldn't, and when he could fight, too!'
No, I don't think the monastic life is the one for Ross.
So poor Aunt Constance, being a soldier's daughter, eats her heart out because her Eustace cannot see his way to fight and pray. Well, it's a funny throw-back.
Aunt Amelia acknowledged my letter telling her of my plans in thoroughly characteristic fashion. There is a good bit about the Devil in her epistle. She thinks 'one's days might better be occupied these solemn times than in amassing possessions and lands, marrying and giving in marriage'; but Michael and I are married, and it's only one house, and as to land, two acres and a cow is considered a minimum, and I've left out the cow. She 'hopes that the Vicar is faithful, and wears a black gown,' that the Gidger is showing signs of grace, and that I have been able to purge from the child's young mind the recollection of that dreadful recitation, taught her by some ungodly friend of her poor afflicted nephew.
'Does she mean me?' asked Ross indignantly.
'Yes, you're the afflicted one, and Captain Everard is the person who——'
'Well, old Everard does know some tales, I admit,' said Ross, 'but go on.'
'Oh, I can't bear to read any more of it out.' I threw the letter at him.
'Why does she always spell devil with a capital "D"? I should have thought the smallest she could write was good enough for that old beast,' remarked my brother as he handed the missive back.
CHAPTER XIV
I don't know if the day in London was too much for Ross, but he had a bad 'go' of pain in the night and cussed with great enthusiasm after breakfast because he couldn't light his own pipe. Somehow he cannot strike a match with his left hand, though heaps of men do it, I believe. Half an hour after the outburst Sam appeared with a vase filled with spills.
'Why these funny things?' said Ross, picking one up.
'Spills, sir, light them at the fire, sir; can't get matches.'
'Oh,' said Ross, and tried one. 'Why, Sam, this is a brain wave. I can light my own pipe.'
'Can you, sir,' said Sam, going away contented. He is so thoughtful in those little ways. He gives Ross such a very perfect service. Sam never attempts to serve two masters. He is wholehearted for his one.
After lunch Ross said that he didn't feel up to going out, and that his "Rev. Mother" wanted him to lie down and take some soothing syrup.
'And are you going to?' I asked.
'Of course I'm not. Do you think I always do what Brown says. The 'Rev. Mother's' the one that will do the lying down,' said my brother grimly.
So I went over to the Gidger's cottage and found it full of ladders, paint-pots, pails of white-wash, workmen knocking down partitions, while 'Uncle John,' his hair and whiskers bristling like a wild man of the woods, whirls in and out like a dog at a fair, glorying in all the mess and confusion. Now that the house is mine, I go round anxiously and point out the flaws and cracks in the walls, and 'Uncle John' says soothingly, 'Oh, yes, mum, it only wants a bit o' mortar, it won't cost you much,' 'a bit o' mortar' is his panacea for all ills. He says the roof is sound except over the powdering closet, which may give trouble, no doubt 'a bit o' mortar will set it right.'
The two partitions are down and the doorways unblocked so that I can now walk through my entire domain without going out in the garden, over the fence and in at the other front door. All the rooms have had one coat of distemper and the drawing-room is finished. The pale cream walls are quite delightful and cry out for water-colours in gold mounts and frames, the oak floors have been beautifully polished, and joy, there are three Persian rugs in the Depository. To-day I bought a pair of plain old iron dogs to rest the logs on in the open fireplace. The casement curtains are to be made of the anemone besprinkled chintz with frills along the top. But, alas, the little curtains cut into more yards of stuff than one would think, and so I must have others in the bedrooms. I went into a shop to-day and asked the man to show me dimity.
'Dimity,' said he with a supercilious stare, 'dimity, why, good gracious, it's a hundred years old, madam.'
'But my house,' I said with quiet scorn, 'must be at least two hundred and fifty.'
I bought a seventeenth century settee and some deep chairs when I was up in town. They have loose covers made of chintz with a design of birds and baskets printed from the original old wood blocks.
The drawing-room is such a jolly room, very light and bright, with three big windows facing north and east and south. It has only one beam going across the ceiling and none of the sombre dark beauty of the dining-room, so I feel I may be flippant there. I shall have heaps of colour in the covers and curtains. There are a few delightful things of daddy's for this room—a lovely old mahogany corner cupboard with latticed doors, and some bits of china to go in it, bowls and jugs and funny old cups without handles. There are also three beautiful chairs with rounded backs filled in with lattice work painted in black and gold; the gold is very faint and worn in places. The seats are cane and the front legs very spindly, the kind of chair one's heaviest male visitor will inevitably choose. I think they must be French, they are so elegant. No one should sit in them but an old gentleman with powdered hair, delicate lace ruffles, and a little cane, and his lady opposite must have a small patch box, there is one that I can lend her if she likes. None of my men folk will look well in them, unless perhaps my father, in his robes and full lawn sleeves. And I bought an old mahogany bureau with deep drawers and little hidy holes and secret places in it. It was really most expensive, but I asked Ross, and he said Michael's balance at the bank was so indecent that he thought I really must. I don't think we shall want much else; I like space and Michael needs plenty; he will only fall over things if I crowd the rooms too much, and complain that there is nowhere for his legs.
