Here we dance luby loo,Here we dance luby light,Here we dance luby looAll on a Saturday night.All your right hands in,All your right hands out,Shake your right hands a little, a little,And turn yourselves about.
Here we dance luby loo,Here we dance luby light,Here we dance luby looAll on a Saturday night.All your right hands in,All your right hands out,Shake your right hands a little, a little,And turn yourselves about.
Here we dance luby loo,
Here we dance luby light,
Here we dance luby loo
All on a Saturday night.
All your right hands in,
All your right hands out,
Shake your right hands a little, a little,
And turn yourselves about.
Twenty shrill childish trebles (no, nineteen, for Lizzie Wraggles still sat on the hassock in the corner) sang out the old tune and words; nineteen right legs were shaken, nineteen left legs too; then hands and heads wriggled and shook all through the six verses.
Every morning after the game came composition. Sometimes it was History composition, sometimes Geography, sometimes Scripture; sometimes just anything Miss Lavinia read out of a book. Thebest composition time of all was when Miss Lavinia told a story, right out of her head.
The children only half understood Miss Lavinia’s stories, but in spite of this they liked them better than any others, possibly because they felt that these stories belonged to them and to Miss Lavinia only; out of all the world no one else could know them, they were every bit their own.
It was to be Scripture composition this morning. When it was composition all the children listened to Miss Lavinia first of all, then the older boys and girls wrote about it from memory, while the little ones did something else.
After the games “Coppersition” was what Tommy liked best of all. Tommy had a very real love for Miss Lavinia. To most people she was just a little old maid who had great difficulty in making both ends meet, but Tommy admired her greatly. He liked to look at her all the time she was speaking; he admired the wave of her silvery hair and the shape of her delicate, white hands—so different from Mammy’s hands. Still his Mammy had the most beautiful hands in all the world, and he would fight any boy his own size who said she hadn’t. Thus he ruminated when the composition class began. Then he wondered if Miss Lavinia would agree to wait for him until he was grown up, so that he could marry her then if Ruthie would not greatly mind.
He was recalled to the things of everyday by Miss Lavinia’s urging him to look at a picture in frontof him. He was glad to do so, for it was a delightful picture, Tommy thought. One of the most attractive giants he had ever seen was crouching down behind a boulder of rock. Facing him, at some little distance, stood a young man who wore very few clothes and these of a most unusual pattern.
“This,” said Miss Lavinia, pointing to the central figure of the picture, “this is David.”
David Williams, sitting in the corner near the old Grandfather clock, smiled self-consciously as eighteen pairs of eyes turned to look at him. (Lizzie Wraggles still sat on a hassock in the corner with her back to the rest of the school.)
“David,” continued Miss Lavinia, and now nineteen pairs of eyes were fixed solemnly on hers, “David was very brave. All the boys in this room want to grow up to be brave men and true.”
Ten chests swelled visibly and the composition lesson continued: “David went out in the light of the Eastern morning to meet the giant who threatened all the land. And the sun’s rays fell upon David as he went forth. He had no weapons wherewith to fight the giant, but he trusted in God who was his strength and his shield. On the way he passed a brook, rippling through the fresh, green valley, and stooping, he chose from the bed of the stream five large, smooth, polished stones. Why do you think David wanted these stones?”
“For to kill the giant,” said Jimmy Prynne, and Tommy was annoyed that he had not thought of the answer.
“David,” continued Miss Lavinia, “put a stone into his sling and hit the giant” (here Miss Lavinia lowered her voice and there was deep silence in the room) “right on the forehead between the eyes; and the giant fell back dead.”
“Oh!” murmured the children, and David Williams, in the right-hand corner by the old Grandfather clock, looked as though reflected glory shone upon him.
In a dazed way Tommy rubbed his forehead and wondered how it would feel to have a stone just there. Then, remembering the distinction achieved by Jimmy Prynne, “We’m going to have beans for dinner,” he declared.
Miss Lavinia was shocked. She had hoped the story was making a deep impression, and now, before she could point the moral, before she could show how good must always soar triumphant and evil must ever suffer defeat, Tommy Tregennis, one of her best little boys, had interrupted in a manner that surely proved his thoughts to be very far away.
While Miss Lavinia hesitated, Ruthie’s high-pitched voice broke the silence. “’Tisn’t that giant, Tommy,” she said, “’twas Jack and that giant, but this is David.”
Miss Lavinia’s brow cleared. There was some connexion it seemed between beans and the Scripture story and after all Tommy Tregennis had listened although he had missed the point.
After giving the composition Miss Lavinia wentaway to put on the potatoes; then there was only time for a short Geography lesson with the little ones before the Guildhall clock struck twelve, and morning school was ended.
“Shoes is too tight,” Tommy complained to Ruthie, as they stood together in the narrow passage, putting on their hats. “They pinches!”
Ruthie sighed. “You do be growin’ brave an’ fast, Tommy,” she replied. “I can’t keep up with ee nohow.”
Tommy drew himself up proudly. “When my head do be so high as the knob on Mammy’s cupboard, then I be a-goin’ to wear long trousers,” he asserted.
Ruthie looked at him still more admiringly, and, as her custom was, slipped her hand into his, and turned towards the door.
But Tommy hesitated. “I be gettin’ a’most too big to hold hands,” he demurred, and, as he spoke, he tried to pull his hand away.
“Don’t ee be so silly,” Ruthie admonished. “’Tisn’t your hands as is growin’. Your shoes is pinchin’ because your feet do be that big; your hands is all right, Tommy.”
This argument was unanswerable and the children ran home hand in hand.
They were the last to leave. When the door closed behind them Miss Lavinia went over to Lizzie Wraggles in the corner to see the fifty “TO’s” that were to be written before Lizzie went home. Alas! the only “TO” on the slate was the one MissLavinia herself had written there as a copy. Below was Lizzie’s conception of a house.
