Uproarious applause greeted Mr. Taylor's efforts, and he was so elated that it was with difficulty Mr. Thomson restrained him from singing it all over again.
"You've done fine, man," he whispered. "Mind you're the superintendent of the Sabbath school."
Mr. Taylor's face sobered.
"Thomson, ye don't think it's unbecoming of me to sing 'Miss Hooligan'? I've often sang it and no harm thought, but I wouldn't for the world bring discredit on ma office. I did think of gettin' up 'Bonnie Mary o' Argyle.' It would mebbe have been more wise-like."
"No, no, Taylor; I was only joking. 'Miss Hooligan's' fine. I like it better every time I hear it. There's no ill in it. I'm sorry I spoke."
Meantime Jessie was trying to explain away Mr. Taylor to the Simpsons, who continued to look disgusted. Elizabeth Seton, standing near, came to her aid.
"Isn't Mr. Taylor delicious?" she said. "Quite as good as Harry Lauder, and you know"—she turned to Miss Muriel Simpson—"what colossal sums people in London pay Harry Lauder to sing at their parties."
Miss Muriel knew little of London and nothing of London parties, but she liked Elizabeth's assuming she did, so she replied with unction, "That is so."
"Well," said Miss Gertrude, "I never can see why people rave about Harry Lauder. I see nothing funny in vulgarity myself, but look at the crowds!"
"Perhaps," said Elizabeth, "the crowd has a vulgar mind. I wouldn't wonder;" and she turned away, to find Stewart Stevenson at her elbow.
"I say, Miss Seton," he said, "I wonder if you would care to see that old ballad-book I was telling you about?"
"I would, very much," said Elizabeth heartily. "Bring it, won't you, some afternoon? I am in most afternoons about half-past four."
"Thanks very much—I would like to.... Well, good night."
It seemed to strike everyone at the same moment that it was time to depart. There was a general exodus, and a filing upstairs by the ladies to the best bedroom for wraps, and to the parlour on the part of the men, for overcoats and goloshes, or snow-boots as the case might be.
Elizabeth stood in the lobby waiting for her cab, and watched the scene.
As Miss Waterston tripped downstairs in a blue cashmere cloak with a rabbit fur collar Mr. Inverarity emerged from the parlour, with his music sticking out of his coat-pocket.
Together they said good night to Mr. and Mrs. Thomson and told Jessie how much they had enjoyed the party. "We've just had a lovely evening, Jessie," said Miss Waterston.
"Awfully jolly, Miss Thomson," said Mr. Inverarity.
"Not at all," was Jessie's reply; and the couple departed together, having discovered that they both lived "West."
The Simpsons, clad in the smartest of evening cloaks, were addressing a few parting remarks to Jessie, when Mr. and Mrs. Taylor took, so to speak, the middle of the stage. Mrs. Taylor had turned up her olive-green silk skirt and pinned it in a bunch round her waist. Over this she wore a black circular waterproof from which emerged a pair of remarkably thin legs ending in snow-boots. An aged black bonnet—"my prayer-meeting bonnet" she would have described it—crowned her head.
They advanced arm in arm till they stood right in front of their host and hostess, then Mr. Taylor made a speech.
"A remarkably successful evenin', Mrs. Thomson, as I'm sure everybody'll admit. You've entertained us well; you've fed us sumptuous; you've——"
"Now, Mr. Taylor," Mrs. Thomson interrupted, "you'll fair affront us. It's you we've to thank for coming, and singing, and I'm sure I hope you'll be none the worse of all—there, there, are you really going? Well, good night. I'm sure it's real nice to see you and Mrs. Taylor always so affectionate—isn't it, Papa?"
"That's so," agreed Mr. Thomson.
"Mrs. Thomson," said Mr. Taylor solemnly, "me and my spouse are sweethearts still."
Mrs. Taylor looked coyly downwards, murmuring what sounded like "Aay-he"; then, with her left hand (her right hand being held by her lover-like husband), she seized Mrs. Thomson's hand and squeezed it. "I'll hear on Sabbath if ye're the worse of it," she said hopefully. "It's been real nice, but I sneezed twice in the bedroom, so I doubt I've got a tich of cold. But I'll go home and steam my head, and that'll mebbe take it in time."
"Yer cab has came," Annie, the servant, whispered hoarsely to Elizabeth.
"Thank you," said Elizabeth. Then a thought struck her: "Mrs. Taylor, won't you let me drive you both home? I pass your door. Do let me."
"I'm sure, Miss Seton, you're very kind," said Mrs. Taylor.
"Thoughtful, right enough," said her husband; and, amid a chorus of good nights, Elizabeth and the Taylors went out into the night.
Half an hour later the exhausted Thomson family sat in their dining-room. They had not been idle, for Mrs. Thomson believed in doing at once things that had to be done. Mr. Thomson and Robert had carried away the intruding chairs, and taken the "leaf" out of the table. Jessie had put all the left-over cakes into a tin box, and folded away the tablecloth and d'oyleys. Mrs. Thomson had herself carefully counted and arranged her best cups and saucers in their own cupboard, and was now busy counting the fruit knives and forks and teaspoons.
"Only twenty-three! Surely Annie's niver let a teaspoon go down the sink."
"Have a sangwich, Mamma," said her husband. "The spoon'll turn up."
Mrs. Thomson took a sandwich and sat down on a chair. "Well," she said slowly, "we've had them, and we'll not need to have them for a long time again."
"It's been a great success," said Mr. Thomson, taking a mouthful of lemonade. "Eh, Jessie?"
"It was very nice," said Jessie, "and as you say, Mamma, we'll not need to have another for a long time. Mr. Taylor's the limit," she added.
"He enjoyed himself," said her father.
"He's an awful man to eat," said Mrs. Thomson. "It's not the thing to make remarks about guests' appetites, I know, but he fair surpassed himself to-night. However, Mrs. Taylor, poor body, 's quite delighted with him."
"He sang well," said Mr. Thomson. "I never heard 'Miss Hooligan' better. Quite a lot of talent we had to-night, and Miss Seton's a treat. Nobody can sing like her, to my mind."
"That's true," said his wife. "Mr. Stevenson seems a nice young man, Jessie. What does he do?"
