The Fortune-makers or The Cherry-garden
Mollie was rather silent at tea-time. She could not help thinking of those other children in that long-ago far-away garden. Were they real? Or had it all been a dream? Itmusthave been a dream, she thought—such things do not happen in real life—it was impossible that it should have been true. And yet, never before had she dreamt anything so clearly, so "going-on" as she expressed it to herself. She longed to tell Aunt Mary all about it, but the memory of her vow restrained her. If nothing further happened, in course of time she would feel free to tell of her wonderful experience, but in the meantime she must have patience. She racked her brains to think of some roundabout way of introducing the subject of Australia and the year 1878, but could not get past her vow—it seemed to block the way in every direction.
So she ate her little triangles of toast—made in a particularly fascinating way peculiar to Grannie's housekeeping—without enjoying the scrunch, scrunch between her teeth so much as usual. Even the early strawberries and cream found her somewhat absent-minded.
But after tea was cleared away and the room tidied up, Aunt Mary disappeared for a short time and returned with her hands behind her back. She stood before Mollie, and in a solemn voice chanted the following words:
"Neevie neevie nick nack,Which hand will ye tak?Tak the right or tak the wrong,I'll beguile ye if I can."
This was too interesting to be ignored. Mollie sat up and became her ordinary self again. She looked critically at Aunt Mary's arms, shoulders, and eyes, but got no information from any of these. Then she laughed:
"Iwon'thave the wrong, please, I'll have the right."
Aunt Mary laughed too. "You are too clever, Miss Mollie. That is not the wayIdid neevie-neevie when I was young." She brought her right hand round as she spoke, and in it was a charming box, large, varnished, and clamped at the corners with brass. She laid it on Mollie's lap, and watched the sliding lid being pulled out by a pair of impatient hands. It was a beautiful jig-saw puzzle.
"Oh, wheredidyou get it?" Mollie cried joyfully. "Iadorejig-saw puzzles. You are a lovely, lovely aunt!" and she held out her arms for a hug and a kiss.
"Well," said Aunt Mary, smiling with pleasure at the success of her surprise, "I remembered how fond you are of jig-saws, so yesterday, as soon as you had fallen asleep, I wired to Hamley's. I was not sure if it would arrive to-day, so I did not tell you. Now, let us see what it is—a map! Oh, dear me, I hope you won't find a map dull!"
Grannie, who loved jig-saws almost as much as Mollie did, had drawn up a substantial table to the sofa and seated herself beside it. "Dull!" she said reprovingly, "I hope not indeed. Maps are the most interesting puzzles one can have. What is it a map of?"
"We'll soon find that out," said Mollie, laying a very jagged section upon the table and studying it with interest. "What funny names—Weeah! Where's that? It sounds like China."
Grannie had also possessed herself of a section, and was scrutinizing it through her spectacles. "I'll need my reading-glass, Mary, my dear," she said; "my old eyes cannot see this tiny print."
A silver-handled reading-glass was brought, and Grannie considered her section again: "The Yarra," she read out, "I wonder if you can tell me where the Yarra is, Mollie?"
"Never heard of it," said Mollie, shaking her head. "Yankalilla. Where's that? Goomooroo, Wanrearah, Koolywurtie.Whatnames! I am glad I am not a railway guard in this place, wherever it may be."
"Aha, Miss Mollie, I am cleverer than you are with all your Oxford and Cambridge examinations!" Grannie exclaimed triumphantly, "for I can tell you where the Yarra is—it is the river upon which Melbourne is built, and Melbourne is the capital of Victoria, and Victoria is a colony in Australia."
"Australia!" Mollie exclaimed, a little startled. "How funny—I mean how interesting!" It was certainly rather odd, she thought, that her difficulty should be solved so promptly, for now, of course, she might ask as many questions as she pleased and no one would wonder at her sudden interest in our distant colonies. In the meantime Grannie and Aunt Mary were both too much engrossed in the puzzle to notice the rather peculiar expression on Mollie's face, and soon she too became absorbed in the puzzle under her eyes, and forgot for the moment the stranger puzzle in her mind.
When Mollie's breakfast-tray came up next morning, the first thing she saw on it was a letter from Dick. She seized it and tore it open.
"I've had the rummest experience you ever. Young Outram says it was -pyh- -psy- -pysh—-ghosts, you know. He says I must tell youexactlywhat happened and not leave out anything, because quite small things might turn out to be most important. Young Outram is great on ghosts and Spirits, he says it is because he was born in the East. It happened like this. Y.O. and me were sitting together at our desk, which is at the back beside the window. It is a very good desk. Old Nosey was talking aboutMacbeth—or perhaps it wasParadise Lost,I am not sure of this point, because sometimes he does one and sometimes the other, according to the mood he is in. But it was one of them. Y.O. and I were making a list of Probable Players in next term's 1st XV, and we both said 'Jenkyns will have left', at the same time, so we hooked little fingers and said Kipling, and were wishing a wish when all of a sudden,without the slightest warningthere appeared, sitting onour desk,the most absolutely top-hole parrot I ever saw in my life. We sat staring, because, you see, we never saw the beast fly in, and if it flew through the window wemusthave seen it, because of my arm being on the window-sill. While we were still staring Idistinctlyheard your voice say, 'Do come here, Dick.' Just those words and then no more. Then the parrot vanished absolutely, tail and everything, though it was the finest parrot's tail I ever saw in my life. I can tell you, Moll, it made me sit up hearing you like that. Y.O. said my freckles came out like a rash because I got almost pale under them. I wish I'd seen myself. Then we made the astonishing discovery that none of the other chaps had seen the parrot, in fact they say it is a cock-and-bull story, but we are sitting tight because of the phyc-thingummy. Young O. says that whatever it is he has to be in it too, because most probably it was owing to his peculiar Indian ghostiness that we saw it at all. I don't quite agree, but anyhow that's what he says, and he'd better be in. Please write by return of post if you can explain this phenomenon. We hope you aren't dead.
"Yours affec.,
Mollie read this letter through twice, then laid it down and ate her egg and toast without thinking much of what she was doing. She felt rather startled again; things were certainly queerish. Either her vivid dream had penetrated to Dick's brain—and such experiences were not altogether unknown between the twins—or else—or else Prudence reallyhadcome yesterday, and there was something in that story of the Time-travellers. So the experiment had worked too. She remembered the brilliant parrot.
She could not make up her mind how much of her story she might tell to Dick. Her vow had only applied to grown-ups, and since the Campbells had helped her to wish Dick over, presumably they would allow her to take him into her confidence. But would he believe such an unlikely story—and what about Young Outram? They had not bargained for two boys. She decided to wait and see if Prudence came again, and, in the meantime, to write and tell Dick that she was alive and well, and that some explanation of his most extraordinary vision would certainly be forthcoming sooner or later.