As for Lizzie herself she had fallen asleep and one tear was still wet on her cheek. Miss Lavinia’s heart softened. All the other children had gone. She put one arm round Lizzie and gently roused the sleeping child. “Lizzie,” she whispered and kissed her, “little Lizzie, try to be a good girl, dear; and try to read your words just as well as ever you can.”
Lizzie smiled, a little roguish smile. “TO,too,” she crooned, and Miss Lavinia kissed her again and sent her home.
EVERYSaturday morning Tommy kept Granny Tregennis company, for it was then that Aunt Keziah Kate made her pastry. Granny Tregennis had lived for a great many years and was getting very tired; so until twelve o’clock each morning she stayed in bed. Her bed was a very high one with a long post at each corner, and curtains hung all around.
Tommy knew that Granny was always very anxious for his visit; for when he came into the bedroom she was thinking of him audibly. “WherecanTommy Tregennis be?” he would hear her say: “Surely ’tis time for him to come to his granny!”
Then Tommy would creak across the room on tip-toe, climb first of all on to a hassock, and from this to a chair; lifting up a corner of the curtain, “Bo,” he would cry, and Granny always gave a little start. “Why, ’tis the very boy I was thinkin’ of; ’tis Tommy Tregennis himself.”
When these friendly greetings had passed between them, they settled down comfortably for the morning.
By the fireplace in Granny’s room was a small cupboard, and in this cupboard Tommy’s Saturday playtoys were kept. One of his favourite toys was a massive bedroom candlestick in shining brass.
Granny had many stories to tell a little boy aboutthat candlestick. The very night that Tommy’s father was brought to her, years and years ago, she had stuck a lighted dip in the brass candlestick and had put it in this very bedroom window, because Granfäather Tregennis was out on a rough, wild sea catching pilchards.
There was no light at the end of the Frying Pan then, for the pier was not yet built and the men in the boats looked to the cottage windows for guidance. When Granfäather came home, very cold and very wet, in the grey light of the dawn, the candle was just guttering out. In the candlestick were little runnings of grease, and in the big fourposter bed, along with Granny, was a son.
Tommy could picture Granfäather’s great surprise when he came upstairs and found a new boy in the house. It was disconcerting to feel that new children might appear in this way at any moment. Whenever Tommy had been away from home for some hours, he was always just a little apprehensive lest another child should have come in his absence, knowing, as he did, how very suddenly his own father had been brought to Granny on the night of the storm.
Among the playtoys, too, were a pair of wee, patent-leather slippers. They were cracked now and stiff with age, and the tiny buckles that used to be so bright were quite yellow. These were the first leather shoes that Tommy’s Daddy had ever worn. Tommy knew exactly how his Daddy had tried to walk in them holding on to the horse-hair sofadownstairs, and how he had sat down suddenly in the middle and sucked the patent-leather toes.
“And then my Daddy tried to get up again,” Tommy would say, “but he was so very, very little that he rolled right over ’n hit his head on the sofy leg, ’n had brown paper on the big lump, ’n vinegar.”
When Granny had duly corroborated this version of the accident, they set aside the worn old slippers and passed on to another toy.
At eleven o’clock quite punctually Aunt Keziah Kate brought up a glass of hot milk for Granny. This was the signal for Tommy to go downstairs and help with the pastry. Quickly he ran down the twists and turns of the quaint old-fashioned stairway, so that he might be the first to get to the kitchen and hide behind the roller-towel before Aunt Keziah Kate saw him.
Like the ostrich Tommy was perfectly contented in his hiding-place, utterly oblivious of the fact that the towel, hanging from the kitchen door, only covered the upper part of him; from his knees downwards he was exposed to the full view of the public.
The public, in the guise of Aunt Keziah Kate, walked briskly into the kitchen, “Now then, ma man,” she was saying, “you shall have the rolling-pin and a bit o’——”
Then there was a start and an exclamation. “Why, my blessed fäather, and whereisthe boy? Surely ’n to goodness, I must have left ’e upstairs.”
While Aunt Keziah Kate returned to Granny’s room to look for the missing nephew, a wriggling Tommy, some inches of runnerin’ in his mouth, gave rise to distracting undulations in the roller-towel.
Back once more in the kitchen his Aunt instituted a thorough search; behind the rocking-chair covered with the big woolwork antimacassar; under the horse-hair sofa round which Daddy had walked in the new patent-leather shoes; in the kitchen cupboard; even in the coal-box and other probable and improbable places.
There was one breathless moment when Aunt Keziah Kate rinsed her fingers under the tap, and actually came to the roller-towel to dry them. Even then she did not find the missing boy.
By this time she was overcome with grief and sitting down on the sofa, in an attitude of despair, gave way to tears; leastways she produced a large handkerchief of granfäather’s from her overall pocket, covered her face with it, and rocked to and fro.
“How shall a tell his mother?” she wailed; “oh, ma lamb, ma blessed little lamb! His mother’ll have to get a new little boy as none of us knows, ’n poor little Tommy gone no one knows where.”
But this was the breaking strain. The roller-towel heaved and pulled, and with clenched fists out rushed Tommy.
“Hush, hush, hush!” he screamed. “I’m here, Aunt Keziah Kate, I’m right here.” Then in reply to her incredulous stare, “I was hidin’,” he explained,“hidin’ behind the runnerin’-towel,” and he jerked his thumb in the direction of the kitchen door.
“Found,” said his Aunt, gasping for breath, “found!” She clasped her hands tightly and closed her eyes, repeating, “Ma lamb is found.”
Then with a sudden descent to the things of everyday, “Now then, Tommy Tregennis, here’s the rollin’ pin, ’n put your lame leg first and press forwards, ’n get your bit o’ pastry made, or we’ll be all behind with the cleanin’ up when your granfäather comes home.”