"He's an artist," said Jessie. "I met him at the Shakespeare Readings. Muriel Simpson thinks he's awfully good-looking."
"Muriel Simpson's not, anyway," said Alick. "She's a face like a scone, and it's all floury too, like a scone."
"Alick," said his father, "it's high time you were in bed, my boy. We'll be hearing about this in the morning. What about your lessons?"
"Lessons!" cried Alick shrilly. "How could I learn lessons and a party goin' on?"
"Quite true," said Mr. Thomson. "Well, it's only once in a while. Rubbert"—to his son who was standing up yawning—"you're no great society man."
Robert shook his head.
"I haven't much use for people at any time," he said, "but I fair hate them at a party."
And Mr. Thomson laughed in an understanding way as he went to lift in the mat and lock the front door, and make Jeanieville safe for the night.
"When that I was and a little tiny boy,With a hey ho hey, the wind and the rain."Twelfth Night.
The Reverend James Seton sat placidly eating his breakfast while his daughter Elizabeth wrestled in spirit with her young brother.
"No, Buff, you arenotto tell yourself a story. You must sup your porridge."
Buff slapped his porridge vindictively with his spoon and said, "I wish all the millers were dead."
"Foolish fellow," said his father, as he took a bit of toast.
"Come away," said Elizabeth persuasively, scooping a hole in the despised porridge, "we'll make a quarry in the middle." She filled it up with milk. "There! We've made a great deep hole, big enough to drown an army. Now—one sup for the King, and one for the boys in India, and one for—for the partridge in the pear-tree, and one for the poor little starved pussy downstairs."
Buff twisted himself round to look at his sister's face.
"Yes, there is. Ellen found it last night at the kitchen door. If you finish your breakfast quickly, you may run down and see it before prayers."
"What's it like?" gurgled Buff, as the porridge slid in swift spoonfuls down his throat.
"Grey, with a black smudge on its nose and such alittletail."
"Set me down," said Buff, with the air of one who would behold a cherished vision.
Elizabeth untied his napkin, and in a moment they heard him clatter down the kitchen stairs.
Elizabeth met her father's eyes and smiled. "Funny Buff! Isn't it odd his passion for cats? Oh, Father, you haven't asked about the party."
Mr. Seton passed his cup to be filled.
"That is only my second, isn't it?" he asked, "Well, I hope you had a pleasant evening?"
Elizabeth wrinkled her brows as she filled her cup. "Pleasant? Warm, noisy, over-eaten, yes—but pleasant? And yet, do you know, it was pleasant because the Thomsons were so anxious to please. Dear Mrs. Thomson was so kind, stout and worried, and Mr. Thomson is such an anxious little pilgrim always; and Jessie was so smart, and Robert—what a nice boy that is!—so obviously hated us all, and Alick's accent was as refreshing as ever. We got the most tremendously fine supper—piles and piles of things, and everybody ate such a lot, especially Mr. Taylor—'keeping up the tabernacle' he called it. I was sorry for Jessie with that little man. It is hard to rise to gentility when you are weighted with parents who will stick to their old friends, and our church-people, though they are of such stuff as angels are made, don't look well on the outside. I know Jessie felt they spoiled the look of the party."
"Poor Jessie!" said Mr. Seton.
"Yes, poor Jessie! I never saw Mr. Taylor so jokesome. He called her a 'good wee miss,' and shamed her in the eyes of the Simpsons (you don't know them—stupid, vulgar people). And then he sang! Father, do you think 'Miss Hooligan' is a fit song for the superintendent of the Sabbath school to sing?"
Mr. Seton smiled indulgently.
"I don't think there's much wrong with 'Miss Hooligan,'" he said; "she's a very old friend."
"You mean she's respectable through very age? Perhaps to us, but I assure you the Simpsons were simply stunned last night at the first time of hearing."
Elizabeth poured some cream into her cup, then looked across at her father with her eyes dancing with laughter. "I laugh whenever I think of Mrs. Taylor," she explained—"ma spouse, as Mr. Taylor calls her. I don't think she has any mind really; her whole conversation is just a long tangle of symptoms, her own and other people's. What infinite interests she gets out of her neighbours' insides! And then the preciseness of her dates—'would it be Wensday? No, it was Tuesday—no, Wensday it must ha' been.'"
Her father chuckled appreciatively at Elizabeth's reproduction of Mrs. Taylor's voice and manner, but he felt constrained to remark: "Mrs. Taylor's an excellent woman, Elizabeth. You're a little too given to laughing at people."
"Oh, Father, if a minister's daughter can't laugh, what is the poor thing to do? But, seriously, I find myself becoming horribly minister's daughterish. I'm developing a 'hearty' manner, I smile and smile, and I have that craving for knowledge of the welfare of absent members of families that is so distinguishing a feature of the female clergy. And I don't in the least want to be a typical 'minister's daughter.'"
"I think," said Mr. Seton dryly, "you might be many a worse thing." He rose as he spoke and brought a Bible from the table in the corner. "Ring the bell, will you? The child will be late if he doesn't come now."
Even as he spoke the door was opened violently, and Buff came stumbling in, with a small frightened kitten in his arms.
"Father, look!" he cried breathlessly, casting himself and his burden on his father's waistcoat. "It's a lost kitten, quite lost and very little—see the size of its tail. It's got no home, but Marget says it's got fleas and she won't let it live in her kitchen; but you'll let it stay in your study, won't you, Father? It'll sit beside you when you're writing your sermons, and then when I'm doing my lessons it'll cheer me up."
Mr. Seton gently stroked the little shivering ball of fur. "Not so tight, Buff. The poor beastie can scarcely breathe. Put it on the rug now, my son. Here are the servants for prayers." But the little lost kitten clung with sharp frightened claws to Mr. Seton's trousers, and Buff, liking the situation, made no serious effort to dislodge it.
The servants, Marget and Ellen, took their seats and instantly Marget's wrath was aroused and her manners forgotten.
"Tak' that cat aff yer faither's breeks, David," she said severely.
"Shan't," said Buff, glowering at her over his shoulder.
"Don't be rude, my boy," said Mr. Seton.
"Shewas rude to the little cat, Father; she said it had fleas."