The morning passed much more quickly than the previous morning had done. Mollie and Grannie worked hard at the jig-saw puzzle, and, without breaking her word by the smallest fraction, Mollie contrived to get a considerable amount of information about Australia from Grannie. Not, of course, that she was totally ignorant on the subject of our Australian colonies, but her knowledge was vague, and her interest before this time had been so faint that it was hardly worth mentioning. Grannie, on the other hand, had had a brother and many friends in Australia, and had, at one time or another, corresponded with a number of people there. She was able to tell Mollie several thrilling tales of bush fires, of the gold-fields, and of Ned Kelly, the great bushranger. But in none of her stories did the name of the Campbells appear.
After lunch Mollie was again tucked up on her sofa and told to take a little nap. Grannie was somewhat amused to be asked for the photograph-album again. "Bairns have queer fancies," she thought to herself, as she laid it on Mollie's lap. "Don't look too long, my lamb," she said aloud. "Try and go to sleep. You were all the better yesterday. There is Aunt Mary playing the piano—dear me, it is long since I heard that tune!"
When Mollie was left alone she opened the album, lay back on her cushions, and stared hard at the picture of prim little Prudence.
"Nowwe shall see! Was it a dream, or will she come again? That is the question."
But nothing happened. Prudence stared solemnly and stolidly back, looking almost too good for human nature's daily food.
"But she wasn't, I feel sure she wasn't, even if itwasall a dream. Oh—howdisappointing! I did hope that parrot of Dick's meant something, and I do so want to see those children again and know what happened next. Besides, it would be thrilling to be a Time-traveller—one could see all sorts of things."
As she meditated over her disappointment Mollie turned the pages of the album, looking rather listlessly at the other children, and deciding that none was so attractive as Prudence, till she came to a group of three girls and a boy. She looked closer, then stretched out her hand for the reading-glass and looked again: "I do believe it is—yes, itis—Hugh and Prudence and Grizzel and Baby! How Iwishthey would come alive!"
Even as she said the last word she saw a smile dawn upon Prue's face. She did not drop the album this time but held tightly on to it, closed her eyes, and counted twenty. When she opened them there stood Prue, looking as good and sweet as ever.
"Oh, Iamglad to see you!" Mollie exclaimed, sitting up and holding out her hands. "I thought it was all a dream, and that you were not coming. You will take me with you again, won't you? I did love yesterday."
Prudence smiled and took Mollie's hands in her own. "We need not waste time talking to-day," she said. "Listen to the music."
Mollie shut her eyes and listened to Aunt Mary, who just then began to sing—Mollie could hear the words quite plainly:
"Oft in the stilly night,Ere slumber's chain hath bound me,Fond memory brings the lightOf other days around me."
They were standing on a rough deeply rutted cart-track high up on a hill-side. Behind them the hill rose steeply, so thickly wooded that Mollie could not see plainly to the top. Before her it fell in a gentle slope to a narrow valley, through which ran a shallow creek with green banks on either side. Straight before her, half-way up the opposite hill, she saw a white cottage covered with a scarlet flowering creeper. It had casement windows all wide open, and a trellised porch. The garden of the cottage reached to the foot of the hill, and for three-quarters of its length was filled with rows of vines, looking like green lines ruled on a brown slate.
On one side of the little vineyard Mollie could see a path winding up the hill, twisting in and out between vines and overhanging trees till it lost itself in a flower-garden, which made such a splash of rosy pink and flaming scarlet that Mollie thought it might have been spilt out of a sunset.
By the roadside at her feet sat Grizzel, red curls still bobbing round her head, and apparently the very same blue overall still clothing her slim little body. She was moulding a lump of wet clay, shaping it into a bowl, pinching here, smoothing there, patting and pressing with both little grubby hands. On a strip of grass before her stood a long row of golden balls, glittering in the sunshine as if they had newly left a jeweller's shop.
Prudence stood beside Mollie, rolling a clay ball round and round in her hands; and Mollie discovered presently that she herself was also rolling a lump of sticky stiff mud into some sort of shape, she was not sure what, but it seemed very important that it should be exactly right.
As she watched the other two children, she saw Grizzel rise to her feet and run a few steps along the road to where, on the upper slope, a wedge had been sliced out of the hill, leaving a three-cornered open space which glittered curiously. This apparently was where the golden balls came from, for Grizzel stooped down, and lifting a handful of shining sand let it filter evenly through her fingers over her bowl. She then set the bowl on the ground, and lightly rubbed the gold sand into its surface. She repeated this process three times, then straightened herself, rubbed her gritty hands on her overall, shook the curls out of her eyes, and said:
"It's quite a nice bowl. Ifonlywe could make them hold water, Prue, it would do beautifully for Mamma's Russian violets."
As Grizzel spoke Mollie suddenly realized that she knew where she was. They were in "the hills", across the way was their summer cottage, and those blue-green trees were gum trees. She remembered the long road she had seen from the Look-out, and how she had longed to follow it and see what lay behind those hills.
She carried her ball along to the wedge in the hill-side and rolled it in the golden sand, rubbing it and sprinkling it as she had seen Grizzel do, and soon it took on a splendid yellow shine.
"It looks very nice, Mollie," said Grizzel. "I like the way you've shaped it like an orange. I wonder if I could make a bunch of cherries—I think I will try to-morrow. Put it here beside mine; it is the hottest place."
Mollie stopped and put her ball—which she now saw shehadshaped like an orange—beside Grizzel's on the sunny patch of grass. Then she stood up and looked round her again.
"Where is Hugh?" she asked, "and Baby, and your father and mother?"
"I think that is Hugh prowling among the roses over the way," Prudence answered, shading her eyes with one hand, and looking across the valley at the garden. "What is he doing, I wonder—he seems to have lost something! Baby is with Bridget. Papa and Mamma haven't come up yet. Miss Hilton is supposed to be taking care of us, but she is rather a goose."
"All the better for us," said Grizzel. "If she were strict and fussy we wouldn't have nearly such a nice time as we do. You have only to say snake to Miss Hilton and she is ready to faint; it is useful sometimes."
"Why should you say snake?" asked Mollie, feeling rather relieved to hear that the elders of the family were away.
"Because there are snakes about, and she is terrified of them,"Prudence explained.
"Oh dear—so am I, horribly frightened!" Mollie exclaimed. "I never saw a snake in my life except in the Zoo." "Then how do you know you are frightened of them?" Grizzel asked. "You only have to be a little firm with them and they won't do you any harm. I have lived in Australia for years and years and have never once been bitten."
"I hope I will never meet one when I am alone," Mollie said, shaking an unconvinced head.
While the other children counted their balls, dried their hands, and tied on their sunbonnets, Mollie stood still and gazed about her. The country she saw looked strange and unfamiliar to her eyes. So far as she could see there seemed to be few trees but gum trees, with their monotonous foliage and gaunt grey trunks, so different from the mossy trunks at home in English woods. Here and there one had fallen, and lay like a giant skeleton on the ground. On all sides were hills, not very high, but rolling one behind the other like waves, some wooded and some bare of trees and covered only with short grass and rough boulders. Over everything was the same beautiful clear sunlight that had impressed Mollie so much on her first visit, and the air was warm and soft. She thought of the dull street at home in North Kensington, with brick houses all crowded up together and dingy little back-yards, and she wished that her family could come and live in this wide and sunny country.