Tommy’s jam turn-over took up more time in the making than all the rest of the pasties and tarts put together. First of all the paste had to be rolled very heavily and very often; rolled so heavily and so often in fact that it wore too thin in the middle. It was then pulled and scraped from the board to which it stuck, and was all pinched up by grubby fingers into a lump again. When it had been rubbed once more into the shape of a ball, the rolling-pin was again used. By the time the size, shape and thickness of the pastry satisfied Tommy’s requirements, it was of a uniform grey colour relieved, here and there, by darker shades. Tommy then spread on the jam, doubled it over and pinched it well to keep the open sides together. Tough from much handling and hot from the oven the turn-over was eaten by Tommy himself at the end of dinner.
“Can’t think,” Granfäather Tregennis had saidone Saturday, “can’t think why you let the boy eat that muck, Keziah Kate!”
“Must have a peck o’ dust in his lifetime, fäather.”
“Yes, ’n so he must, but surely ’n to goodness he needn’t have it all to wanst.”
Tommy, entirely unmoved, ate on.
When dinner was over Tommy grew restless. He had not been home since breakfast; that was a very long time ago and in his absence much might have happened.
He slipped from his chair and thrust his hands into his trouser-pockets. “I’d best be goin’ now, Granny,” he said, and when the old woman put her arms round him and kissed him he wriggled away, and addressed his Granfäather, for another man would understand.
“Granfäather,” he said, “ma Mammy’ll be missin’ me.”
“To be sure she will, Thomas, to be sure she will.”
Granfäather removed his pipe from his mouth and with unerring aim spat into the heart of the glowing coals; “you’d best be runnin’ home now, ma man; your Mammy’ll mebbe be missin’ you.”
After this there was no detaining Tommy. He snatched his cap and ran all the way home. The door was shut, and he hammered on it with his fists, and kicked with his toes in nervous dread.
Mammy came to the door singing; how happy she sounded. “Be you all alone, Mammy?” he demanded.
“’N who should be with me, ma lovely?”
“Daddy, or——”
“Your Daddy’s up to the station helpin’ Uncle Sam.”
He ran into the kitchen. Everything seemed all right there, but what about upstairs in his little cot? “’N there’s no other little boy here, is there?” he asked hesitatingly.
Mammy’s arms were round him in an instant. “’N what other little boy should I be wantin’, Tommy Tregennis?” she managed to say between his hugs. “Why, you’re just the best little boy as ever I had!”
ASChristmas drew near Tommy was full of expectancy. In the windows of the village shops pictures of Santa Claus were now displayed. Santa Claus was a tall old gentleman with flowing beard and long, white hair; he wore a bright red cloak, and on his back was a sack almost bursting with the pressure of the toys it held.
Like the other children of Draeth, Tommy flattened his turned-up nose against the shop windows and looked at the treasures within; looked until he could see no longer because of his breath upon the glass. A vigorous rubbing with his coat sleeve set matters right once more, and again his roving fancy pitched first on one then on another of the toys beyond his reach.
It was about a week before Christmas, and Mrs. Tregennis was preparing Tommy for his nightly wash in the zinc bath in front of the kitchen fire.
“Mammy,” he said, thoughtfully surveying his toes when the home-knitted stockings had been pulled off inside out. “I be growin’ so that they stockin’s be rather small for I, same as my vestises.”
“Your vestises, Tommy Tregennis, do be run up in the wash, but I see nothin’ at all wrong with they stockin’s; they’m good stockin’s, ’n ’ll do you my son for a month o’ Sundays.”
Tommy’s diplomacy had failed. His lip trembled slightly. “Mammy, when Santy Claus do come down the bedroom chimbley ’n finds this tiddely stockin’ hangin’ on the rail, he’ll not be able to slip in even ’n orange, let ’lone a drum.”
“That’s so, ma handsome.” Mrs. Tregennis knitted her brow in perplexed thought.
“’ll tell you what, ma lovely,” she said after a few moments’ pause. “We’ll hang a big stocking of your Daddy’s on the rail instead.”
This suggestion brought no comfort to Tommy.
“Then he’ll go ’n think as how ’tis Daddy’s stockin’,” he objected; “’n he’ll be puttin’ in pipes, ’n baccy, ’n things; ’n I don’t want they—leastways, not yet,” he added as an afterthought. “I wants a drum.”
Mammy understood the difficulty. “Well,” she said, after another and a longer pause, “we’ll hang up your Daddy’s stockin’, but we’ll write on a bit of paper ’LittleTommy Tregennis’, ’n pin it on the leg, ’n the old gentleman’ll never know no better.”
Tommy was pleased with this plan. Before going to sleep, however, he stipulated that Daddy’s stocking should be well darned before it was hung up, so that no little gift could escape either by way of the heel or the toe.
Three days before Christmas the children were discussing Santa Claus at school.
Jonathan Hex, who was bigger than the rest, scoffed openly: “There warn’t no Santy Claus,” he said, “it was just fathers and mothers it was,as came in when you were asleep ’n rammed the things in the stockin’ ’n crep’ out again on tippety toes.”
The other children were indignant at such unbelief, and Jonathan was obliged to retract, otherwise he would have been excluded from the circle gathered round the fire.
Jimmy Prynne had a grievance against the size of chimneys in Draeth. Jimmy was six, and easily remembered previous Christmases. Last year, for instance, he found only a tiny box of chocolates in his stocking, and his mother had read him a letter that came along with it; in fact he had the letter at home now:
“Dear Jimmy Prynne(it ran)“This is only a littel preasant because there ant no room in your chimeney if you want something biger you must have your chimeney widenered before next year.“From“Santy Claus.”
“Dear Jimmy Prynne(it ran)
“This is only a littel preasant because there ant no room in your chimeney if you want something biger you must have your chimeney widenered before next year.
“From
“Santy Claus.”
David Williams was also six. He was Jimmy Prynne’s cousin and he, too, remembered last Christmas. He had a note from Santy in his stockin’, too, and nothin’ else. Santy had wrote as he couldn’t possibly get down the chimberley because it was such a tight squeeze. He cried, he remembered, and he was cold because they had no fire. His Mammy had said she expected Santy would be thinner next time, and slip down right enough. However they’dgone into a new house now, and the hole was wider for he’d poked up to see.