I forgot to say there is a great cupboard in this room with battened shelves for fruit. (I told you the domestic offices were all mixed up), and there are Cox's orange apple trees in the garden. I seem to see a man who will get up suddenly and leave the fire on a winter's night and hie him to the cupboard 'for a map,' but his pockets will bulge suspiciously on his return, and there will be a kind of 'ain't going to be no core' look in his eyes. Then he will lean back in the chair covered with the bird and basket chintz and blatantly and vulgarly eat a Cox's, skin and all, regardless of the fact that he's already had at least one properly at dinner with finger bowls and silver knives and plates. Then I shall say in righteous indignation, 'Where's the map?' and he will say, 'Why, in my pocket, can't you see it sticking out?' 'I can see something round,' I say severely. 'Well, what would you have?' he drawls, 'the world's round, isn't it? It follows that the maps should be round, too.' And he picks up his book again and reads. But I, because the flesh is weak and the man tempted me too far, and because his second apple looks so good, I shall shriek out, 'Oh, now I know how Adam felt, Michael, you old serpent, give me one.' 'You can't eat maps,' he says. 'Oh, yes, I can,' I say, and snuggle down beside the fire and lean against his knee and munch in jolly comradeship, while the tale of cores mounts steadily and sizzles with delightful splutterings in the fire. Ah, well!
CHAPTER XV
Everything now is signed, sealed, and delivered. Gidger's cottage really belongs to me.
I have engaged a most enchanting charwoman: she cleans silver and brass better than any one else in the world, and polishes furniture till it dazzles, but she can't scrub, she has an 'inside.' It is of deep and lasting interest to her, and must be such a consolation on a wet day when one wants a hobby in the house. She is never tired of talking of it. It has a way of cropping up in every conversation, like the head of Charles the First in Mr Dick's memorial. Ross calls her 'Our Lady of Ventre,' which sounds more like a Belgian cathedral than it really is! She is very emaciated and her looks are more 'delicate' than her conversation.
'You see, mum, it's my inside,' she says; 'what I've suffered no one don't know but those what 'as it; why, one hoperation alone they took out——' but I spare you. So I have a second woman to scrub, and between them they are getting the house like a new pin, and it will burst upon the staff in all its pristine and primeval cleanness. I am a little afraid of the staff. I understand that English servants in these days need 'standing up to.' I can manage a man all right, having had a vast experience, and Ross keeps my hand in, but a woman—how does one stand up to her?
To-day the saucepans and baking tins arrived. I was thrilled, so was 'Our Lady of Ventre,' she helped me to unpack them while the other lady scrubbed the shelves.
'Could you wash them, do you think?' I asked.
'Oh, yes, mum, as long as I don't do no scrubbing; you see, it's my——' but I changed the conversation quickly by asking how her husband was.
'I 'ad a field card yesterday' (I wish I had), she answered, ''e was all right then; my 'usband's in the calvery, in the calvery 'e is, always was a one for 'orses.'
'So is mine,' I said.
'Fond of hall dumb hanimals, my 'usband is.'
'Ah, a kind man,' I answered.
''E is that,' she said, waving the lid of a saucepan at me, 'never laid a 'and on me or any of the children, and what I've cost 'im in doctors you never would believe; you see, it's my inside, mum,' and she took a header into it, which I was powerless to prevent. 'Why, when I first went out walkin' with 'im, mum, only nineteen I was at the time, I got such a hawful pain in my inside they took me to the 'orsepital, took me kidney right out they did, never thought I would 'ave lived they didn't. Me young man, 'im what's me 'usband now, you understand, mum, 'e come to see me when I began to git over it a bit; fair upset 'e was when the sister told 'im about me kidney. I says to 'im, "Alb," I says, "I'm sure if we gets married I shall cost you a hawful lot in doctors, and as I lay 'ere," I said, "I've thought it's 'ardly fair to expect a man to feel the same to 'is young woman when she ain't got all 'er orgins, and if you feel you'd rather 'ave some other young lady, why, say so now," I says, and I cried, I did, I was that weak and low, for I thought a deal of Alb, I did, and I didn't want to lose 'im, mum.'
'"Liza," 'e says, "don't never talk like that again, my gal, I'd rather 'ave you with no hinside than any other young lady what's got all her guts." Always one was Alb to speak 'is mind, and 'e fair blubbed, 'e did, 'e was that upset, and then the nurse come along again and sent 'im off, but I never forgot it, mum' (I shouldn't have either), 'and, as I say, I've never 'ad an unkind word from 'im. 'Elped with the 'ousework, too, many a time, and always lights the kitchen fire and brings me up a cup of tea, 'e does, of a morning, suppose that's why I miss 'im so now 'e's in France,' and a tear splashed down into the saucepan she had started washing.