"Well, well," said his father peaceably; "be quiet now while I read."
Elizabeth rose and detached the kitten, taking it and Buff on her knee, while her father opened the Bible and read some verses from Jeremiah—words that Jeremiah the prophet spake unto Baruch the son of Neriah in the fourth year of Jehoiakim, the son of Josiah, king of Judah. Elizabeth stroked Buff's mouse-coloured hair and thought how remote it all sounded. This day would be full of the usual little busynesses—getting Buff away to school, ordering the dinner, shopping, writing letters, seeing people—what had all that to do with Baruch, the son of Neriah, who lived in the fourth year of Jehoiakim?
The moment prayers were over Buff leapt to his feet, seized the kitten, and dashed out of the room.
"He's an ill laddie that," Marget observed, "but there's wan thing aboot him, he's no' ill-kinded to beasts."
"Marget," said Elizabeth, "you know quite well that in your heart you think him perfection."
"No' me," said Marget; "I think no man perfection. Are ye comin' to see aboot the denner the noo, or wull I begin to ma front-door?"
"Give me three minutes, Marget, to see the boys off."
Two small boys with school-bags on their backs came up the gravelled path. "Here comes Thomas—and Billy following after. Buff! Buff!—where is the boy?"
"Here," said Buff, emerging suddenly from his father's study. "Where's my bag?"
He paid no attention to his small companion and Thomas and Billy made no sign of recognition to him.
"Are you boys not going to say good morning?" asked Elizabeth, as she put on Buff's school-bag. "Don't you know that when gentlefolk meet courtesies are exchanged?"
The three boys looked at each other and murmured a greeting in a shame-faced way.
"Can you say your lessons to-day, Thomas?" Elizabeth asked, buttoning the while Buff's overcoat.
"No," said Thomas, "but Billy can say his."
"This is singing-day," said Billy brightly.
Billy was round and fat and beaming. Thomas was fat too, but inclined to be pensive. Buff was thin and seemed all one colour—eyes, hair, and complexion. Thomas and Billy were pretty children: Buff was plain.
"Uch!" said Thomas.
"I thought you liked singing-day," said Elizabeth.
"We did," said Buff, "but last day they asked me and Thomas to stop singing cos we were putting the others off the tune."
"Oh!" said Elizabeth, trying not to smile. "Well, it's time you were off. Here's your Edinburgh rock." She gave each of them half a stick of rock, which they stuck in their mouths cigar-wise.
"Be sure and come straight home," said Elizabeth to Buff.
"You'd better not come to tea with us to-day, Buff," said Thomas. "Mamma said yesterday it was about time we had a rest."
"I wasn't coming," said the outraged Buff.
Elizabeth put an arm round him as she spoke to Thomas.
"Mamma has quite enough with her own, Thomas. I expect when Buff joins you you worry her dreadfully. I think you and Billy had better come to tea here to-day, and after you have finished your lessons we'll play at 'Yellow Dog Dingo.'"
"Hurray!" said Billy.
"And when we've finished 'Yellow Dog Dingo,'" said Buff, "will you play at 'Giantess'?"
"Well—for half an hour, perhaps," said Elizabeth. "Now run off, or I'll be Giantess this minute and eat you all up."
They moved towards the door; then Thomas stopped and observed dreamily:
"I dreamt last night that Satan and his wife and baby were chasing me."
"Oh, Thomas!" said Elizabeth. She watched the three little figures in their bunchy little overcoats, with their arms round each other's necks, stumble out of the gate, then she shut the front-door and went into her father's study.
Mr. Seton was standing in what, to him, was a very characteristic attitude. One foot was on a chair, his left hand was in his pocket, while in his right he held a smallish green volume. A delighted smile was on his face as Elizabeth entered.
"Aha, Father! Caught you that time."
Mr. Seton put the book back on the shelf.
"My dear girl, I was only glancing at something that——"
"Only a refreshing glance at Scott before you begin your sermon, Father dear, and 'what for no'? Oh! while I remember—the Sabbath-school social comes off on the ninth: you are to take the chair, and I'm to sing. I shall print it in big letters on this card and stick it on the mantelpiece, then we're bound to remember it."
Mr. Seton was already at his writing-table.
"Yes, yes," he said in an absent-minded way. "Run away now, like a good girl. I'm busy."
"Yes, I'm going. Just look at the snug way Buff has arranged the kitten. Father, Thomas has been having nightmares about Satan in his domestic relations. Did you know Satan had a wife and baby——?"
"Elizabeth!"
"I didn't say it; it was Thomas. That boy has an original mind."
"Well, well, girl; but you are keeping me back."
"Yes, I'm going. There's just one thing—about the chapter at prayers. I was wondering—only wondering, you know—if Baruch the son of Neriah had any real bearing on our everyday life?"
Mr. Seton looked at his daughter, then remarked as he turned back to his work: "I sometimes think you are a very ignorant creature, Elizabeth."
But Elizabeth only laughed as she shut the door and made her way kitchenwards.
On the kitchen stairs she met Ellen the housemaid, who stopped her with a "Please, Miss Elizabeth," while she fumbled in the pocket of her print and produced a post card with a photograph on it.
"It's ma brither," she explained. "I got it this mornin'."
Elizabeth carried the card to the window at the top of the staircase and studied it carefully.
"I think he's like you, Ellen," she said. "How beautifully his hair is brushed."
Ellen beamed. "He's got awful pretty prominent eyes," she said.
"Yes," said Elizabeth. "I expect you're very proud of him, Ellen. Is he your eldest brother?"
"Yes, mum. He's a butcher in the Co-operative andawfulsteady."
Elizabeth handed back the card.
"Thank you very much for letting me see it. How is your little sister's foot?"
"It's keepin' a lot better, and ma mother said I was to thank you for the toys and books you sent her."
"Oh, that's all right. I'm so glad she's better. When you're doing my room to-day remember the mirrors, will you? This weather makes them so dim."
"Yes, mum," said Ellen cheerfully, as she went to her day's work.
Elizabeth found Marget waiting for her. She had laid out on the kitchen-table all the broken meats from the pantry and was regarding the display gloomily. Marget had been twenty-five years with the Setons and was not so much a servant as a sort of Grand Vizier. She expected to be consulted on every point, and had the gravest fears about Buff's future because Elizabeth refused to punish him.