Tommy went home that evening greatly disturbed. There were so many things he wanted, and he felt very doubtful indeed about their chimney for the bedroom grate was small.
That night when Mrs. Tregennis kissed him and said “Good-night and bless ee” to her surprise Tommy asked for the candle to be left “jus’ a minute or two, Mammy!” The voice was so pleading that she gave way.
Tommy listened to her footstep on the stair and for once was quite glad when he heard her reach the bottom, pass into the kitchen and close the door.
Very softly he then crept out of bed and tiptoed across the room.
Round the fireplace was a high old-fashioned fender. Tommy stretched over this and tried to thrust one arm up the chimney. It seemed to be rather wide but his arm was short, and did not reach very far.
In the corner was Mammy’s best umbrella. Seizing this he returned to the grate and poked the umbrella upwards. Almost at once it came in contact with something soft. Tommy was distinctly alarmed. Could it be some robber-man waiting there quietly, oh, so quietly, until he was asleep; waiting to slip down the chimney quite noiselessly and carry him silently off? He nearly screamed for Mammy in his fright.
After Christmas Tommy would be six, and at six a boy must be brave like David ’n the giant. SoTommy summoned all his courage and again thrust the umbrella upwards. The contact this time partially displaced the obstruction in the chimney, and a piece of sacking slipped into view. Then, indeed, Tommy’s heart stood still. He realized at once what had happened. Santy’s rounds this year were evidently unusually heavy, so he was secretly putting sacks of toys in chimneys beforehand, so that when Christmas Eve came his work would be partly done.
Tommy took hold of the free end of the sacking and pulled gently, but the bag was wedged too firmly to move. He then stepped inside the fender, and this time using both hands he really put his back into the work. The third tug released the sack which burst open as it fell and bits of screwed-up paper were littered in all directions.
“The packin’ of the presents,” Tommy had time to think before fate overtook him.
Sitting there inside the fender he was pelted with bits of mortar and loose stones, tickled with feathers and old starlings’ nests, suffocated with falling soot, as the accumulation of years, set free by the fall of the stuffed sack, fell upon him with terrifying speed.
Then he lifted up his voice and wept, crying loudly for Mammy; a frightened little boy upon whose face soot mingled with tears as he sat there, utterly cowed, inside the high old-fashioned fender. At the cry Mrs. Tregennis rushed upstairs and burst into the room, prepared indeed for the worst,but not prepared for anything quite so bad as that which she actually found.
“’Tis just mad I be with ee, Tommy Tregennis,” and she spoke through tight lips. “There’s a horrid little sight you be and the room not fit for a Christian to sleep in, what call had you to go pokin’ up chimneys, ’n where ’m I to put you now?”
Tommy’s sobs were becoming more subdued. “Wanted to see how wide the chimberly was,” he spluttered, “’n I found Santy’s sack here for me.”
“Santy’s sack, indeed,” said an angry Mammy; “I’ll Santy’s sack you my son if you go playin’ they monkey tricks. That’s a sack to keep my grate clean, so as bits shan’t fall down, and it’s stuck there for years before we came here to live; ’n you must go pryin’ and meddlin’, you shammock, you!” Mrs. Tregennis shook Tommy as she lifted him out of the grate and over the fender. “Here’s a fine set to for your tired Mammy. Downstairs you go! Clear!”
A clean night-shirt was aired for Tommy while he had his second bath. He was then wrapped up in Daddy’s winter coat and plumped into the rocking-chair in the corner by the fire.
It took Mrs. Tregennis a good half-hour to make the bedroom fit for use and when she came downstairs again Tommy was fast asleep. Tenderly she raised him to carry him back to bed. As her arms enfolded him a long, sobbing sigh escaped from quivering lips, while a tear rolled slowly down his cheek.
“My lamb,” she murmured, “my own precious lamb! This Christmas is goin’ to be a better time ’n last, ’n you’ll have things in your stockin’, ma handsome, drum an’ all!” Having well tucked in the bed clothes Mrs. Tregennis took up the candle, and left her son to the healing of the night.
“MY LAMB,” SHE MURMURED, “MY OWN PRECIOUS LAMB”!
“MY LAMB,” SHE MURMURED, “MY OWN PRECIOUS LAMB”!
THEthree days before Christmas passed more slowly than any other days in Tommy’s life. As usual the hands of his cuckoo clock remained stationary in spite of the steady movement of the pendulum; but to Tommy’s unspeakable annoyance, although the chimney-piece clock seemed to tick louder than ever, he could scarcely see its hands move at all.
To make matters worse school had broken up and it was too wet and too cold for the children to play much out-of-doors. So all day long Tommy was in the kitchen trying to find something to do to fill up the time. When Ruthie was with him they quarrelled, and when she left him he was more miserable still.
Then Aunt Keziah Kate gave him some balls of coloured wool and Granny taught him to crochet. This was most engrossing for a time. He used a stubby forefinger as hook, pulling the loose loops as tight as possible, and slowly and laboriously made lengths of uneven chain. Later he taught Ruthie to make chains too, but was angry when he found that her chains were not only better done than his, the loops being much more even, but that she did quite six inches while he did only three.
At last, in spite of the slowly moving hands of the clock, it was Christmas Eve.
The whole day was one long excitement. At breakfast-time Tregennis, Mrs. Tregennis and Tommy were all in a state of high tension. The evening before, when Tommy was in bed and asleep, Tregennis had brought home a goose, which he handed with pride to his wife.
“Well,” she exclaimed, “an’ where did ee get that bird?”
“A drawin’,” answered Tregennis, laconically. He was always a man of few words.
“A drawin’! My blessed fäather! an’ how much did ee pay?”
“Only sixpence, Ellen, an’ he weighs twelve pound.”
“Sixpence!” breathlessly. “I don’t know how ee dare take such risks. You might easily ’a’ lost, and ’twould just ’a’ been a good sixpenny-bit wasted.”
“But I didn’t lose, I won, an’ here do be the bird; an’ as plump a one as’ll be eaten by any o’ the best in Draeth.”