Oh, it was really very sweet: the little woman's eyes were all alight with love at the remembrance of her Alb's renunciation of her 'orgin,' which, after all, was inspired by the same divine spark which caused Dante to adore his Beatrice, Jacob to serve fourteen years for Rachel, and Elizabeth to cry out to Robert,—
'How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.. . . . . . I love thee with the breath,Smiles, tears of all my life! and if God choose,I shall but love thee better after death.'
'How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.. . . . . . I love thee with the breath,Smiles, tears of all my life! and if God choose,I shall but love thee better after death.'
'How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
. . . . . . I love thee with the breath,
Smiles, tears of all my life! and if God choose,
I shall but love thee better after death.'
I nearly forgot to say that the workpeople are out of all the rooms, except the servants' bedrooms, so we are able to make a start arranging furniture. Really, there isn't time to breathe, but when it is finished Michael will perhaps come home. Oh, the happiness of seeing him walk up to the front door, of taking him round the rooms, of introducing him to all the dear old things, of showing him the garden. I can't think about it, I cannot bear the separation bravely if I do—and for five days I have had no letter.
The weather is delightful for going to and fro from Fernfold. It is warmer, and there is a shade of green over the garden. Snowdrops and a few early primroses make a show of bloom and great fat buds are coming on the lilac trees. Soon there will be violets under the hedges. My lines are fallen unto me in pleasant places. Each morning Ross and I walk over to the cottage with sandwiches and Cornish pasties, eggs and things, and coffee hot as hot in thermos flasks. The two chars meet us there and Nannie and the Gidger come sometimes for tea. We all go home tired but happy in the bus at five o'clock. The General Public will be relieved to know that up to now the horse has not succumbed to any other fits on my account!
To-day we arranged the hall. Three sides of it are panelled with black oak. There are large red flagstones for a floor and a wide window looking out across a bit of lawn into a little wood already pierced with bluebell spikes. Amongst the family things there is an old deal settle painted black, and this and a spinning wheel now stand beside the open fire, and where there is no panelling on the walls, I've stood an ancient dresser and filled its shelves with plates and dishes, made of stoneware, blue and gold. There are cups to match as well upon the hooks, and on the board below a naval copper rum jug Ross dug up from somewhere, and some copper bowls and pans. The carved oak chest now stands beneath the window, and there are other things besides which you shall see if you like to come and call on me! And then, although it looked so nice it lacked the feel of Michael, and because I am a very foolish woman I hung some caps and a coat of his upon the hooks just by the door, and flung a pipe and matches and a riding whip upon the table, and pretended that he had just come in and said, 'Lunch ready, old lady, what's the pudden?' and was gone upstairs for a moment followed by a trail of dogs. Then because he hadn't, and his things only increased the desolation, and because I have not had a letter for five days, I wept copiously into the aforesaid coat, and made a wet patch on the sleeve. Ross, passing unexpectedly, caught me with wet eyes, so I told him that the smell of Harris tweed always had, did, and would make my eyes water, which was the best excuse I could make at such short notice. This statement my brother received with the tact of an archangel, merely remarking as he went out that he knew exactly what I meant. Some things made his eyes run, for example, pepper and onions, and measles in the early stages. He returned soon after and said,—
'Meg, I want my lunch.'
'But you can't possibly eat your lunch at half-past twelve, Ross.'
'Can't I? You try me. Nature abhors a vacuum, come on, I'm starving. Now,' said he, as he stood, a great tall thing with his back to the fire, 'you're going to have a long rest this afternoon.'
'Indeed, I'm not, I've simply stacks to do.'
'This afternoon and every afternoon,' continued Ross, ignoring my remark. 'Michael says I'm letting you do too much, you're tired out and it's got to be stopped, I've got to read the Riot Act and then the list of crimes.'
'I should have thought the crimes came first,' I said.
'They have,' replied my brother grimly. 'Been reading in bed?' he asked abruptly.
'Yes, I haven't been able to sleep the last three nights, and it's no good, I simply must work, I can't do nothing with the news so bad and Michael in the thick of all that hell. Work all day and reading at night stop me thinking, and keeps me sane, so don't ask me to do less, Ross.'
'I don't "ask" you,' he said, and there was a horrid little silence.
One of the masters at Harrow once said to daddy, 'Don't mistake your boy, in spite of his wild spirits, his fun and charm and fascination, there's iron underneath.' The iron has a way of slipping up at times; it was uppermost just then, floating merrily, like the borrowed axe, and where was the prophet to whom I could go for rescue and say, 'Alas, Master.'
'You're too thin,' he began again, and then he pulled a letter out of his pocket and said, 'I don't really know any one who can express himself more clearly than Michael, once he really starts. I've had a regular jawing to-day from him for letting you get overtired—he——'
'Oh, Ross,' I interrupted, getting up hurriedly and clutching at his sleeve, 'have you had a letter from Michael to-day?'
'Yes, and another yesterday; why, what's the matter, kid?'
'Oh, why didn't you tell me?'
'It never occurred to me,' he said, 'Michael only wrote yesterday about money matters, and about you to-day; you hear from him every day yourself, don't you?'