"It's no' kindness," she would say; "it's juist saftness. Heshouldbe wheepit."
She adored the memory of Elizabeth's mother, who had died five years before, when Buff was a little tiny boy. She adored too "the Maister," as she called Mr. Seton, though deprecating his other-worldly, absent-minded ways. "It wadna dae if we were a' like the Maister," she often reminded Elizabeth. "Somebody maun think aboot washin's and things."
As to the Seton family—Elizabeth she thought well-meaning but "gey impident whiles"; the boys in India, Alan the soldier and Walter the promising young civilian, she still described as "notorious ill laddies"; while Buff (David Stuart was his christened name) she regarded as a little soul who, owing to an over-indulgent father and sister, was in danger of straying on the Broad Road were she not there to herd him by threats and admonitions into the Narrow Way.
Truth to say, she admired them enormously, they were her "bairns," but often her eyes would fill with tears as she said, "They're a' fine, but the best o' them's awa'."
Sandy, the eldest, had died at Oxford in his last summer-term, to the endless sorrow of all who loved him. His mother—that gentle lady—a few months later followed him, crushed out of life by the load of her grief, and Elizabeth had to take her place and mother the boys, be a companion to her father, shepherd the congregation, and bring up the delicate little Buff, who was so much younger than the others as to seem like an only child.
Elizabeth had stood up bravely to her burden, and laughed her way through the many difficulties that beset her—laughed more than was quite becoming, some people said; but Elizabeth always preferred disapproval to pity.
This morning she noted down all that Marget said was needed, and arranged for the simple meals. Marget was very voluble, and the difficulty was to keep her to the subject under discussion. She mixed up orders for the dinner with facts about the age of her relations in the most distracting way.
"Petaty-soup! Aweel, the Maister likes them thick. As I was sayin', ma Aunty Marget has worked hard a' her days, she's haen a dizzen bairns, and noo she's ninety-fower an' needs no specs."
"Dear me," said Elizabeth, edging towards the door. "Well, I'll order the fish and the other things; and remember oatcakes with the potato-soup, please."
She was half-way up the kitchen stairs when Marget put her head round the door and said, "That's to say if she's aye leevin', an' I've heard no word to the contrary."
Elizabeth telephoned the orders, then proceeded to dust the drawing-room—one of her daily duties. It was a fairly large room, papered in soft green; low white bookcases on which stood pieces of old china lined three sides; on the walls were etchings and prints, and over the fireplace hung a really beautiful picture by a famous artist of Elizabeth's mother as a girl. A piano, a table or two, a few large arm-chairs, and a sofa covered in bright chintz made up the furniture of what was a singularly lovable and home-like room.
Elizabeth's dusting of the drawing-room was something of a ceremonial: it needed three dusters. With a silk duster she dusted the white bookcases and the cherished china; the chair legs and the tables and the polished floor needed an ordinary duster; then she got a selvyt-cloth and polished the Sheffield-plate, the brass candlesticks and tinder-boxes. After that she shook out the chintz curtains, plumped up the cushions, and put her dusters in their home in a bag that hung on the shutter. "That's one job done," she said to herself, as she stopped to look out of the window.
The Setons' house stood in a wide, quiet road, with villas and gardens on both sides. It was an ordinary square villa, but it was of grey stone and fairly old, and it had some fine trees round it. Mr. Seton often remarked that he never saw a house or garden he liked so well, but then it was James Seton's way to admire sincerely everything that was his.
Just opposite rose the imposing structure of three storeys in red stone which sheltered Thomas and Billy Kirke. Mr. Kirke was in business. Elizabeth suspected him—though with no grounds to speak of—of "soft goods." Anyway, from some mysterious haunt in the city "Papa" managed to get enough money to keep "Mamma" and the children in the greatest comfort, to help the widows and fatherless, and to entertain a large circle of acquaintances in most hospitable fashion. He was a cheery little man with a beard, absolutely satisfied with his lot in life.
Elizabeth looked out at the prospect somewhat drearily. It was a dull November day. Rain was beginning to fall heavily; the grass looked sodden and dark. A message-boy went past, with his empty basket over his head, whistling a doleful tune. A cart of coal stopped at the Kirkes', and she watched the men carry it round to the kitchen premises. They had sacks over their shoulders to protect them from the rain, and they lifted the wet, shining lumps of coal into hamper-like baskets and staggered with them over the well-gravelled path. What a grimy job for them, Elizabeth thought, but everything seemed rather grimy this morning. Try as she would, she couldn't remember any really pleasant thing that was going to happen; day after day of dreary doings loomed before her. She sighed, and then, so to speak, shook herself mentally.
Elizabeth had a notion that when one felt depressed the remedy was not to give oneself a pleasure, but to do some hated duty, so she now thought rapidly over distasteful tasks awaiting her. Buff's suit to be sponged with ammonia and mended, old clothes to be looked out for a jumble sale, a pile of letters to reply to. "Oh dear!" said Elizabeth; but she went resolutely upstairs, and by the time she had tidied out various drawers and laid out unneeded garments, and had brought brown paper and string and tied them into neat bundles, she felt distinctly more cheerful.
The mending of Buff's suit completed the cheering process; for, in one of his trouser pockets, she found a picture drawn and coloured by that artist. It was a picture of Noah and the Ark, bold in conception if not very masterly in workmanship. Noah was represented with his head poked out of a skylight, his patriarchal beard waving in the wind, watching for the return of the dove; but the artist must have got confused in his ornithology, for the fowl coming towards Noah was a fearsome creature with a beak like an eagle. Aloft, astride on a somewhat solid cloud, clad in a crown and a sort of pyjama-suit, sat what was evidently intended to be an angel of sorts—watching with interest the manoeuvres of Noah and the eagle-like dove. And as Elizabeth smoothed out the crumpled masterpiece she wondered how she could have imagined herself dull when the house contained the Buffy-boy.
The writing-table in the drawing-room showed a pile of letters waiting to be answered. Elizabeth stirred the fire into a blaze, sniffed at a bowl of violets, and sat down to answer them. "Two bazaar circulars! and both from people who have helped me.... Well, I must just buy things to send." She turned to the next. "How bills do come home to roost! I wish I had paid this at the time. Now I must write a cheque—and my account so lean and shrunken. What an offence bills are!"