“Well, well,” said Mrs. Tregennis, and resumed her knitting, momentarily neglected; “an’ what a Christmas dinner we shall have—as good as the gintry! Go round now to wanst, an’ ask Granfäather, an’ Granny an’ Keziah Kate. We’ll mebbe never have another goose.”
After breakfast, therefore, on Christmas Eve the goose had to be plucked. Work for Tregeagle Mrs. Tregennis said this was, with Tommy playin’ round all the time, and all the feathers all a-blowin’ noone knew where every time the kitchen door was opened.
Tommy stuck the biggest feathers in his hair, and was a wild red Indian; some of the smaller, fluffier ones he put by in his box of treasures; all the rest Mammy tried to save to help to make a cushion for the upstairs sitting-room.
When Mrs. Tregennis was in the middle of cleaning the goose she was interrupted by a loud knock.
“See who’s there, Tommy,” she said, “an’ shut the kitchen door so as the feathers won’t fly.”
Tommy obeyed and opened the outer door a few inches only, with the instinctive caution of childhood, and peeped through the gap.
“Fer your Mammy, Tommy,” said the station carman, indicating an enormous package at his feet.
In his excitement Tommy forgot all about being careful and flung open the kitchen door. A gust of wind seized the feathers and whirled them round the room. Mrs. Tregennis’s anger was checked by the entrance of the carman, swaying with a square, solid-looking package done up in sacking. When he dumped it down on the kitchen floor more feather flew, but by this time Mrs. Tregennis was past thinking of flying feathers.
“’N what is this, Sam?” she demanded, “a joke?”
“’Tis a pretty heavy joke,” said the carman, first straightening his shoulders, then with a large, red handkerchief wiping condensation drops from his moustache, “’n a joke as has cost some folks good money to send from London.”
“Then there do be some mistake, Sam Trimble, for I know no one to London, an’ this’ll not be mine.”
But the address on the label showed plainly that the package was indeed for Mrs. T. Tregennis, of Chapel Garth.
Even the goose was forgotten when Sam Trimble had closed the door behind him. Mrs. Tregennis washed her fingers so hurriedly under the tap that she left red streaks on the runnerin’ towel when she dried her hands there.
“Have you had the scissors, Tommy? Find Mammy’s scissors, quick, ma handsome.”
After a search, they remembered at the same time that the scissors had been used before the goose could be cleaned, and they were found lying under the neck of the bird just where Mrs. Tregennis had put them before Sam Trimble knocked.
The sacking was sewn with stout cord and the scissors were blunt, therefore it was some little time before the opening made was wide enough for Mrs. Tregennis to pull out the padding of straw. Under the straw something hard revealed itself to the touch, but there were more stitches to be cut through before the contents could be withdrawn. Then Tommy held on as firmly as he could at one end of the sacking while Mammy tried to pull out whatever it was that was so carefully packed within. Something rolled to the floor as she pulled, and after a glance at it she snatched it up and furtively hid it underneath her apron.
“What’s that, Mammy?” said Tommy, all alert.
“That,” pointing disdainfully to the pile of straw, “’n do we pay for your schoolin’, Tommy Tregennis, an’ you not so much as to know as that’s called straw!”
“But there was somethin’ as fell, an’ you——”
“You’m but a noosance an’ in the way, Tommy. Run an’ see if your Daddy’s on the quay, and if he be tell him to come an’ help clear up.”
When Tommy had gone Mrs. Tregennis took from underneath her apron a brown paper parcel, on which was written: “From Tommy’s Ladies, for his Christmas stocking.” She put it among the potatoes and fire-wood in the dark kitchen cupboard, and had only just time to kneel down and pull out more straw when Tommy bounded into the kitchen and again made the feathers fly.
“Can’t see Daddy nowheres, Mammy!”
“And much trouble you’ve taken to find he, my son. However, never mind, I’ve done it.” With a final push and one last pull a simple but well-made fumed-oak book-case came into view.
Mrs. Tregennis lifted it from the ground. “Come on, Tommy,” she said.
“Where be we a goin’, Mammy?”
“Why, to show it, of course, to your Granfäather and Granny and Aunt Keziah Kate; an’ Aunt Martha, an’ Auntie Jessie an’ Ruthie an’ all.”
The partly dressed goose was forgotten and left with its head dangling dejectedly over the edge of the kitchen table. Thus, half an hour later, Tregennis found it in the midst of a litter of feathers and blood and straw.
He had just finished clearing up when Mrs. Tregennis and Tommy returned, and excitedly called him into the sitting-room on the left-hand side of the door. In front of the book-case he stood in silence.
“’Tis from the ladies,” Mrs. Tregennis said, in answer to his unspoken question.
“The ladies, not——”
“Yes, from Tommy’s Ladies.”
“Ellen,” said Tregennis, passing a toil-worn hand over the smooth, polished wood, “’tis a’most like bein’ in church; ’tis like they hymn-boards, an’ pulpits an’ such. ’Tis a’most like bein’ in church.”
“An’ not a penny under fifteen shillin’ Martha says it must have cost. An’ to think as they just knocked at the door; no bikes nor nothin’; not so much as a paper parcel in their hands, well, well!” With a last look at the book-case Mrs. Tregennis returned to the kitchen and finished her work on the neglected goose.
That very afternoon the fumed-oak book-case was nailed up in the best sitting-room. Until now many books belonging to Nelson’s sevenpenny library, left behind by visitors, had been piled up on the top of the grandfather clock. These were all taken down, dusted and arranged in red and gold rows along the two lower shelves, while the top shelf Mrs. Tregennis reserved for some of her choicest ornaments.
“Tom,” she said, when this was done, “to-morrow after dinner we’ll have a fire, and sit here. ’Tis unusual, I’ll admit, but, after all, ’tis Christmas time, and ’tis no goodbein’small an’lookin’small both; and here we’ll sit; so there!”