'But I haven't had a letter for nearly a week, Ross.'
'Why on earth didn't you tell me, then,' he said, sitting down beside me on the settle.
'It's such a small worry compared with other people's, but I've been so dreadfully anxious.'
'You poor little scrap,' he said, and the cry which he had interrupted earlier in the morning I finished on his shoulder comfortably.
'What ridiculous handkerchiefs women use,' he remarked presently, exchanging my wet crumpled ball for his nice big, cool, dry one. 'Some chap said that men must work and women must weep, and you'd think that the sex that did the weeping would go in for the larger handkerchiefs, but I suppose you can't expect a female thing to be consistent. I shall have to ask our Lady of Ventre to bring a mop if you don't stop soon, and it'll be so bad for her inside, Meg.'
'How can you be so absurd,' I said, cheering up a bit, 'and I'm not a female thing.'
'You're a very provoking one,' he replied, 'and if there's another interval in Michael's letters, I'm to be told.'
'What does Michael say?' I asked.
'I'm to be told,' he repeated, tilting up my chin.
'So you said before,' I answered, trying to take his hand away, 'but I don't want to worry you with all my woes, you've got enough of your own.'
'My dear child, I could have told you two days ago that as I had heard from Michael his letters to you were only hung up in the post, and you would have been spared all this needless worry. Are you going to tell me in future, or must I order Nannie to bring me all your letters first?' and he tilted my chin still higher.
'I will tell you,' I said weakly, leaning up against him, it seemed the only way to stop him looking at me, 'What does Michael say?'
'That the Power of Attorney he gave me to manage his affairs is now extended to his wife, that there's to be no more reading in bed, no more rackety days in London. Blows me up sky high for letting you work all day and sew miles of little frills at night. Here, I'll read you out the last bit: "Yes, it's all right about the shares. You take quite decent care of my goods, why can't you of my chattel? I'll scrag you if you let her get knocked up; don't take the slightest notice of anything she says, make her obey orders."'
'The audacity of the man, the cheek,' I exclaimed, 'to call me a "chattel," to talk of "orders"—to a person who by Act of Parliament has been put on an equality with himself—to a woman with the vote—to a householder—the autocracy of it!'
'Good word that,' said my aggravating brother, 'but then, you see, Michael isn't exactly Mr Jellaby, and I'm going to see that you do obey orders, and chuck in a few extras of my own—milk and things,' said Ross vaguely. 'Here, get outside this sandwich and have some more coffee for a start, and then up you go to get a rest.'
'It's so nice by the fire,' I remarked rebelliously, and then he remembered the old joke and said whimsically, 'You know what you promised in the harness-room that day, darling,' and he gave me one of his rare kisses.
So I hope Michael the caveman is satisfied—that black beast—out there. All my plans upset, all the crockery still in straw, no curtains up, and not a picture hung. Oh, I had planned to have the cave so nice for his return, to sprinkle all the floor with fine sea sand, to hang up the skin of that big tiger that he killed, to keep away the draught, and over the driftwood fire to set a pot of rabbit stew (he always is so hungry), and then perhaps with a new necklace for myself I should have been ready.
Just as we were getting in the bus to-night our Lady of Ventre came running out to ask me if she might come two hours late to-morrow. She said that an old woman in the village was dying, and was sure to be dead by the morning, and she had been asked to lay her out, there being no nieces or daughters who could do it. 'Can't say I like the job, mum, but one can't 'ardly refuse to perform the last horfice for the dead seeing as 'ow we've all got to come to it; it's different if you know a person; if it was you now, mum, or the capting, I'd do it with pleasure.' Ross's guffaw nearly took the roof off.
When we got back to Fernfold there were three letters from Michael, but I only liked two of them. If he gives another man a Power of Attorney to row his wife, he oughtn't to do it himself as well. It's not cricket. Oh, well, I read the third one through again and liked it better, because I left out all the written part and only read between the lines—my darling!
CHAPTER XVI
Another week has passed. The workpeople have gone and taken all their pots and pails. Gidger's cottage is almost finished. It will be quite completed by to-night and we are going to sleep in it.
At the moment the two chars are working in the kitchen: Brown with his leg up is unpacking china, Ross ordering every one about, Nannie and the Gidger very busy in the nursery (the Poppet giving much advice about her own department), while the only person who really matters is doing 'nothing much' for a day or two, except cussing her male relatives in her heart.
The day-nursery is rather pretty—soft green walls, so that there may be no glare to strain the precious eyes: white furniture, just big enough for tiny folk: cupboards with shelves, low enough for little hands to reach the toys and that lovely 'Masque of Flowers' for pictures.
There is a window seat with cushions, where big people can tell small ones fairy stories in the dusk. There's a comfy chair for Nannie and a rocking-horse and doll's house, all presents from Aunt Constance, sent 'with love.'