As she stood, a cry came across the valley.
"Coo-eee! Cooo-eeeee!"
"There's Bridget calling for tea," said Prudence. "Come on quick; I'm as hungry as a hunter, and Biddy said she would make some damper, because we are rather short of bread."
"What is damper?" asked Mollie, as she followed the other two down the hill. "Is it wet bread?"
"Don't you know whatdamperis?" Grizzel asked, with round eyes. "It is unleavened bread—you know, like the Children of Israel ate. Sometimes we find manna too, lying underneath the trees, but I don't like it much. I am glad I am not a Child of Israel," she added; "I don't like that old Moses. Do you?"
"I haven't thought about him very much," Mollie confessed; "I suppose he was all right in his own way."
"He was so fond of Thou shalt not," Grizzel objected, "and I can'tbearthou shalt nots. IfIhad made the commandments I should have said 'Thou oughtest not to commit murder, but if thou doest thou shalt be hung'. Don't you think that would be more interesting?"
"No, I don't," Mollie answered decidedly, "I like things to be short and plain like Thou shalt not steal. Then you know where you are."
Prudence looked disapprovingly at her sister. "You should not talk like that, Grizzel; it is flippant, and you know what Papa says about flippancy."
Grizzel made a face but did not answer, and they went on in silence till they reached the foot of the hill. They crossed the little creek by stepping-stones, and walked slowly up the winding path, the vines with their ripening grapes on the one side, and on the other great cherry trees, laden with the largest and reddest cherries that Mollie had ever seen in her life. They hung down temptingly among the green leaves, dangling their little bunches in the most inviting way imaginable, some scarlet, some black, and some almost white, but all ripe and luscious. The children stretched up their hands and pulled some, which tasted as good as they looked.
"I'm going to make cherry jam to-morrow," Grizzel said, dropping her stones on the ground and carefully pushing them into the soil with the heel of her boot. "I'm going to make the first beginnings of my fortune."
"What fortune?" asked Mollie, throwing her stones away in the careless fashion of people who are accustomed to buying their fruit in shops.
"My jam fortune," Grizzel answered. "Every year Mamma sends a case of jam home to Grandmamma, and this year I am going to put in twelve tins of my very own jam, and Grandmamma will sell it and put the money in the bank for me. She promised she would if I was a good girl, and I've been as good as it is possible for a human being to be."
"But canyoumake really-truly jam?" Mollie asked incredulously—Grizzel looked so small and young to be a maker of real jam in shoppy tins.
"Grizzel is abeautifulcook," said Prudence, with an air of great pride. "You wait till you taste her herring-shape, and her parsnip sauce. Mamma says that cooks are born, not made, and that Grizzel is born and I'm not made."
Mollie felt an immense respect for Grizzel. Cooking was not her own strong point, as her Guide captain had informed her in plain language more than once, and in any case food at home was too precious for children to experiment with except under supervision—there could be no playing about with fruit and sugar for instance. She began to think that if there were some things she could teach these forty-years-ago children, there were also some things she could learn from them—a thought which would have given her mother much pleasure could she have seen into her daughter's mind at that moment.
"Hullo, girls!" said Hugh, coming out of the garden as they drew near the cottage, "I've got an idea."
[Illustration: GRIZZEL THREW IN A SMALL HANDFUL OF TEA]
Mollie turned to look at Hugh. He had grown a little taller, she thought, but was as clear-eyed and meditative as ever. And behind Hugh was the flower-garden, full of roses—thousands and thousands of roses, mostly pale pink. They were loose-petalled and exquisitely sweet. The children paused for a moment before going into the house, and all four sniffed up the delicate fragrance appreciatively.
"That's my idea," said Hugh, with an extra loud sniff. "Scent! Let's make attar of roses. It costs a guinea a drop to buy, and we could make bottles full. I've been examining the rose-bushes—they are simply packed full of buds behind the flowers. I have been reading about it. It's quite easy to do; you merely have to extract the essential oil from the petals and there you are. I'll show you after tea."
They passed through the porch into the house. There was no hall; they walked straight into the sitting-room, where a table was spread with tea, and Miss Hilton, a rather faded-looking lady of middling age, was already seated behind the tea-pot.
"Go and wash your hands, children," she said, in a voice that matched her looks, "and smooth your hair. I amsurprisedat you coming into the room like this. I don't know what your visitor will think, I am sure. Children haveverydifferent manners in England."
Mollie glanced round at the other three. She herself stood behind Miss Hilton and was therefore not within that lady's line of vision. She winked largely with her left eye, and a smile of relief travelled round the room.
Tea was a silent meal in spite of the festive damper, which was so good that Mollie thought it must have alleviated the unfortunate lot of the Children of Israel considerably. Hugh was thinking out his plan for making attar of roses; Prue was day-dreaming about nothing in particular, as she was too fond of doing; Grizzel's mind was wandering away to golden bowls, golden cherries, and other possible and some quite impossible golden achievements; while Mollie listened to Baby, who carried on a long and intimate conversation with a family of bread-and-butter—otherwise the beddy-buts—which had found a temporary home upon her plate. Miss Hilton poured out tea absent-mindedly, and seldom spoke except to rebuke someone for putting elbows on the table.
As soon as the meal was over the children went into the garden again, and, once outside, their tongues began to move.
"I shall nab Baby's bronchitis-kettle," Hugh announced, "and make a distiller, and we can begin to-morrow. You girls will have to help me, for I must watch the distilling all the time, and someone must keep me supplied with fresh rose-petals."
"I can't do much, because I'm going to make jam," said Grizzel, "and I want Prue and Mollie to help me to gather cherries. I've got one or two new ideas"—Mollie thought the family seemed great on ideas—"but, if you'll solder up my jam tins, I'll help with your attar."
"I'll tell you what," said Prue, "we'll have a secret breakfast."
"What's a secret breakfast?" asked Mollie.
"You'll see in a minute," Prue answered. "It's a lovely thing. Then we'll get up and pull the cherries and cut them open, and we can pick the roses afterwards, when they are warm and dry."
"Then we had better get the things ready now," said Grizzel.
So while Hugh went off to a little old hut, which served them for a playroom, to build up his distillery, the three girls set out to inspect the cherry trees, and engaged in the pleasing task of tasting a few cherries off each tree to decide which had the finest flavour.
"I think they are all absolutely topping," said Mollie. "I don't know how you can tell which is best."
"What funny words you use," said Grizzel. "Topping!"
"Well—top-hole then, or ripping, or great, or first-class, or jolly good."
Both hearers laughed. "You had better not let Miss Hilton hear you," said Prue, "or she will tell Mamma, and then you will have to write out 'topping' a hundred times."
Grizzel led the way to the flower-garden, which was laid out on the terrace immediately below the cottage. A sanded path ran along by the rose-bed, which was banked up for two feet or so to keep the soil from washing down in the rainy season. Prudence and Grizzel stopped at a corner where, in a sheltered angle, lay a low pile of bricks built up four-square with a hollow centre.