As soon as tea was over Tommy wished to go to bed. He was anxious to intercept Santa Claus in his descent of the chimney, and, if possible, exercise a certain selective power in the matter of toys. In his inmost heart he was exceedingly glad that he had dislodged the sack of paper. Had it still been in the chimney it would have been quite impossible for Santy to slip through with his burden, and what would have been the good of Daddy’s labelled stocking then?
As soon as Tommy was in bed Mrs. Tregennis withdrew from the potatoes the parcel she had hidden there early in the day. It contained a brown jersey suit and a good big box of chocolates of many kinds.
When Tommy wakened on the morning of Christmas Day and sleepily demanded that the candle should be lit, Daddy’s stocking, with the label pinned on the leg, held nuts and two oranges and two apples, while a trumpet stuck out at the top. On the floor below lay a drum, and a brown jersey suit and a box of chocolates. These Santy had clearly meant for some other boy, but had dropped them by mistake in his haste to be gone.
Tommy was naturally delighted at receiving more than his share, but he could not help being afraid that Santy might discover his loss and soon return. By way of preventing this he suggested that the stuffed sack should at once be replaced in the chimney and kept there for the whole of the day.
The lids with their long lashes drooped heavily over the sleepy blue eyes, and Mammy lifted Tommypresents and all, into the big bed. Soon he was breathing regularly through parted lips, and did not waken until Daddy was ready to carry him pick-a-back down the stairs, to be washed and dressed in front of the kitchen fire.
TOMMY TREGENNIS,Chapel Garth,East Draeth.
This was the address on a cheap, white envelope that the postman brought on Boxing Day and pushed through the gap below the door. Mrs. Tregennis picked up the letter and turned it over more than once before passing it on to her husband.
“Well, it beats me, Ellen,” said he; “’tis a female hand for certain. Who can be makin’ up to our Tommy?”
Mrs. Tregennis went to the door and espied Jimmy Prynne. “Seen our Tommy?” she asked him.
Jimmy jerked his thumb over his right shoulder, and Mrs. Tregennis walked in the direction indicated.
“Tommy,” she called.
But Tommy, conscious of grimy hands and sticky mouth, thought this was a summons to wash, and affected not to hear. Something on the horizon claimed his attention and he gazed fixedly out to sea.
Mrs. Tregennis, therefore, waved the white envelope in vain. “Tommy, postman’s brought a letter for ee, for your very own.”
This was arrestive. Very few letters came to the house when there were no visitors, and never beforehad there been one for Tommy. Often, certainly, he had picked up old envelopes, and by licking the torn flaps had made them stick down for a time so that he could pretend that they were letters that had come for him. But now there was a real letter all for his very own, and it was held in Mammy’s hand only a few yards off. He ran hastily, tripped over a stone, picked himself up and ran on again. Then he actually held his own real letter in his grimy hand.
He could read the two capital T’s without any difficulty, and of course he knew that they stood for his name. This knowledge gave him much satisfaction; it was a fine thing to be educated. He was all for opening the envelope then and there, but, persuaded by Mammy, they returned to the house together, and in Daddy’s presence the flap was torn.
Inside the envelope was a gilt-edged card. At the top left-hand corner of this a gaily-dressed boy with powdered hair was bowing to a Watteau shepherdess who curtsied before him. The picture absorbed them until Mammy discovered that there was interest, too, in the old-fashioned, pointed handwriting below:
“Miss Lavinia invites Tommy Tregennis to a party on New Year’s Day, from four o’clock until seven.”
There was no R.S.V.P. in the bottom, right-hand corner. The invited guests would not have known what it meant; but when New Year’s Day came of course all who were bidden to the party would go.
“My dear life,” ejaculated Mammy. “I was never at a Christmas party in all my born days. You’m a lucky boy, Tommy Tregennis!”
Tommy nodded.
After dinner on New Year’s Day there was no rest for Mrs. Tregennis until Tommy was dressed in the new brown jersey suit. He was ready before half-past two and wished to set off for the party at once. When Mammy, however, pictured to him how very disappointed Granny and Aunt Keziah Kate would be if he did not go and show himself in his new clothes, he decided to run in to see them first. He was gratified when they unstintingly praised his personal appearance, although it was only what he had expected.
With one little thing or another it was half-past three before Tommy was able to leave for Miss Lavinia’s house. On such an occasion as this no-one would have thought of referring to it as school. Following his usual custom Tommy called for his cousin. He was much taken aback when Auntie Jessie told him that Ruthie was upstairs and was not quite ready, but would be brought to the party later.
Ruthie’s absence took some of the brightness out of the afternoon, and as he drew nearer and nearer to Miss Lavinia’s house Tommy became unaccountably shy. To add to his embarrassment when he reached the familiar door he found it shut, instead of standing invitingly open as on ordinary school days. At the sight of the closed door the last particle of courageleft him, and he wished to run home fast and have tea quietly with Mammy. Yet something urged him to be brave, and he screwed up his hand tight, ready to hammer on the door. It was just at this point that a gentleman walking down the street, seeing a small boy and a high knocker, crossed over to Tommy and gave a loud rat-tat to help him. Smiling he passed on, leaving Tommy more deeply embarrassed than before.
When Miss Lavinia, wearing her best black silk dress and a gold locket, herself answered the knock Tommy stood still, not quite knowing what to do next. When she stooped and kissed him he flushed deeply, then, with a broad smile of anticipation, stood flat against the wall in the narrow passage while she closed the door.
Miss Lavinia, who was really just as shy and nervous as her guests, led the way into the schoolroom, and here the sense of unfamiliarity deepened. The desks and maps had gone and the room was hung with evergreens. Round the fire stood children whom Tommy saw every single day and never before had he been at a loss in entering upon a conversation with any one of them. This afternoon, however, he found nothing to say, and they all looked at one-another in silence.
Miss Lavinia felt that the party was a failure and grew more and more nervous as the silent moments were ticked out by the school-room clock. She went away presently to speak to Mrs. Harris about the tea. Mrs Harris was the woman who came in for anhour now and again to help with the rough work, and she had volunteered to be there this evening just to see Miss Lavinia through.