Then in the Gidger's other room the same soft green, and all the pictures the small owner loves: that perfect Madonna of Andrea del Sarto, and a copy of Watts' 'Whence—Whither?' Do you remember that perfect baby, who runs out of the sea toward you, whichever way you stand and look at it. By special request, hung where she can always see them, are the two great favourites, 'The Good Shepherd' with a lamb, and the other—five Persian fluffy kittens sitting in a row.
'Because I like,' explained the Gidger to Uncle Woss, 'to see Jesus and the tittens when I get into my byes.'
'Would you call King George by his Christian name, Gidger?' Ross asked.
'Course not, Uncle Woss.'
'Why?'
'Because it would be most fwightful cheek.'
'Then don't you see it's much more cheek to call Him by His, darling?'
'But I didn't mean to be wude to Him,' said the Poppet tearfully, 'I'm fond of Him.'
'Of course, darling, so if you just say "Sorry, Sir," it'll be all right.'
So the Gidger said, 'Sorry, Sir,' and the conversation changed to kittens.
'I wish I had a titten, Uncle Woss, just like the one in the miggle.'
Ross said he would see what could be done, with which my daughter seemed contented.
But, ah, why is there only one little bed in the nursery, why is there no little son? Yes, of course, Michael is 'better to me than ten sons,' only he's so 'normous, the other would be so cuddley.
The Gidger does so want a long clothes baby doll. She's got a mother hunger for it, and I won't give her one. Shall I tell you why? If I should ever have the joy to hope about a little son, I shall hunt the garden for a nest, and let the Gidger peep at it with all the soft, downy things inside. Then I shall say, 'I made a little nest for you once, darling, just underneath my heart,' and I shall take her up in the nursery and open a drawer and show her all the small robes and garments that I made for her, and then she'll say, 'Oh, muvver, why won't you let me have a long clothes baby dolly?' And I shall tell her about the second nest that I've begun to make, and then I shall give her a most perfect baby doll that I've got waiting in a box just now. I shall ask her sometimes if she'd like to come and learn to sew some clothes for her baby while I sew some for mine: and if she pricks her little fingers, and makes a tiny spot of blood upon the narrow hem, and looks at me with eyes like drowned forget-me-nots (as she does if she is going to cry), I shall say, 'But, darling, don't you think it's worth it for your baby?' She'll learn to know then, when she's married and she's got the mother hunger, that her baby will be worth the mother pain.
And now the evening time has come. The house is finished, the last picture is up, the last curtain hung, and all the dear domestic gods arranged. Alas! the fly in the ointment has turned up also. The staff has arrived, and I am terrified of it. I feel all awash inside to think that I have to order the dinner in the morning and tell the S.P. what her work is. However, 'sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.'
Tired, but happy, I wandered into the scented garden in the dusk to gather great branches of white and purple lilac, armfuls of forget-me-not and fragrant pheasant eye and the very early honeysuckle that grows over the porch. Then I filled every vase and pot that could be induced to hold water, and some that couldn't, Ross says, because I stood a leaky jar on his dressing-table and the water trickled into the drawer beneath and reduced the contents to pulp.
The house is so sweet, filled with the spring, but if only I had decorated all the rooms for Michael! My heart goes out to him to-night with a great longing. The rooms are full of the peace and fragrance only found in old houses, yet, dear as it is, it can never be to me anything more than a house till he comes and transforms it intoHome.
CHAPTER XVII
I think 'The Staff' might be worse, though it could not be more alarming. Dulcie cooks beautifully, only she won't cook enough of anything, and the S.P. is very superior, quite appallingly so. She does her work well, but she despises me. I try to like her, but it is difficult to feel any affection for a person who looks as if you were a bad smell under her nose. She has always lived with such exclusive families that I cannot think she will stay very long with us. Her last place was a failure, she only stayed a month. 'After I got there,' she explained, 'I found the mistress was not a lady.'
'How did you know?' I inquired politely.
'Oh, she never dressed for dinner, put the coals on with her fingers, and had tea in the dining-room. (By a merciful dispensation we have ours in the hall.) 'I was most uncomfortable,' she added, 'but I liked him. He was a real gentleman, his underclothing was all made of silk.'
'My 'Ilda' needs a great deal of polishing. At lunch the S.P. teaches her to wait at table, but it is a daily martyrdom for any one so perfectly genteel, so unutterably refined!
Monica turned up yesterday, unexpectedly, in a motor-car. She stayed ten minutes and then dashed back to her hospital.
'Oh, Meg!' she laughed as she came in, 'why didn't you tell me the truth years ago? What an utter little fool I've always been, but I've found out that I love him after all.'
'Well, you'd better write and tell him so,' I said, and kissed her.
'I have,' she answered, blushing like a wild rose. 'Aren't I a bold, bad girl? Aren't modern women hussies? I'm so longing for his letter, Meg. Oh, you were funny! I'm not a bit patrician, am I? I adore cement!'
Dear old Monica!
And after she had departed like a young whirlwind I had another thrill. The curate and his wife called, and he turned out to be Mr Williams. He is still solemn, and thinner and limper even than he used to be, but he cheered up a bit at the mention of the Bishop of Ligeria. She is a frail little person with a dress like a spasm and the most desolating hat it has been my lot to meet for years. I wonder if she dresses so from choice or poverty.