"This is our fire-place," Prue explained to Mollie. "When we get up very early we make a fire here and boil tea and have a secret breakfast, because proper breakfast isn't till nine o'clock when Miss Hilton is mistress, and we get so hungry—besides, it is a lark."
"Write out 'lark' one hundred times, my dear Prudence," said Grizzel, in a voice so exactly like Miss Hilton's that Mollie looked round with a start, and the other two laughed.
They gathered sticks, which they carried into the kitchen to be dried, Bridget being a good-natured conspirator, and they collected sugar, tea, and damper for their feast. Darkness falls early in Australia, and the children decided to go to bed in good time, so that they should waken fresh in the morning. Mollie thought that their bedroom was a delightful place, quite different from a London bedroom. It had a door to itself, with a flight of wooden steps leading down to the garden, so that the children could slip out without disturbing the household. Mollie thought this very romantic.
"You won't think it very romantic if some old bushranger gets in through the night and shoots you dead," Grizzel cheerfully suggested.
"Be quiet, Grizzel," Prudence said reprovingly. "What is the use of frightening Mollie like that? You never saw a bushranger in your life."
But a London girl, who has been through a dozen air-raids without losing any nerve, is not likely to disturb herself over a possible but improbable bushranger, and indeed Mollie was blissfully ignorant on the subject in spite of Grannie's tales; so she went to bed quite peacefully in the little camp-bed, and lay for a time watching the brilliant stars shine through the wide-open window. The lovely night scents floated in with the soft breeze, and Mollie could hear strange birds calling to their mates at an hour when most English birds are in bed and fast asleep.
The first rosy streaks of dawn saw the three girls making their morning toilet at the pump, where the water was cold even to the touch of English Mollie, but it was freshening, and they emerged from their splashes with pink cheeks and ravenous appetites. The "inventor" loved his bed and did not join in the morning revels. (So boyswerelazy lie-a-beds in Father's young days, thought Mollie.)
Prudence and Mollie went straight to the cherry trees with their baskets, while Grizzel lighted the fire and prepared the secret breakfast. She called them before the first baskets were quite full. The fire was burning cheerfully, sending long streamers of wood smoke into the morning air. On the bricks sat a billy-can full of water just on the boil, and, as it bubbled up, Grizzel threw in a small handful of tea, giving it a stir round with a cherry twig. She let it bubble again while she counted ten, then lifted the can to one side and put the lid on. She had begged a cup of warm, frothy milk from the milk-boy's pail as he came up the hill. The damper was sitting on the hot bricks, and Grizzel had gathered a plateful of strawberries from the berry-bed at the foot of the hill.
They sat down on the sandy path, holding their mugs of steaming tea in one hand and their damper in the other, large juicy strawberries taking the place of jam. Mollie thought it was the most exquisitely delightful breakfast she had ever tasted in her life. The sun had risen and was sending his beautiful rays along the valley; they fell upon the roses and heliotrope in the garden and on the misty blue-green of the gum trees on the hill opposite. As the children munched in silent enjoyment, their eyes wandering here and there, one long shaft of light fell straight upon the patch of golden sand, so that it glittered as though it were the door to Aladdin's cave. Prue reached out her hand and pulled down a branch of sweet-scented geranium, crushing a leaf and holding it to Mollie's nose.
"Isn't it nice here, Mollie?" she said.
"It's perfectly heavenly," Mollie answered, with a sigh. "Why can't all the world be as nice as this, and why do peopleeverlive in streets?"
They tidied up the remains of their breakfast, and were soon back at work in the cherry trees. By nine o'clock they had filled four baskets and had stoned more than half, and laid them in a shallow pan with sugar over them "to draw", as Grizzel explained. They cracked the kernels and took out the tiny white nuts, and last of all Grizzel added a good handful of gooseberries.
"That's my idea," she said, "it will help the cherries to jell. I thinkI will pop in some red currants too."
"Youareclever," Mollie said admiringly. "I never in all my life saw a girl as young as you make jam."
"When I am grown up," Grizzel said, sucking her sugary fingers as she spoke, "I am going to have a fruit-farm and make immense quantities of jam to send home. Grandmamma says our jam is the nicest she has tasted, especially our peach and apricot. I am going to try grape jam too, and I shall preserve mandarin oranges whole, and pineapples, and figs."
Mollie suddenly remembered big tins of jam which used to arrive from Australia now and then, at a time when jam was very scarce and precious in London. She smiled to herself as she wondered if they had been Grizzel's jams—they might have been. At any rate they must have come from beautiful gardens like this.
"If you do," she said to Grizzel, "put a picture of yourself and a cherry tree on the tin. It will look much prettier than 'Campbell's Jams'!"
This made the children laugh, and they went in to their second breakfast feeling very cheerful and what Mollie called "pleased with life". The lazy inventor made his appearance halfway through the meal, looking still rather sleepy. "Come and see my distillery," he said, when breakfast was over, "I fixed it up last night."
Hugh had set the bronchitis-kettle—always carried about with Baby, who was subject to croup—on the fire-place, and had fixed a long narrow jam-tin on to the end of the spout.
"I put the roses and water into the kettle," he explained, "and they boil, and the steam comes out and drops into this cold tin and condenses. Then, when we have enough, we boil that up and condense again. Then we skim the oil that rises to the top, and that is attar of roses. It is perfectly simple."
"Itsoundssimple," said Mollie, "but—"
"But what?" asked Hugh, with a frown.
"Oh, I don't know—just but," said Mollie, in a hurry. "I don't know a thing about distilling; how many boilings will it take to collect a bottle of attar?"
"A good many, but you must not forget that a bottle holds a great many drops, and each drop is worth a guinea, so that a lavender-water bottle will hold about three hundred guineas' worth."
Mollie was greatly impressed. How easy it was to make fortunes in Australia! And how much pleasanter a way than Father's way, which meant living in a street and sighing over bills, and not making much of a fortune after all.
The girls returned to the garden, and soon gathered enough petals for the first boiling. Hugh, in the meantime, lit the fire and fetched water from the rain-water tank. "It says water from a spring, in the book," he said, "but there's nothing like rain-water really for this kind of work."
Soon Grizzel said she must go to her jam-making. Prudence stayed to help Hugh, and Mollie decided to hover between both fortune-building schemes, as she was too deeply interested in the results to wish to miss either. For an hour they worked hard, Mollie and Prudence bringing in fresh supplies of roses, rain-water, and logs of wood, for the fire had to be kept well stocked. The room got very hot, for Hugh would not allow any windows to be opened, and a good part of the steam managed to escape in spite of all his care. Indeed it seemed to Mollie that more steam got into the room than into the tin. After the third instalment of roses and water she asked if she could be spared to go and see how the jam was getting on.
"You might bring back some bread and skimmings," said Prudence."Working like this makes you so hungry."