Very reluctantly she wrote a cheque and looked at it wistfully before she put it into the envelope, and took up a letter from a person unknown, resident in Rothesay, asking her to sing in that town at a charity concert. "I heard you sing while staying with my sister, Mrs. M'Cubbins, whom you know, and I will be pleased if you can stay the night——" so ran the letter. "Pleased if I stay the night!" thought Elizabeth wrathfully. "I should just think I would if I went—which I won't, of course. Mrs. M'Cubbins' sister! That explains the impertinence." And she wrote a chill note regretting that she could not give herself the pleasure. An invitation to dinner was declined because it was for "Prayer-meeting night." Then she took up a long letter, much underlined, which she read through carefully before she began to write.
"Most kind of Aunts.—How can I possibly go to Switzerland with you this Christmas? Have I not a father? also a younger brother? It's not because I don't want to go—you know how I would love it; but picture to yourself Father and Buff spending their Christmas alone! Would you not come to us? I propose it with diffidence, for I know you think in Glasgow dwelleth no good thing; but won't you try it? You know you have never given it a chance. A few hours on your way to the North is all you ever give us, and Glasgow can't be judged in an hour or two—nor its people either. I don't say that it would be in the least amusing for you, but it would be great fun for us, and you ought to try to be altruistic, dearest of aunts. You know quite well that Mr. Arthur Townshend will be quite all right without you for a little. He has probably lots of invitations for Christmas, being such a popular young man and——"
The opening of the gate and the sound of footsteps on the gravel made Elizabeth run to the window.
"Buff—carryinghis coat and the rain pouring! Of all the abandoned youths!"
Buff dashed into the house, threw his overcoat into one corner, his cap into another, and violently assaulted the study door, kicking it when it failed to open at the first attempt.
"Boy, what are you about?" asked his father, as Buff fell on his knees before the chair on which lay, comfortably asleep, the little rescued kitten.
"Sir Toby Belch.Does not our life consist of four elements?Sir Andrew Aguecheek.Faith, so they say, but I think it rather consists of eating and drinking."Twelfth Night.
"Poo-or pussy!" murmured Buff, laying his head beside his treasure on the cushion.
"Get up, boy," said Mr. Seton. "You carry kindness to animals too far."
"And he doesn't carry tidiness any way at all," said Elizabeth, who had followed Buff into the study. "He has strewed his garments all over the place in the most shocking way. Come along, Buff, and pick them up.... Father, tell him to come."
"Do as your sister says, Buff."
But Buff clung limpet-like to the chair and expostulated. "What's the good of putting things tidy when I'm putting them on again in a minute?"
"There's something in that," Mr. Seton said, as he put back in the shelves the books he had been using.
"All I have to say," said Elizabeth, "is that if I had been brought up in this lax way I wouldn't be the example of sweetness and light I am now. Do as you are told, Buff. I hear Ellen bringing up luncheon."
Buff stowed the kitten under his arm and stood up. "I'll pick them up," he said in a dignified way, "if Launcelot can have his dinner with me."
"Who?" asked Elizabeth.
"This is him," Buff explained, looking down at the distraught face of the kitten peeping from under his arm.
"What made you call it Launcelot?" asked Elizabeth, as her father went out of the room laughing.
"Thomas said to call him Topsy, and Billy said Bull's Eye was a nice name, but I thought he looked more like a Launcelot."
"Well—I'll take it while you pick up your coat and run and wash your hands. You'll be late if you don't hurry."
"Aw! no sausages!" said Buff, five minutes later, as he wriggled into his place at the luncheon-table.
"Can't have sausages every day, sonny," said his sister; "the butcher man would get tired making them for us."
"Aren't there any sausage-mines?" asked Buff; but his father and sister had begun to talk to each other, so his question remained unanswered.
Unless spoken to, Buff seldom offered a remark, but talked rapidly to himself in muffled tones, to the great bewilderment of strangers, who were apt to think him slightly deranged.
Ellen had brought in the pudding when Elizabeth noticed that her young brother was sitting with a tense face, his hands clenched in front of him and his legs moving rapidly.
She touched his arm to recall him to his surroundings. "Don't touch me," he said through his teeth. "I'm a motor and I've lost control of myself."
He emitted a shrill "Honk Honk," to the delight of his father, who inquired if he were the car or the chauffeur.
"I'm both," said Buff, his legs moving even more rapidly. Ellen, unmoved by such peculiar table-manners, put his plate of pudding before him, and Buff, hearing Elizabeth remark that Thomas and Billy were in all probability even now on their way to school, fell to, said his grace, was helped into his coat, and left the house in almost less time than it takes to tell.
Mr. Seton and Elizabeth were drinking their coffee when Elizabeth said:
"I heard from Aunt Alice this morning."
"Yes? How is she?"
"Very well, I think. She wants me to go with her to Switzerland in December. Of course I've said I can't go."
"Of course," said Mr. Seton placidly.
Elizabeth pushed away her cup.
"Father, I don't mind being noble, but I must say I do hate to have my nobility taken for granted."
"My dear girl! Nobility——"
"Well," said Elizabeth, "isn't it pretty noble to give up Switzerland and go on plodding here? Just look at the rain, and I must go away down to the district and collect for Women's Foreign Missions. There are more amusing pastimes than toiling up flights of stairs and wresting shillings for the heathen from people who can't afford to give. I can hardly bear to take it."
"My dear, would you deny them the privilege?"
It might almost be said that Elizabeth snorted.
"Privilege! Oh, well... If anyone else had said that, but you're a saint, Father, and I believe you honestly think it is a privilege to give. You must, for if it weren't for me I doubt if you would leave yourself anything to live on, but—oh! it's no use arguing. Where are you visiting this afternoon?"
"I really ought to go to Dennistoun to see that poor body, Mrs. Morrison."
"It's such a long way in the rain. Couldn't you wait for a better day?"
James Seton rose from the table and looked at the dismal dripping day, then he smiled down at his daughter. "After twenty years in Glasgow I'm about weather-proof, Lizbeth. If I don't go to-day I can't go till Saturday, and I'm just afraid she may be needing help. I'll see one or two other sick people on my way home."