I was glad my brother was in London when they called. His eyes would have been fascinated by the reserve of food on Mr Williams's coat. Funny old thing I Ross is always so well-groomed himself that, like the robin, he makes all the other birds look dirty.
When he came home he brought a hamper.
'The one in the miggle's in there,' he said with pride.
'You are famed for your lucidity,' I remarked politely.
It was a kitten for the Gidger, such a purring, fluffy atom, just out of the frame and christened Fitzbattleaxe by my daughter the moment she saw it. When Nannie had whisked her away, Ross said,—
'You'll have to put up with me for a bit longer, old thing. I got a big overhauling to-day. They say my arm is better, and I can have it in a sling now instead of these infernal bandages.'
'Well, that's something,' I observed, but Ross is not of a grateful nature.
'Small something, I think,' he snorted. 'Boards are a lot of old women, said I must be content to "Make haste slowly," as if I were a schoolgirl. I want to be back with my men. Oh, what an awful time it seems since I saw anybody decent.'
'Well,' I ejaculated, 'if that's not the pink-edged limit!'
'Oh, twins don't count, Meg, but I am in a vile temper. Let's go and do something. Clean the greenhouse roof, shall we? There's just light enough. Come on!'
Ross decided the plan of campaign. I was to pour the water from my bedroom window on to the glass beneath, while he, armed with a long broom borrowed from the kitchen, would stand on a pair of steps in the garden and clean the glass with the broom aforesaid.
'Now, Meg, plenty of water, no stinting,' he ordered.
So I got a huge canfull, and in order that Ross should have all the water he desired, I poured it out, not from the spout but from the other end, with great pride and force. Alas, 'the ways of mice and men aft gang agley.' The gutter of the beastly thing was too small to catch my Niagara, and the entire volume of water rushed over the glass, down Ross's neck, into his eyes and mouth, flooding his pockets and soaking him to the skin.
He gave one awful yell and overbalanced into the water butt, the lid of which, of course, was off (it would be in my garden). In my agitation I dropped the can, which followed the water in a wild leap on to the path below, smashing two or three panes of glass in its mad career.
'Well, you have done it,' said Ross, surveying the wreckage from the water tub. 'There's no doubt if you want a thing really well done, it's best to do it oneself.'
Then Sam appeared and looked reproachfully at me, and spoke to Ross, and I heard the words 'arm' and something about 'taking more care.'
Ross looked through Sam in that disgusting way he has when he isn't pleased, and said,—
'I can't go through the house like this, Meg; why do you have your tubs lined with green. Get me a bath, Brown.'
'Cold, sir?'
'How can I get this stuff off in cold? Hot, of course,' snapped his master, 'and ask the Titmouse for the ladder, Brown, and I'll go through the bathroom window.'
As I went upstairs a little later, Ross's door was slightly open; Sam was catching it. King's Regulations and the Hickley Woods wrestling for the mastery.
'You'll excuse me, sir, you don't take care.'
Then my brother's voice floated towards me down the passage.
'No, I'll not excuse you, Brown. I've had too much cheek from you the last ten minutes! Get me a shirt. If you mention my arm again in front of Mrs Ellsley, you'll quit. Now my coat. Do you call this brushed? Now a handkerchief, and get out.'
Then as he remembered that he was now promoted to a sling he added stormily,—
'Understand once for all, I will not be fussed over like a schoolgirl, I'm not a sucking dove.'
'Oh, no, sir,' said Brown, and I caught a flicker of amusement on his impassive countenance as he closed the door behind him with the wet clothes on his arm.
Just then the carrier brought a crate of hens and a box of rabbits from Aunt Constance. We felt rather like Noah when the animals began to file into the ark. The hens were the breed that have the very large combs. 'My 'Ilda' remarked as they were put into their run,—
'My! you won't get many eggs from them, mum, they're all cocks.'
The Gidger loved the rabbits and I told her how the mother bunny would presently have some little ones, and that she would love them very much and make a warm nest for them, and pull off her own soft fur to keep her babies warm. I want my little daughter to know of all the wonderful protective instincts God has implanted in His creatures and the sweet provision that He makes for all the tiny things.
Just before dinner we flew down the village to buy some bran for the new arrivals. On our return my brother did one of his atrocious lightning changes.
When Sam let us in Ross said,—
'Thanks, Sam, any letters?' and then 'Knee bad?'
'Pretty middling, sir.'
'Go and put it up, then. What are you about on it for?'
'It'll be time enough to put it up after dinner, sir. Imustwait at table to-night, the parlour-maid is out.'
The atmosphere in the hall became suddenly arctic. I shivered as the cold of it blew into me. I could feel Ross looking through Sam as he asked coldly,—
'Did you intend to say "must" to me, Brown?' And Brown said,—
'No, sir,' and did not appear at dinner. I sent him up a book and two Cox's oranges, so I had to continue 'My 'Ilda's' education in the art of waiting.