The day was warm, but it was refreshing to get out of doors after the steamy atmosphere of the playroom. Mollie sauntered along, keeping in the shade of the trees, a little tired after her early rising. She could see Bridget and Baby at the bottom of the garden gathering gooseberries for a pudding. Baby's pink sun-bonnet bobbed about like a rose going for a walk in the berry-bed. Before she reached the kitchen door she began to smell something uncommonly like burning sugar.
"I expect it has spilt on the stove," she thought; "that pot is pretty heavy for Grizzel to lift."
The smell got stronger and stronger, and when Mollie reached the kitchen there was not only a smell but smoke. There was no sign of Grizzel, nor of anyone else; the house was silent and empty but for the sizzling and smoking of the boiled-over jam. Mollie ran to the stove—a funny flat arrangement, different from the stoves of her acquaintance. The jam had evidently been boiling over for some time, for not only the saucepan, the stove, and the fender, but even the floor was covered with a dark-brown sticky syrup. She trod carefully to the fire-place and lifted the pan to one side, the smoke and steam making her eyes water.
"Making fortunes is pretty hot work in Australia," she muttered to herself. "If I made many there wouldn't be much of me left to enjoy them with. Where on earth is Grizzel?"
She found her in their bedroom, arranging some vine leaves and green grapes in her golden bowl, quite oblivious of a world which contained jam.
"I think your jam is burning, Grizzel—I am afraid it is rather badly burnt."
"My jam!" said Grizzel, coming back to the world of every day. "Goodness me! I forgot all about the jam." She hastily dumped her bowl down on the window-sill, and flew to the kitchen, followed by Mollie.
"Oh dear, dear, dear!" she cried, when her eyes fell upon the scene of devastation. "Oh, my jam! my jam! Oh, why am Ibotha cook and an artist? One half of me isalwaysgetting into the way of the other half! Oh, Mollie—my lovely, beautiful jam!"
"Let's taste it and see;perhapsit isn't burnt," Mollie suggested. But one sip was enough. "Ab-so-lute wash-out!" was her verdict. Grizzel seized the pot by the handle and made for the door.
"What are you going to do?" asked Mollie, following her.
"Bury it," said Grizzel, laying down the pot and seizing a spade. She rapidly dug a shallow hole, poured the sticky black mixture into it and tossed back the earth.
"And they were so pretty a few hours ago," she wailed. "Why on earth did I go and spoil them like that! Oh, Mollie, I am a cruel girl!"
"It isn'treallyany more cruel than eating them," said Mollie consolingly. "I'd just as soon be burnt as eaten myself—only perhaps one might be cooked first and eaten afterwards. I must say it is rather hard lines on mutton when you come to think of it."
Grizzel took the blackened pot to the pump, filled it with water, and carried it back to the kitchen. The fire was nearly out, and logs had to be piled on and blown up with the bellows before the pot could be set on again. Grizzel looked round for a towel to clear up the horrible mess with, but Bridget had washed her towels that morning and they were all hanging out to dry on the line.
"Get a newspaper and crumple it up," suggested Mollie; "wet it in the pot-water."
When Bridget and Baby appeared at the door, two very hot and sticky children were surrounded by a litter of crumpled, wet, black newspapers, and the stove was as far as you can possibly imagine from being clean.
"Holy saints!" said Bridget.
Nothing could have looked less like holy saints than Mollie and Grizzel did at that moment. They stood up in the midst of the ruins, and Mollie waited for the skies to fall. But Biddy was a good-natured soul.
"An' me stove new cleaned this very mornin'—you an' yir jam! Be off wid ye!" flapping the children out of the way with her apron as she spoke.
"Come and wash," said Grizzel, catching up a tin basin from the porch as they went out.
When they were moderately clean again they went back to the playroom to see how the scent-makers were faring. They found Hugh and Prudence as red as lobsters; the big kettle had been moved and a tiny one put in its place.
"I thought I'd better try how the experiment was getting on," Hugh explained to Mollie and Grizzel. "There's no use doing all the roses till we see if it's all right; so I'm boiling up the distilled water now."
He peered into a doll's milk-jug, which was fastened on to the end of the little spout. "There is a little. We'll just try for oil," he said, lifting the jug off and carrying it to the window. There was about half a teaspoonful of water in the bottom.
"It looks oily; I guess there will be one drop." He sniffed anxiously as he spoke. "And it does smell of roses too, by jiminy!"
They all sniffed in turn, and agreed that there really was an undeniable smell of roses. "And itmighthave only smelt of wet tin," Hugh said. "Look here, Prue, don't empty that little kettle. We'll boil it up again and collect another drop. Put some more logs on the fire."
Prudence looked at Hugh with a slightly exasperated expression; she was very hot and rather tired: "Hugh Campbell, you know as well as I do that there is nothing but tinny water left in that kettle. If you think anyone is going to pay a guinea a drop for scent called Wet Tin you are a goose. I wouldn't buy it if it was the only scent in the world."
Hugh was not discouraged. "Myideais right," he said. "I shall make a larger distiller and try again. There's plenty more roses. Next time we are by the sea I shall look for ambergris. It is found floating on the shores of warm countries, and all scent should have ambergris in it, properly speaking."
"I shall try again too," said Grizzel. "There's plenty more cherries, and a new barrel of sugar came yesterday. After all, everybody has ups and downs when they are making fortunes. I'll take good care never to burn my jam again."
"I'm not really sure if attar of roses is worth while," Hugh said thoughtfully, his eyes on the tiny milk-jug in his hand; "only rich people could afford to buy it. If you want to make a fortune it is better to make something that everyone wants, rich and poor. Soap might do."
"Jam," said Grizzel.
"I'mnot sure if it is right to make fortunes at all," said Mollie slowly.
"Why not?" asked the other three all at once.
"Because it doesn't seem fair, somehow. Some people are so frightfully rich, and some people haven't even enough to eat. My mother goes to the children's hospital every week, and sometimes she takes me. You can'tthinkwhat some of the poor babies are like—and then you go outside and see rich,richwomen in splendid motor-cars—I mean carriages," she corrected herself, "and it does make you feel things aren't fair, and I do like fairness."
The Australian children were silent for a minute or two.
"But if no one was rich no one could give," Grizzel said at last. "We know very rich people here, and they do lovely kind things. Mrs. Basil Hill sends us a packing-case ofexquisiteoranges every summer, and when she comes to see Mamma she almost always brings us a surprise packet—last time it was five pounds of the most beautiful sweets in Rundle Street, and the time before it was all Miss Alcott's books."
"But if everybody was the same, people wouldn't have to give you things," said Mollie. "You'd have them yourself."
"Then we would never get a surprise," said Grizzel, "and that would be horribly dull. Don't you think it would be dull if everybody was exactly the same?"
"I suppose it would," Mollie admitted, with a sigh, feeling that she had not presented her case attractively; "but I think they might be samer than they are."
"There's no use talking," Hugh said decisively. "Australia is full of fortunes waiting to be made. I heard Papa say so. And the early bird gets the worm, and the better the bird the better it is for everyone all round."