Elizabeth protested no more, but followed her father into the hall and helped him with his coat, brushed his hat, and ran upstairs for a clean handkerchief for his overcoat pocket.
As they stood together there was a striking resemblance between father and daughter. They had the same tall slim figure and beautifully set head, the same broad brow and humorous mouth. But whereas Elizabeth's eyes were grey, and faced the world mocking and inscrutable, her father's were the blue hopeful eyes of a boy. Sorrow and loss had brought to James Seton's table their "full cup of tears," and the drinking of that cup had bent his shoulders and whitened his hair, but it had not touched his expression of shining serenity.
"Are you sure those boots are strong, Father? And have you lots of car-pennies?"
"Yes. Yes."
Elizabeth went with him to the doorstep and patted his back as a parting salutation.
"Now don't try to save money by walking in the rain; that's poor economy. And oh! have you the money for Mrs. Morrison?"
"No, I have not. That's well-minded. Get me half a sovereign, like a good girl."
Elizabeth brought the money.
"We would need to be made of half-sovereigns. Remember Mrs. Morrison is only one of many. It isn't that I grudge it to the poor dears, but we aren't millionaires exactly. Well, good-bye, and now I'm off on the quest of Women's Foreign Mission funds."
Her father from half-way down the gravel-path turned and smiled, and Elizabeth's heart smote her.
"I'll try and go with jubilant feet, Father," she called.
A few minutes later she too was ready for the road, with a short skirt, a waterproof, and a bundle of missionary papers.
Looking at herself in the hall mirror, she made a disgusted face. "I hate to go ugly to the church-people, but it can't be helped to-day. My feet look anything but jubilant; with these over-shoes I feel like a feather-footed hen."
Ellen came out of the dining-room, and Elizabeth gave her some instructions.
"If Master David is in before I'm back see that he takes off his wet boots at once, will you? And if Miss Christie comes, tell her I'll be in for tea, and ask her to wait. And, Ellen, if Marget hasn't time—I know she has some ironing to do—you might make some buttered toast and see that there's a cheery fire."
"Yes, mum, I will," said Ellen earnestly.
Once out in the rain, Elizabeth began to tell herself that there was really something rather nice about a thoroughly wet November day. It made the thought of tea-time at home so very attractive.
She jumped on a tram-car and squeezed herself in between two stout ladies. The car was very full, and the atmosphere heavy with the smell of damp waterproofs. Dripping umbrellas, held well away from the owners, made rivulets on the floor and caught the feet of the unwary, and an air of profound dejection brooded over everyone. Generally, Elizabeth got the liveliest pleasure from listening to conversation in the car, but to-day everyone was as silent as a canary in a darkened cage.
At Cumberland Street she got off, and went down that broad street of tall grey houses with their air of decayed gentility. Once, what is known as "better-class people" had had their dwellings there, but now the tall houses were divided into tenements, and several families found their home in one house. Soon Elizabeth was in meaner streets—drab, dreary streets which, in spite of witnesses to the contrary in the shape of frequent public-houses and pawnshops, harboured many decent, hard-working people. From these streets, largely, was James Seton's congregation drawn.
She stopped at the mouth of a close and looked up her collecting book.
"146. Mrs. Veitch—1s. Four stairs up, of course."
It was a very bright bell she rang when she reached the top landing, and it was a very tidy woman, with a clean white apron, who answered it.
"Good afternoon, Mrs. Veitch," said Elizabeth.
"It's Miss Seton," said Mrs. Veitch. "Come in. I'll tak' yer umbrelly. Wull ye gang into the room? I'm juist washin' the denner-dishes."
"Mayn't I come into the kitchen? It's always so cosy."
"It's faur frae that," said Mrs. Veitch; "but come in, if ye like."
She dusted a chair by the fireside, and Elizabeth sat down. Behind her, fitted into the wall, was the bed with its curtain and valance of warm crimson, and spotless counterpane. On her right was the grate brilliant from a vigorous polishing, and opposite it the dresser. A table with a red cover stood in the middle of the floor, and the sink, where the dinner-dishes were being washed, was placed in the window. Mrs. Veitch could wash her dishes and look down on a main line railway and watch the trains rush past. The trains to Euston with their dining-cars fascinated her, and she had been heard to express a great desire to have her dinner on the train. "Juist for the wance, to see what it's like."
If perfect naturalness be good manners, Mrs. Veitch's manners were excellent. She turned her back on her visitor and went on with her washing-up.
"That's the London train awa' by the noo'," she said, as an express went roaring past. "When Kate's in when it passes she aye says, 'There's yer denner awa then, Mither.' It's a kinda joke wi' us noo. It's queer I've aye hed a notion to traivel, but traivellin's never come ma gait—except traivellin' up and doon thae stairs to the washin'-hoose."
Elizabeth began eagerly to comfort.
"Yes—travelling always seems so delightful, doesn't it? I can't bear to pass through a station and see a London train go away without me. But somehow when one is going a journey it's never so nice. Things go wrong, and one gets cross and tired, and it isn't much fun after all."
"Mebbe no'," said Mrs. Veitch drily, "but a body whiles likes the chance o' finding oot things for theirsel's."
"Of course," said Elizabeth, feeling snubbed.
Mrs. Veitch washed the last dish and set it beside the others to drip, then she turned to her visitor.
"It's money ye're efter, I suppose?"
Elizabeth held out one of the missionary papers and said in an apologetic voice:
"It's the Zenana Mission. I called to see if you cared to give this year?"
Mrs. Veitch dried her hands on a towel that hung behind the door, then reached for her purse (Elizabeth's heart nipped at the leanness of it) from its home in a cracked jug on the dresser-shelf.
"What for wud I no' give?" she asked, and her tone was almost defiant.
"Oh," said Elizabeth, looking rather frightened, "you're like Father, Mrs. Veitch. Father thinks it's a privilege to be allowed to give."
"Ay, an' he's right. There's juist Kate and me, and it's no' verra easy for twae weemen to keep a roof ower their heads, but we'll never be the puirer for the mite we gie to the Lord's treasury. Is't a shillin'?"