As she handed the soup she decorated each plate with a beautiful scallop like a flannel petticoat. I suppose it is difficult to keep liquid level and walk at the same time. She had put no fish forks on the table, so I said reprovingly,—
'What are we to eat the fish with, Hilda?'
'Oh, whatever you like, Mrs Ellsley,' she said brightly. Ross drank some water hurriedly. I endeavoured to make my meaning clearer and to keep my face straight at the same time, whereupon 'My 'Ilda' said,—
'I do like being here; you don't mind how many mistakes I make so long as I do it right.'
She shot a knife and fork into Ross's lap, mercifully they were clean or there would have been ructions, then she upset a glass of water and got the hiccoughs, and later tripped over the footstool and sent the cheese straws flying like leaves before an autumn gale.
When 'My 'Ilda' brought the coffee into the hall she stepped on the kitten's tail, and as that indignant fluffy ball spat at her, she remarked,—
'My! ain't Fitzbattleaxe got a temper, I don't think. Your faceisred, Mrs Ellsley; did I do it all right at dinner?'
As I went to my room to fetch a book I heard her fall down the back stairs with a pail. It was the end of an imperfect meal. Ross says I ought to start a nursing home for sergeant-majors suffering from depression—they'd be cured in a week, and then he remarked,—
'I wonder if Sam's got a decent supper. I must go and see.'
When he came down again he tossed a little box into my lap and said,—
'Why didn't you tellmethat you wanted a new necklace? I'd have loved to give you one.'
'Whatdoyou mean, Ross?'
'Michael wrote to me to-day that you had said you wanted a "new necklace for yourself" directly the cave was finished, and that I was to buy you one.'
Oh, isn't he absurd and dear? So I opened the box, and inside there were two to choose from. So I chose the one of very perfect pearls, and then for some extraordinary reason of his own Ross kissed me and said,—
'HowMichael spoils you, darling.'
But two kisses in twelve days. He must be ill, I think.
CHAPTER XVIII
It's All Fools' Day. Perhaps that's why the Titmouse elected to get the rheumatics that come from damp attics, so that I had to tell the Stench what 'to be getting on with.'
As I walked round the garden with him I asked if all the seeds were in.
'In, an' coming up by the galore, mum, an' I've given the turnips a dressin' of soot, as it makes a vast difference to 'em on their first appearance through the soil, mum.'
I could well believe it!
'I think you'd better dig the bed in front of the kitchen window then.'
'How deep, mum, two spits?'
I hadn't the foggiest notion how deep that is, but I said,—
'Oh, yes,of course, dig down as deep as ever you can; you can't dig too deep, Stench—Tench, I mean!'
Ross thinks he knows a bit about gardening, so at lunch I said,—
'Ross, how big is a spit?'
'Depends on how bad your cold is,' he began, but I closed the conversation.
Alas, alas, hear the end. Half an hour later the S.P. said would I speak to the captain in the garden? I found him in front of the kitchen window surveying some extraordinary earth-works and excavations, the Stench standing by looking particularly wooden.
'What on earth——' I began.
'I've dug so deep, mum, I come to a poipe; do it matter?' said the boy.
I surveyed the scene of his labours and found the little wretch had dug down to the kitchen drain.
'Gardening is certainly your strong point, Meg. Do you think the boy has dug this bit deep enough, or shall he take up the drains as well? By Jove,' added my brother, doubling up suddenly with laughter, 'what an acquisition you'd both be in the army. I never saw a better communication trench in my life.'
At tea-time Ross gloomily surveyed the table lightly spread with thin bread and butter and minute cakes.
'Well, there doesn't seem enough for Fitzbattleaxe, so let's go and have tea with Sam. He's dead down on his luck, too.'
'Knee bad?' I questioned.
'Putrid, so's his temper since I rowed him this morning.'
'What did you row him for?' I asked.
'Usual thing. Found him standing up brushing my clothes to-day, so I pitched into him for once in his life, hot and strong. It is rotten for him, but I really had to tell him a few home truths. He simply must stick his leg up all day.'
So we went up into Sam's little sitting-room with Fitzbattleaxe.
'Better?' said Ross, as he went in.
'Yes, thank you, sir,' said Sam, and got up hastily as I entered.
'Forgotten your orders again, Brown?' asked Ross sternly, opening the door to go out.
'No, sir,' said Sam, still standing up. (I do love to see him 'fighting' Ross.) 'Orders were: "Bed at 11. Not to stand up when it were you only, between the hours of 10.30 a.m. and 7 p.m.," sir.'
Quite obviously Sam was obeying the strict letter of the law, so Ross came in again, and I remarked,—
'And I say, same hours when it's only me, Sam.'
'If you could both remember about the verb "to be,"' began my brother.
'I can't,' I said.
Sam dropped into a chair, looking as if he'd like to smash all clocks, and remarked he was absolutely fed up.
'Well, we're not, we're half starved. That's why we've come to tea.'