"Except the worm," said Grizzel.
They all laughed. "I wish I had a brother instead of three sisters,"Hugh remarked, emptying the contents of the tiny milk-jug over ahandkerchief which had once been clean. "A brother would be some use.Where's yours?" he asked Mollie. "Did he get our message?"
This reminded Mollie of Dick's letter, which impressed the Australians as much as it had impressed Mollie.
"So the next thing—the next thing——" she repeated, looking round at the other three children. "Whatisthe next thing to do?"
"We can't tell you," Prudence said, with a funny little smile, "you'll have to fix it yourself in the end."
"Cooo-eeeee!" sounded from the cottage.
* * * * *
"Cherry jam for tea to-day, fresh from the preserving-pan," Aunt Mary was saying. "That will be a treat for you, Mollie, my dear."
The Treasure-hunters or The Duke's Nose
"Cherry jam is certainly veryrunny," said Aunt Mary at tea-time.
"Do you put a handful of gooseberries into it?" Mollie asked rather dreamily, as she tried in vain to spread her scone tidily.
"Gooseberries! Why, no; I never thought of it. It might be quite a good idea."
"Or red currants?" Mollie went on.
"Red currants! Bless the child! I didn't know you were a cook, Mollie."
"Neither I am," said Mollie, rousing herself up to the fact that she was back in Chauncery, and must set a watch upon her tongue. Why was it, she wondered, that she forgot Chauncery so much more when she was with those other children than she forgot the children when she was at Chauncery? "I once heard a person say they put gooseberries and red currants into cherry jam, and I suddenly remembered," she told Aunt Mary.
"Well, it is too late for cherries, but I will try it for the strawberries to-morrow. It will be quite an interesting experiment."
Mollie resolutely pushed her thoughts about the cherry garden and its occupants into the background, and gave her whole mind to a game of patience with Grannie, who was getting a little tired of jig-saw. But when that was over, and Grannie was absorbed in casting on a stocking-top with an intricate pattern, while Aunt Mary wrote letters, she began again to think and wonder about her curious journey, which for some reason seemed less strange to-day than it had done yesterday. She pondered over ways and means to get Dick across, or over, or through, "or whatever you call it when you travel in Time", she thought; "back might be the best word. I dowishI could tell Aunt Mary."
She looked thoughtfully at her aunt, whose head was bent over her writing, the smooth bands of her silky, brown hair shining brightly in the lamp-light. No doubt some, perhaps most, grown-ups would scoff at her tale if she told it, Mollie thought. Grown-up people as a rule love best to jog along on well-trodden, safe, commonplace paths, and avoid adventurous by-ways, but Aunt Mary, Mollie felt sure, was an anti-jogger, so to speak, and would always choose adventures if she had a choice. "It's funny to think," Mollie reflected, "that she can't be so very much younger than Mrs. Campbell is—was—is—was then. I suppose she is about thirty-five, and Mrs. Campbell forty or so—she looks—looked old enough to be Aunt Mary's mother. Being good at games keeps her young; she can beat me to a frazzle at golf and tennis; and she is frightfully keen on aeroplanes; I'm sure she would fly if it weren't for Grannie. I wonder why she never got married?"
Mollie had not yet come to the age of sentiment, but now and then she reached forward a little and surveyed its possibilities, and now she paused awhile to muse upon the subject of her aunt's spinsterhood. Not for long, however; she decided that Aunt Mary must have had excellent reasons of her own for remaining single, and returned to the more pressing problem of how to get Dick into the Campbells' garden. Finally she thought of a plan worth trying.
"Grannie, may I have the loan of one of your photographs?" she asked. "Dick has a way of copying them with a thing he has that makes them look like drawings, and the old-fashioned ones are the prettiest."
"By all means, if he will be careful," Grannie answered, nine-tenths of her mind being fixed on her new pattern and only one-tenth upon her grandchild's peculiar fancy for Victorian photographs. So Mollie wrote a short letter to her brother, enclosing the group which had worked the magic charm for herself that afternoon. She put it into the evening post-bag with a sigh. "If that doesn't do it Ican'tthink of anything else," she said to herself.
It is remarkable how quickly one becomes used to a new routine. Already Mollie was making more use of her hands and head because she could not use her feet. She was fond of writing, and decided next morning to begin an account of her strange adventure while it was still fresh in her mind. In the intervals of other plans for her future career she had dreams of becoming a writer of books, but her difficulty hitherto had been that the usual sort of book is so ordinary, and she had never been able to think of anything remarkably unusual to write about. The autobiography of a person who could live in various periods of the Christian Era might turn out to be quite interesting, she thought, if only people would believe that it was true. The trouble was that most likely they would think she was inventing it, "and anyone caninventany old thing. And this is only the beginning of my adventures. When I have thoroughly learnt how to Time-travel I will go back much further—perhaps to the French Revolution, and watch people being guillotined."
She scribbled diligently in the thick exercise-book, which Aunt Mary produced without once asking what it was wanted for. "It just shows—" Mollie murmured gratefully; "some people would have teased me to death."
And so time passed, and half-past two came round again in the usual inevitable way, and Mollie lay expecting Prudence as calmly as though she were coming from next door. She had the album on her lap, and was turning the pages in search of a new photograph, when in the twinkling of an eye Prue was there.
"We don't need that now," she said, "but we must have Aunt Mary's tunes. Where is she?"
"Oh dear, dear, I forgot!" Mollie cried in dismay. "I do believe Aunt Mary is making strawberry jam, and I went and told her about putting in gooseberries and red currants, and her head will be full of them and she will forget me!"
But the lullaby had not been forgotten. At that very moment the piano began—a tune Mollie knew well this time, for she had often heard the American soldiers sing it in London:
"Oh, darkies, how my heart grows weary,Far from the old folks at home".
"Give me your hand—quick," said Prue in a whisper.
* * * * *
Mollie found herself standing on a wide beach in the curve of a beautiful bay. Before her lay the sea, dark blue in the distance, a clear emerald green by the shore. To the right of her the beach stretched as far as she could see, firm yellow sand on the lower half, fine white silvery sand higher up. On the left it only ran for a couple of miles or so and then ended in rocks, over which the sea threw a cool white spray. Behind her, Mollie saw, when she turned, the line of the beach was followed by sandhills, some covered with low-growing scrub and some quite bare and treeless, shining like snow in the hot sunlight.
The children were all there. At a little distance from where she stood Mollie could see Hugh and Prudence, Hugh lightly clad in a swimming-suit, and Prue with her skirts rolled up and her feet bare. A wide sun-hat covered her head, and her brown curls were fastened back with a clasp, which made her look older, Mollie thought.
The two children were hauling a large, square, flat object down to the sea, Hugh pulling in front with ropes, and Prudence pushing behind.
"I do believe it's the raft," thought Mollie. "This must be Brighton, and I suppose the summer holidays have come round again. It is a little difficult to keep up with Time here. I dowishDick could come!"