"Yes, please. Thank you so much. And how is Kate? Is she very busy just now?"
"Ay. This is juist the busy time, ye ken, pairties and such like. She's workin' late near every nicht, and she's awful bad wi' indisgeestion, puir thing. But Kate's no' yin to complain."
"I'm sure she's not," said Elizabeth heartily. "I wonder—some time when things are slacker—if she would make me a blouse or two? The last were so nice."
"Were they?" asked Mrs. Veitch suspiciously. "Ye aye say they fit perfect, and Kate says to me, 'Mither,' she says, 'I wonder if Miss Seton doesna juist say it to please us?'"
"What!" said Elizabeth, springing to her feet, "Well, as it happens, I am wearing a blouse of Kate's making now——" She quickly undid her waterproof and pulled off the woolly coat she wore underneath. "Now, Mrs. Veitch, will you dare to tell that doubting Kate anything but that her blouse fits perfectly?"
Mrs. Veitch's face softened into a smile.
"Eh, lassie, ye're awfu' like yer faither." she said.
"In height," said Elizabeth, "and perhaps in a feature or two, but not, I greatly fear"—she was buttoning her waterproof as she spoke—"not, Mrs. Veitch, in anything that matters. Well, will you give Kate the message, and tell her not to doubt my word again? I'm frightfully hurt——"
"Ay," said Mrs. Veitch. "Weel, ye see, she's no' used wi' customers that are easy to please. Are ye for aff?"
"Yes, I must go. Oh! may I see the room? It was being papered the last time I was here. Was the paper a success?"
Instead of replying, Mrs. Veitch marched across the passage and threw open the door with an air.
Elizabeth had a way of throwing her whole heart into the subject that interested her for the moment, and it surprised and pleased people to find this large and beautiful person taking such a passionate (if passing) interest in them and their concerns.
Now it was obvious she was thinking of nothing in the world but this little best parlour with its newly papered walls.
After approving the new wall-paper, she proceeded to examine intently the old steel engravings in their deep rose-wood frames. The subjects were varied: "The Murder of Archbishop Sharp" hung above a chest of drawers; "John Knox dispensing the Communion" was skyed above the sideboard; "Burns at the Plough being crowned by the Spirit of Poesy" was partially concealed behind the door; while over the fireplace brooded the face of that great divine, Robert Murray M'Cheyne. These and a fine old bureau filled with china proclaimed their owner as being "better," of having come from people who could bequeath goods and gear to their descendants. Elizabeth admired the bureau and feasted her eyes on the china.
"Just look at these cups—isn't it abraveblue?"
"Ay," said Mrs. Veitch rather uncertainly; "they were ma granny's. I wud raither hev hed rose-buds masel'—an' that wide shape cools the tea awfu' quick." She nodded mysteriously toward the door at the side of the fire which hid the concealed bed. "We've got a lodger," she said.
"What!" cried Elizabeth, startled. "Is she in there now?"
"Now!" said Mrs. Veitch in fine scorn. "What for wud she be in the now? She's at her wark. She's in a shop in Argyle Street."
"Oh!" said Elizabeth. "Is she a nice lodger?"
"Verra quiet; gives no trouble," said Mrs. Veitch.
"And you'll make her so comfortable. Do you bake treacle scones for her? If you do, she'll never leave you."
"I was bakin' this verra day. Could ye—wud it bother ye to carry a scone hame? Mr. Seton's terrible fond o' treacle scone. I made him a cup o' tea wan day he cam' in and he ett yin tae't, he said he hedna tastit onything as guid sin' he was a callant."
"I know," said Elizabeth. "He told me. Of course I can carry the scones, if you can spare them."
In a moment Mrs. Veitch had got several scones pushed into a baker's bag and was thrusting it into Elizabeth's hands.
"I'll keep it dry under my waterproof," Elizabeth promised her. "My umbrella? Did I leave it at the door?"
"It's drippin' in the sink. Here it's. Good-bye, then."
"Good-bye, and very many thanks for everything—the subscription and the scones—and letting me see your room."
At the next house she made no long visitation. It was washing-day, and the mistress of the house was struggling with piles of wet clothes, sorting them out with red, soda-wrinkled hands, and hanging them on pulleys round the kitchen. Having got the subscription, Elizabeth tarried not an unnecessary moment.
"What a nuisance I am!" she said to herself as the door closed behind her. "Me and my old Zenana Mission. It's a wonder she didn't give me a push downstairs, poor worried body!"
The next contributor had evidently gone out for the afternoon, and Elizabeth reflected ruefully that it meant another pilgrimage another day. The number of the next was given in the book as 171, but she paused uncertainly, remembering that there had been some mistake last year, and doubting if she had put it right. At 171 a boy was lounging, whittling a stick.
"Is there anyone called Campbell in this close?" she asked him.
"Wait yo here," said the boy, "an' I'll rin up and see." He returned in a minute.
"Naw—nae Cam'l. There's a Robison an' a M'Intosh an' twa Irish-lukin' names. That's a'. Twa hooses emp'y."
"Thank you very much. It was kind of you to go and look. D'you live near here?"
"Ay." The boy jerked his head backwards to indicate the direction. "Thistle Street."
"I see." Elizabeth was going to move on when a thought came to her. "D'you go to any Sunday school?"
"Me? Naw!" He looked up with an impudent grin. "A'm what ye ca' a Jew."
Elizabeth smiled down at the little snub-nosed face. "No, my son. Whatever you are, you're not that. Listen—d'you know the church just round the corner?"
"Seton's kirk?"
"Yes. Seton's kirk. I have a class there every Sunday afternoon at five o'clock—six boys just about your age. Will you come?"
"A hevna claes nor naething."
"Never mind; neither have the others. What's your name?"
"Bob Scott."
"Well, Bob, I do wish you'd promise. We have such good times."
Bob looked sceptical.
"A whiles gang to Sabbath schules," he said, "juist till the swuree comes aff, and then A leave." His tone suggested that in his opinion Sabbath schools and good times were things far apart.
"I see. Well, we're having a Christmas-tree quite soon. You might try the class till then. You'll come some Sunday? That's good. Now, if I were you I would go home out of the rain."