'You want to count your mercies, Sam,' I said, which being a remark to which my Aunt Amelia is much addicted, was the most aggravating thing I could think of at the moment. When one is down on one's luck it is fatal to be sympathetic, and Sam was down on his, right on the bed-rock bottom of it.
'Well, I'm counting the mercies he's got and we haven't,' said Ross; 'there's quite a respectable bit of heaven spread on this table at the moment. A whole loaf, a pound of butter, two pounds of strawberry jam and jorams of Devonshire cream, goodies with sugar on top, and a plum cake that you can cut. My hat, some people have all the luck. It's a regular Hickley Wood one.'
'Make the tea, Sam,' I exclaimed, 'the kettle's boiling; mind you don't set the woods alight.'
'Have I ever set the woods alight, miss?' Sam asked indignantly.
'Nor ever failed to lose your temper either, if I suggested you would,' I answered.
So Sam grinned and felt better, and made a long arm for the kettle, and brewed tea, and cut up bread and cream, and we had it in the Hickley Woods, as we've had it millions of times together. It was just the same. Whenever I had finished my slice, Sam put another on my plate, with mountains of cream and jam on it. At the third I remarked,—
'Sam, there really are limits.'
'Yes, but you ain't reached them yet, miss; four's yours.'
'Do you think you ought to speak to me like that, now I am married and have a daughter, Sam?'
'He gets you muddled up with the daughter, I expect, same as I do,' remarked Ross, 'only the Gidger is so much more sober and serious-minded than you're ever likely to be.'
'Four,' I called out; 'limit's reached, Sam.'
'Well, there isn't any more cream, anyway,' said Sam, which, of course, was the one and only reason why we stopped in Hickley Woods.
'I begin to feel better,' observed my brother. 'Why don't I have enough to eat at lunch, Meg, I do at breakfast?'
'I see to your breakfast,' said Sam, 'and I'd see you had a good lunch if only I was allowed down.'
'Well, you aren't,' said my brother, 'so that's that, and I should think it would be better manners if you saw we had a good tea when we're up. Pass the cake. Here, you eat the little chaps, I'll have the plum.'
So Sam ate all the small cakes with sugar on top, and Fitzbattleaxe got the cream tin to lick out. He went right inside and stuck, and had to be lugged out by the tail. Then we shoved the table back and sat round the fire, and talked about the old days. At seven o'clock Nannie looked round the door. She was promptly hauled in and sat on Ross's knee.
'Sam,' she scolded, 'why do you keep them out so late? I really shall have to tell your father to wallop you. I've often threatened to, I really will to-night.'
'Let's run her down the passage, Sam, for cheek,' said Ross, and they were just about to do it when Brown suddenly got up and said,—
'Want a bath, sir?' and Nannie said, 'Will you wear your black again, ma'am?' and, of course, it was that wretched S.P. come to clear away the tea. The smell under her nose was rather worse than usual, and the picnic broke up hurriedly. I felt as if I had been having tea with my brother's man-servant, and Ross had been nursing one of the maids. Oh, I do loathe that woman!
It was a most unfortunate dinner to-night, like one of those you get at Aunt Amelia's. There didn't seem to be anything solid to eat. At the end Sam handed Ross sardines on toast. 'What a thundering lot of hors d'oeuvres we seem to be having to-night, when's the dinner coming?'
'Savoury, sir,' said Sam.
'You don't mean to tell me,' said Ross, pushing back his chair and glaring at Sam, 'that I'vehadmy dinner?'
'You've had what there was of it, sir.'
'Well, I'm jiggered. Why on earth, Meg, don't you make them cook more food. Really——'
''Tisn't her fault,' said Sam, still in the Hickley Woods, sticking up for me as he always did; 'she's told them times without number; it's no good blaming her. Shall I cut some sandwiches?'
'Sam, I suppose I can reprove my sister without your interfering, and I never blame, I always rule by love.'
'Same as you did this morning, sir,' grinned Sam, 'will you have large cups of coffee with your sandwiches?'
'Do you think that's a respectful remark to make to your superior officer, Brown?'
'No, sir, sorry.'
'I shall judge the measure of your repentance by the number of sandwiches you cut,' said Ross, 'and if the cups of coffee are very large, I might be inclined to overlook your cheek, otherwise——'
But Sam had vanished into the kitchen, and we went into the hall to wait for supper. A few minutes afterwards, Sam dumped a tray of food on the table.
We settled down comfortably for a good long evening. At 10.15, just as we were beginning to enjoy ourselves, Sam came in, he looked like milk and butter, and his voice was a caress.
'Turned your bath on, sir.'
'Are you dotty, Brown?' asked my brother.
'Certainly not, sir.'
'Well, what are you gassing about baths for at this hour of the afternoon, you gloomy ox, you're worse than a keeper.'
'Orders is orders, sir. If I've got to go to bed at 11 you'll have to go at 10.15, if I'm to see to your arm.'
'My hat,' ejaculated Ross, looking across at me in hopeless consternation, 'whata fool I am.'
'First of April, sir,' said Sam, and fled upstairs.