Grizzel was sitting on the beach close beside her, and seemed to be gathering shells from a little pale-rose patch on the sand at her feet. She was very absorbed in her task, but she looked up at Mollie with a smile, apparently not at all surprised to see her there. She was dressed, like Prue, in a turned-up overall and wore a wide hat, which hid the red curls from view and gave her an unfamiliar look. Bridget was sitting not far from Grizzel, busily doing crochet-work and singing a song about a wild Irish boy, while her eyes wandered after Baby, who was singing a little song of her own invention about a poor lonely whale who had a loving heart. Higher up the beach, at the foot of the sandhills, Mollie could see Professor and Mrs. Campbell, one reading aloud and the other sewing.
"Where shall I go first?" Mollie asked herself, "I think I'll go and see what Hugh and Prudence are doing."
She found, when she began to walk, that she was bare-legged and bunchy about the skirts like the other girls, and that her head was covered with a sun-hat like theirs, a tanned Panama straw, light as a feather, and shading her eyes from the glare of sea and sand. The sun was very hot and the sand was warm under her feet.
"Hullo! Here's Mollie the Jolly!" exclaimed Hugh, as she drew near. "Come along and lend a hand—we are just about to launch the good shipNancy Leeon her trial trip."
Mollie examined the raft with deep interest. It was really very neatly made, the planks straight and smooth, and firmly held together by cross-bars underneath. There was a mast in the exact centre, with a sail at present close-reefed, and there was a pair of old oars which, Hugh explained, had been purchased from a boatman of his acquaintance. All round the raft were bunches of corks, several hundreds at least.
"Did Prue and Grizzel find all those?" Mollie asked.
"We all collected 'em," Hugh replied; "lots of people gave us corks—jolly old winebibbers they must be," he added ungratefully. "Now then—with a long, long pull and a strong, strong pull!"
They got to the edge of the water, and the two girls waded in as far as they could go without getting their clothes wet, before the raft finally took to her natural element and rocked up and down on the smoothly rippling wavelets. A gentle breeze was blowing off the sea, but the tide was running out, which, Hugh remarked, was a good plan, as the raft would go out to sea with the tide and come back with the wind in her sail. He thought, however, that he would not carry any passengers on the first trip—in fact, to begin with, he would harness himself to his craft and pull her both out and in, "just till I see how she goes; she's got to find her sea-legs."
The girls watched the raft and its owner depart into deep water; they saw Hugh climb on board, and decided that the passengers who sailed aboard theNancy Leewould be most suitably attired in bathing-dresses, as she appeared to slide along as much below the ocean as above it. After standing for some minutes they wandered along towards Grizzel, who was still sitting by the pale rosy patch on the sand. When they sat down beside her Mollie saw that the shells she was gathering were so tiny that they were hardly larger than a pin's head, and yet they were perfect in form and colour; she thought she had never seen anything more exquisite.
"We thread them and make necklaces," Prudence explained; "they are so thin that you can stick a needle through them quite easily; they come in beds like this all along the beach. There are lots of lovely shells here, and sea-eggs too. We collect them sometimes, but our collections have such a way of getting lost somehow, they are always beginning over again and ending too soon."
"Can you say 'She sells sea-shells' twenty times running, as fast as lightning?" asked Grizzel.
"Not running as fast as lightning," Mollie answered, "but I could say it if I were walking rather slowly."
"I couldn't," said Grizzel, taking no notice of Mollie's flippancy, "ifI were to crawl at the rate of half an inch a year I should be saying'She shells sea-shells' the whole time."
"You are talking nonsense," said Prudence. "Come up and see Papa andMamma."
Mollie was greeted kindly by the older people. She had forgotten to ask if she was supposed to be a visitor or only spending the day with the Campbells, but gathered from Mamma's conversation that she was paying a visit and had arrived that morning. She wondered again how they heard about her coming; the children appeared to take her for granted, but, of course,theyknew she was a Time-traveller!
As the girls sat by their elders, idly playing with the silvery sand and chatting to each other, a large steamship came in view, coming from the north and heading south-west. They all stopped working and talking as they watched her steaming along, a trail of smoke blowing behind her, smudging the blue sky with clouds, black at first and gradually fading to grey.
"That's the English mail," Papa said at last; "she was due to leave theSemaphore at three o'clock to-day."
They were silent again; the great ship drew nearer—now she was almost opposite.
"Oh—John—Home!"Mamma said. There was a tremble in her voice that made Prudence and Mollie look up—there were tears in her eyes.
"I know, little wife, I know," Papa answered softly, putting a hand over the white hands which had dropped the busy needle.
The girls rose to their feet and left Papa and Mamma. They went down to the edge of the shore, and stood watching the ship as she began to slip over the horizon.
"Now she has begun to go down the Big Hill," said Prue. "She will sail for miles and miles and thousands of miles, and for days and nights and weeks across all that sea. I wonder if some children on the other side will be playing on that beach, and will watch her funnel climb over the top of the hill again and say: 'Here comes the Australian mail!'"
Mollie did not answer. She could not remember ever taking much interest in the Australian mail. But in future she determined she would always watch when she had the chance, and wave a friendly hand to the incoming ships.
Soon there was nothing to be seen of the big steamer but a trail of smoke, which lingered long in the sky.
Prudence had fallen into a day-dream; and Mollie's eyes were roaming over the blue sea, when suddenly she caught sight of the raft bobbing about on the little waves, sometimes above and sometimes below. In the water in front of the raft she could see Hugh's head, like a round black ball—and—yes, she was not mistaken, there were two other round black balls which must also be heads. That was rather odd, she thought; she had not noticed any other boys about.
"Look, Prue!" she exclaimed, catching Prue by the arm, "look—there is Hugh, and he has got someone with him—oh,doyou think he has rescued some drowning sailors?"
Prue came out of her day-dream with a jerk, and brought her thoughts and her eyes back to earth, or rather to sea.
"Yes, hehassomeone with him," she said. "How funny!"
As they gazed, the three swimmers turned round and, with a good deal of ducking and slipping, climbed aboard the raft, which triumphantly survived and remained afloat, though decidedly wet about the deck. They proceeded to unfurl the sail, which one boy held while the other two took to the oars, and, after some hard work, theNancy Leewas safely beached. Grizzel joined Mollie and Prudence, and the three girls watched the three boys, not offering to go and help with the raft because they felt a little shy of the strangers.
Presently one of them turned round—and Mollie gave a jump. The boy's hair hung over his forehead in wet, black streaks, and he was dressed, or rather undressed, in a swimming-suit, the rest of him being wet, white skin; but in spite of this unusual appearance Mollie was almost sure—in fact she was quite sure—that it was Young Outram. And the other boy—who kept his back turned in a provoking way as he examined the raft—why,thatboy—yes, it surely was Dick! Mollie squealed and caught Prue by the arm:
"It's Dick and Jerry Outram!" she exclaimed, jumping up and down with excitement. "Oh, Prue—have they swum all the way from London without any clothes?"
Prudence laughed. "Mollie, youarea goose!Doyou think they could swim fourteen thousand miles?"