A very genteel knock at the door put an end to Miss Lavinia’s superfluous directions. There was hushed expectancy among the groups of children gathered round the fire when she ushered into the schoolroom Ruthie’s mother leading Ruthie by the hand.
Ruthie was the only child who had been brought.
In the very middle of the room she stood while her mother freed her from the folds of a big Paisley shawl. Then she was revealed to nineteen pairs of admiring eyes—a little girl in a white silk frock; the only white silk frock in the room.
“It is to save her Sunday dress,” Ruthie’s mother explained to Miss Lavinia. “You see this will wash.”
She then lifted her daughter on to a table at the far end of the room, and with a whispered injunction that she must on no account mess up her clothes she left.
The spell that until now had held the children was broken. Half envious, half admiring they gathered round the table and looked at Ruthie in a real party frock. Her hair had been in so many plaits for so many hours that it stood out crisply all round her head. But the greatest wonder of all was her gloves. Ruthie was actually wearing gloves! White cotton gloves they were, held up at the top by a band of black elastic; a band so tight that it had alreadymade a groove in each little arm between the elbow and the wrist.
Tommy was the only one brave enough to speak about them. “You’ve forgotten to take off your gloves, Ruthie.”
“Mammy said to keep ’em on.”
“Whafor?”
“I don’t know.”
“Take ’em off,” said Tommy, and Ruthie, as usual, obeyed.
The gloves and elastic bands were laid on the table, and from there they fell to the floor. A kick from Tommy sent them into a corner where Mrs. Harris found them the next morning when she came to tidy up.
The summons to tea broke up the group. Ten very shy little girls and ten boys trying hard to look at ease, walked along the narrow passage to Miss Lavinia’s kitchen. Here table and chairs had been replaced by trestle-boards and forms.
It was a tight squeeze but a place was found for all the guests who, in deep embarrassment, looked at the well-piled plates in front of them.
Miss Lavinia and Mrs. Harris walked round filling tea cups and passing plates.
In the deep silence Miss Lavinia quite dreaded the sound of her own voice. She grew more and more nervous. She had given so much thought to this, her first (and last!) little party. For weeks past she had exercised numerous economies to make the giving of it possible, and now that it was actually happening it was all a failure. The children werenot happy and there were still three hours to drag through. Her mouth was so dry that she had to clear her throat and moisten her lips before she could ask Ruby Dark to have more tea; and her words came so jerkily that Ruby was surprised almost to the point of tears.
Then Mrs. Harris came to the rescue. “Where be they crackers, Miss Lavinia?” she demanded, and Miss Lavinia, opening the cupboard door, brought out two gay boxes with twelve beautiful crackers lying closely and shinily side by side.
First each girl was given one and pulled it with the boy sitting near her, and they all screwed up their eyes and there were little cries of fright when the pop came. By the time the boys were given their crackers all the children were out of their places, jumping up and down with excitement, proudly wearing paper bonnets with frills, and three-cornered caps, and paper aprons whose strings would never meet round any waist.
Miss Lavinia’s nervousness suddenly passed. “Shoo!” she said as though they were so many chickens. “Run back to the school-room.”
She clapped her hands and they surged along the passage laughing, jumping, poking one another; a boisterous band of happy children for whom tea and the crackers had broken the ice.
First of all they would play “Hunt the Slipper,” and therefore they must all sit in a ring.
“Mammy said not to sit on the floor,” whispered Ruthie to Tommy.
“Sit down,” said Tommy scornfully. Ruthie sat, and the game began.
The slipper went round and round and round. It was thrown across, and up and back again, and Jimmy Prynne, outside the circle, grabbed and missed and snatched again. There was much confusion, and no one quite knew what anyone else was doing, or what they themselves were meant to do, but it was a grand game, and in the merry laughter no-one joined more heartily than Miss Lavinia herself.
Next came “Nuts and May,” and “Blind Man’s Buff.” The blind man always guessed the wrong number of fingers held up, and yet managed to see just quite a little either above or below the handkerchief that smelled so sweetly of lavender and had belonged to Miss Lavinia’s father years and years ago.
After this they were all so hot that they played “Postman’s Knock” for coolness. Jimmy Prynne went out first. He rapped sharply on the closed door and Miss Lavinia opened it just a small crack and peered out into the passage where Jimmy stood. Then followed the old-time dialogue, dear to so many generations of children.
“Who’s there?” said Miss Lavinia. Memories laid away in lavender these many years were awakened by the foolish old game.
“Postman,” replied a gruff, stern voice.
The children sitting in a row, waiting—waiting, laughed their appreciation of Jimmy’s dramatic power.
Then the dialogue continued. “What with?”
“A letter.”
“How many stamps?” The air was tense.
“Fifteen stamps.”
Then the most important question of all. “Who for?”
There was a pause on the part of the postman.
“Jimmy, Jimmy Prynne, choose me, Jimmy,” and Ruby Dark stood up in her excitement.
Jimmy hesitated.
Miss Lavinia, the doorkeeper, bent down, and in a very gentle whisper, said: “Choose Ruby, Jimmy.” And Ruby, shining eyes and chin uplifted passed out into the dim light of the narrow passage, and there fifteen kisses, each one carefully counted by the bearer of the letter, were solemnly exchanged.
Every one had a letter. Miss Lavinia saw that nobody was forgotten. She was childishly glad when Tommy chose her and the letter bore one hundred stamps; although, as she explained when they were together in the passage, there really was not time for all the hundred then, they must be content with two and the rest could be delivered some other day.
After this Mr. and Mrs. Brown, and the little dog, and the cushions, and the whip, and the reins and all the other parts of the Old Family Coach grew dizzier and dizzier with the restless whirling and turning resulting from the many adventures and accidents that befell the coach on its perilous summer morning’s journey.
Christmas parties come all too quickly to an end. It was nearly time to go home, but first of all wouldMiss Lavinia tell them a story? So the lamp was turned out, and in the firelight Miss Lavinia began.