Bob had resumed his whittling, and he looked carefully at his work as he said:
"I canna gang hame for ma faither: he's drunk, and he'll no' let's in."
"Have you had any dinner?"
"Uch, no. A'm no heedin' for't," with a fine carelessness.
Elizabeth tilted her umbrella over her shoulder the better to survey the situation. There was certainly little prospect of refreshment in this grey street which seemed to contain nothing but rain, but the sharp ting-ting of an electric tram passing in the street above brought her an idea, and she caught the boy's arm.
"Come on, Bob, and we'll see what we can get."
Two minutes brought them to a baker's shop, with very good-looking things in the window and a fat, comfortable woman behind the counter.
"Isn't this a horrible day, Mrs. Russel?" said Elizabeth. "And here's a friend of mine who wants warming up. What could you give him to eat, I wonder?"
Mrs. Russel beamed as if feeding little dirty ragged boys was just the thing she liked best to do.
"It's an awful day, as you say, Miss Seton, an' the boy's wet through. Whit would ye say to a hot tupp'ny pie an' a cup-o'-tea? The kettle's juist on the boil; I've been havin' a cup masel'—a body wants something to cheer them this weather." She laughed cheerily. "He could take it in at the back—there's a rare wee fire."
"That'll be splendid," said Elizabeth; "won't it Bob?"
"Ay," said Bob stolidly, but his little impudent starved face had an eager look.
Elizabeth saw him seated before the "rare wee fire" wolfing "tupp'ny pies," then she gathered up her collecting papers and prepared to go.
"Well! Good-bye, Bob; I shall see you some Sabbath soon. Where's that umbrella? It's a bad day for Zenana Missions, Mrs. Russel."
"Is that whit ye're at the day? I thought ye were doin' a bit o'homemission work."
She followed Elizabeth to the shop-door.
"Poor little chap!" said Elizabeth. "Give him as much as he can eat, will you?"—she slipped some money into her hand—"and put anything that's over into his pocket. I'm most awfully grateful to you, Mrs. Russel. It was too bad to plant him on you, but if people will go about looking so kind they're just asking to be put upon."
The rain was falling as if it would never tire. The street lamps had been lit, and made yellow blobs in the thick foggy atmosphere. The streets were slippery with that particular brand of greasy mud which Glasgow produces. "I believe I'll go straight home," thought Elizabeth.
She wavered for a moment, then: "I'll do Mrs. Martin and get the car at the corner of the street," she decided. "It's four o'clock, but I don't believe the woman will be tidied."
The surmise was only too correct. The door when Elizabeth reached it was opened by Mr. Martin—a gentleman of infinite leisure—who seemed uncertain what to do with her. Elizabeth tried to solve the difficulty by moving towards the kitchen but he gently headed her off until a voice from within cried, "Come in, if ye like, Miss Seton, but A'm strippit."
The situation was not as acute as it sounded. Mrs. Martin had removed her bodice, the better to comb her hair, and Elizabeth shuddered to see her lay the comb down beside a pat of butter, as she cried to her husband, "John, bring ma ither body here."
She was quite unabashed to be found thus in deshabille, and talked volubly the while she twisted up her hair and buttoned her "body." She was a round robin-like woman with, as Elizabeth put it, "the sweetest smile and the dirtiest house in Glasgow."
"An' how's Papa this wet weather?"
"Quite all right, thank you. And how are you?"
"Off and on, juist off and on. Troubled a lot with the boil, of course." (Elizabeth had to think for a minute before she realised this was English for "the bile.") "Many a day, Miss Seton, nothing'll lie." Mrs. Martin made a gesture indicating what happened, and continued: "Mr. Martin often says to me, 'Maggie,' he says 'ye're no' fit to work; let the hoose alane,' he says. Divn't ye, John?" she asked, turning to her husband, who had settled himself by the fire with an evening paper, and receiving a grunt in reply. "But, Miss Seton, there's no' a lazy bone in ma body and I canna see things go. I must be up an' doin': a hoose juist keeps a body at it."
"It does," agreed Elizabeth, trying not to see the unmade bed and the sink full of dirty dishes.
"An' whit are ye collectin' for the day? Women's Foreign Missions? 'Go ye into all the world.' We canna go oorsel's, but we can send oor money. Where's ma purse?"
She went over to the littered dresser and began to turn things over, until she discovered the purse lurking under a bag of buns and a paper containing half a pound of ham. Elizabeth stood up as a hint that the shilling might be forthcoming, but Mrs. Martin liked an audience, so she sat down on a chair and put a hand on each knee. "Mr. Seton said on Sunday we were to give as the Lord had prospered us. Weel, I canna say much aboot that, we're juist aye in the same bit, but as A often tell ma man, Miss Seton, we must a' help each other, for we're a' gaun the same road—mebbe the heathen tae, puir things!"
Mr. Martin grunted over his newspaper, and his wife continued: "There's John there—Mr. Martin, A'm meanin'—gits fair riled whiles aboot poalitics. He canna stand Tories by naething, they fair scunner him, but I juist say to him, 'John, ma man,' I says, 'let the Tories alane, for we're a' Homeward Bound.'"
Elizabeth stifled a desire to laugh, while Mr. Martin said with great conviction and some irrelevance, "Lyd George is the man."
"So he is," said his wife soothingly, "though A whiles think if he wud tak' a bit rest to hissel' it wud be a guid job for us a'."
"Well," said Elizabeth, opening her purse in an expectant way, "I must go, or I shall be late for tea."
"Here's yer shillun," said Mrs. Martin, rather with the air of presenting a not quite deserved tip.
"An' how's wee David? Yon's a rale wee favourite o' mine. Are ye gaun to mak' a minister o' him?"
"Buff? Oh, I don't think we quite know what to make of him."
Mrs. Martin leaned forward. "Hev ye tried a phrenologist?" she asked earnestly.
"No," said Elizabeth, rather startled.
"A sister o' mine hed a boy an' she couldna think what to mak' o' him. He had no—no—whit d'ye ca' it?"
Elizabeth nodded her comprehension.
"Bent?" she suggested.
"Aweel, she tuk him to yin o' thae phrenologists, an' he said he wud be either an auctioneer or a chimist, and," she finished triumphantly, "a chimist he wus!"