"Well how—? Oh, I forgot! It is so hard to remember aboutTime-travelling here! Oh, Prue,howexciting it is!"
At that moment Dick looked round and saw his sister. Both boys came racing along the sand towards the girls, kicking up their heels like young colts.
"Cheerio!" cried Dick, as he pranced up. "What price school! How's this for a rag? Jolly old beano, I call it!"
"What does he say?" asked Grizzel.
"He says that school isn't much of a place, and that this is a great lark, and that he enjoys being here immensely," translated Mollie. "Somepsychical phenomena!" exclaimed Young Outram, prancing up in his turn.
"I'm afraid we haven't got any," said Prudence politely.
"And you forgot to say 'Please' if we had," said Grizzel, with a frown.
"Whatdo they say?" asked Young Outram, looking puzzled.
"Prudence thought you were asking for some what's-its-name-how-much,"Mollie explained again.
"Whatdoeshe mean then?" Grizzel asked.
"He means that this is the loveliest magic that he ever heard of," said Mollie. "You shouldn't use such long words, Jerry, and they aren't true either, for this isnotthingummy phenomena, it is simply common everyday magic."
"There is no such thing as common magic," said Jerry.
"There is," said Mollie.
"There isn't," said Jerry.
"What do you call it when your mother gives you a dirty little brown onion to put in the ground and you bring it back to her turned into a parrot-tulip?" asked Mollie.
"Oh—if you—"
"Stow it, Young Outram, you blighter," Dick interrupted. "Don't be such a silly old Juggins, making them ratty first go-off like that. Keep your hair on, Mollie, and don't get the hump over nothing. If youmustjaw about parrots, jaw about the dossy chap we spotted in school; you are simply talking hot air, both of you."
"Whatdoes he say?" asked Hugh, who had come up by this time.
"I wish to goodness you boys would speak plain English," Mollie said impatiently. "I don't want to spend all my time explaining you to the others."
"Irry yourry tawrry lierry tharry weerry wirry tawrry lierry thirry, arry therry yourry woerry urrystarry wurry wurry tharry weerry sayrry," said Grizzel, rather angrily and very rapidly.
"Whatdoes she say?" asked both boys at once.
"It's only our private language," said Prudence; "she says that if you talk that way we'll talk our way, and then you won't understand us.Thatwouldn't do any good. I think we'd better have a Circle. Give me your hand, Mollie, and you take Hugh's. And Hugh Dick's, and Dick Grizzel's, and Grizzel Young Outram's, and Young Outram my other hand. Now all stand quite still and shut your eyes; listen to the waves, and try and think of three nice things about the people next you."
The six children stood in a circle, silent and still, as Prudence had ordered, their eyes tightly closed. They felt the hot beams of the sun pouring over them, and the cool salt wind blew on their faces and through their hair; their toes curled and wriggled in the warm, wet sand, and in their ears was the plash-plash of the little waves beating backwards and forwards on the beach. It was very pleasant. It seemed quite easy to think of those three nice things. And presently each child felt a warm and friendly glow steal up its left arm, through its heart, down its right arm—and so on to its neighbour. When this pleasing and cheerful sensation had gone round the Circle three times, Prudence said: "Now, open your eyes and let go."
They stood there smiling at each other, and feeling almost ready to burst with goodness and loving kindness towards all the world.
"Now we'll understand each other," said Prue. "Words don't matter much if you understand people. Now what shall we do?"
"Don't let's stand about any more," said Mollie; "the time does go so quickly, and there are lovely things to do. What would you like to do, Young Outram?"
"Call me Jerry all the time," he answered first. "I want to forget about school while I can—there are a good many of us at school," he explained to Prudence, "and we are called Old Outram, and Outram Two, and Young Outram; and there are three Outram Kids at the prep, and another kid at home."
"Allboys!" exclaimed Prudence.
Jerry nodded. There had been nine Outram boys before the war! "Let's go out on the raft again—please," he added, with a wink at Grizzel, who smiled back. "You come too; we could easily push you along."
"We'll have to change into our bathing things first," said Prudence; "the raft looks a little wet. We won't be long."
The girls ran up into the sandhills to change, but before Prue disappeared she returned to the boys with a basket made of rushes in her hand, which she had begged from Bridget.
"Here are some buns and grapes," she said a little shyly, "I thought you might be feeling hungry, and it is a long time yet till tea-time."
Jerry decided on the spot that if he everdidgo in for the peculiar entertainment of falling in love, he would choose a shy girl with brown curls who did not talk slang and went about distributing buns to hungry boys. "Her for mine," he expressed it to himself.
The girls were soon back, all in navy-blue bathing-suits, knickers below, and a belted tunic reaching to their knees above—too much clothed for Mollie's taste; she liked to be skimpy when she went swimming. But no one grumbles after they have been in a Circle—at least, not for the next twenty-four hours—so Mollie endured her substantial garments philosophically and soon forgot all about them.
The girls waded out to the raft, which the boys had launched. They climbed on board and were soon in fairly deep water. Mollie and Prudence slipped off and left lazy Grizzel alone on deck, sitting cross-legged like a little tailor, one arm flung round the mast. The raft rocked gently up and down on the calm sea, while the children swam, ducked, and played about in the clear, sun-warmed water like a school of young porpoises. As Grizzel sat idly watching the rest, her eyes fell upon an object which floated at a little distance from the raft. It was a bottle—a common beer-bottle—its cork rammed well in and sealed with red wax.
"What's that?" she called to Hugh, pointing to the bottle as it danced about, twirling round and round, tossing from side to side in the wide ripples sent out by the children and the drifting raft.
They all made for it. "It's a message from the deep," cried Jerry; "probably from a ship-wrecked sailor."
Hugh, being the nearest, caught it by its red neck, and the whole party collected on and about the raft to see what would happen next. But Hugh refused to break the bottle until they went ashore again.
"The sea might get in and spoil the paper, and the broken glass would get on deck and cut us; we'll pull her in now and read the message on the beach," he decided.
They got under way and, practice making perfect, were soon high and dry on the beach, and theNancy Leedragged up and comfortably moored. The children seated themselves in a ring, and Hugh cautiously knocked off the neck of the bottle with a stone. He drew out a paper, which had been carefully rolled round a thin bamboo stick and tied with a red ribbon. There was no date on the paper, nor was there any sign to show where the bottle had been thrown in, but written in large, clear round-hand was the following message:
"Hidden treasure," said three boys all at once. "Where is The Duke'sNose?" asked Dick.
"Never heard of it," answered Hugh, looking hard at Jerry, whose nose was distinctly aquiline and promised to be more so in the future. "You aren't a duke by any chance, I suppose?" he asked.
"No, old sport, I'm not," Jerry answered, with a grin, "and if I were, the only treasure you would find in the cave under my nose would be some jolly sharp teeth, and they wouldn't be at all to your advantage either."
"It's probably among those rocks over there," Mollie suggested; "I expect if we went there and walked round we would see something that looked like a duke's nose."