“Once upon a time” (every child looked straight into Miss Lavinia’s eyes). “Once upon a time, in the heart of a deep, green wood, a very beautiful princess lived all alone. She had no father and no mother, but all the creatures that flew, or crawled, or ran were her friends.
“It was always summer in the wood. So the princess wore beautiful garments made of silken gossamer, and the spiders wove a new robe for her every morning, just when the sun was up. When the new gossamer robe was ready the birds flew to the boughs of the beech tree under which the princess slept, and sang sweet songs until the princess sat up and rubbed her eyes, and said: ‘Why, it is day!’
“Then the birds flew away to look after their own families, and the squirrels brought nuts and cracked them, and laid them at the feet of the beautiful princess.
“She was never hungry, this beautiful princess, for such wonderful fruits grew in the wood. She was never cold, for the sun shone all day long. When night came, and the moon and the stars took the place of the sun, she lay down under the beech tree that had stood there for hundreds of years, and covered herself with bracken, and slept.
“She was perfectly happy, was the princess, until one night she had a dream. It was the very first dream that she had ever had, and she dreamed that she was alone. In the morning she sat up and rubbedher eyes just at the dawn, long before the birds came. She looked down through the long shadows of the trees. She was afraid, for ‘I am alone,’ she said. It seemed a dreadful thing to be a beautiful princess all alone in the heart of a deep, green wood.”
A glowing coal fell from the fire. Miss Lavinia paused for a moment, and for the first time the children stirred.
“When I’m growed up,” said Ruthie, “I shall get married.”
“You must wait until some one asks you, Ruthie,” Miss Lavinia gently reproved her.
“Didn’t no-one never ask you, Miss Lavinia?” said Tommy, pushing a hot, moist hand into hers. “’N so couldn’t you never be married?”
“What happened to the Princess in the wood?” asked Jimmy Prynne impatiently.
“Well, a butterfly that had also wakened very early flew round and round the Princess, and then away from her, towards the shadows of the trees. The Princess stood up and followed, one hand stretched out as if to touch the coloured wings. The butterfly led her quite to the edge of the wood. There, beyond the bracken that she gathered for her bed under the beech tree, stood the most wonderful Prince in the whole, wide world.
“And the Princess knew that she was no longer alone.
“‘Come!’ she said to the Prince.
“‘There is magic,’ he replied, ‘and I cannot cross the bracken unless you lead me by the hand.’
“So the Princess stepped through the high fern-fronds,and when she held the hand of the Prince he kissed her. At his kiss a wind arose and the branches of the trees waved to and fro. The birds twittered uneasily, and there was a sound like thunder and falling rain. Then, as hurrying shadows, the trees vanished. The Prince and the Princess could no longer see the birds, but they heard the fluttering of their wings overhead.
“There was a sudden lightning flash that made the Prince and Princess close their eyes.
“When they opened them again they were no longer in the wood, but in a room with a cheerful fire and a lighted lamp. The Princess had lost her gossamer robe; she wore a blue serge frock and a white apron. The Prince had on a blue jersey with a name on the front. They stood in the little room hand in hand.
“‘I am no longer alone,’ said the Princess, and smiled.
“‘Let us unlock the door,’ said the Prince, ‘then perhaps a little child will come in.’
“So they drew back the bolt and waited!”
Tommy wriggled his hot hand from the clasp of Miss Lavinia’s thin fingers. “My Mammy’ll be missin’ me,” he said, and struggled to his feet. Then the clock struck seven.
Five minutes later twenty little people, in coats and mufflers, kissed Miss Lavinia and ran out laughing into the winter night.
Miss Lavinia closed the door behind them and returned to the firelight alone.
OFcourse Tommy was much too excited to sleep. When a girl called Annabel is coming to live in your house for ever and ever it naturally absorbs all your thoughts.
Annabel’s father was a naval officer who was sailing away from Plymouth for two years, and Annabel and Annabel’s mother were to live in Tommy’s house until he came home again.
All Tommy’s particular friends, with the single exception of Ruthie, were looking forward to the coming of Annabel, but Tommy had made it quite clear to them that only now and again would she be able to give them much attention, as most of the time she would be helping him to carry out the most wonderful of wonderful games.
A late train this very February night was to bring Annabel and her mother to Draeth. Tommy reduced the bed clothes to indescribable confusion while he waited for their coming.
“Mammy, has Annabel come yet? Mammy, what’s Annabel like?”
Mrs. Tregennis came upstairs and for the twentieth time that day described the little girl.
She had seen neither Annabel nor Annabel’s mother. It was with the naval officer himself that she had made all arrangements, and as he had crisp, curlyhair, and very blue eyes she decided that his little daughter possessed these qualities too. Tommy, therefore, pictured Annabel with golden curls, rosy cheeks, blue eyes and a merry smile.
“’N will she play with me, Mammy?”
“If you’m a brave good boy, she will. But no sliding down Skiddery Rock, mind.”
“’N shall I show her the Smuggler’s Cave, ’n let her ride on Dobbin? Oh, Mammy, Iwishas Annabel would come. You’ll bring her straight in to see me, Mammy, won’t you, before her goes to bed?”
Mrs. Tregennis promised. “But you’ll have to be very good, ma handsome,” she warned him, “or your Mammy’ll be properly ashamed of ee ’longside Annabel.”
For the first time Tommy felt the improvement of his moral character to be a real need.
Mrs. Tregennis went downstairs to make final preparation for supper, while Tommy left to himself passed into the realms of play-acting. Thedramatis personæwere Tommy Tregennis, enacted by himself, and blue-eyed, curly-haired Annabel, represented for the moment by the pillow. There were others, too, scattered dimly in the shadows of the room.
In the first act Tommy sat up in bed, clutched the pillow tightly, and “Iloveyou,” he said.
Then, in reply to an interruption from the shadows: “No, herdon’tlove ee, Jimmy Prynne!”
The setting of the second act was slightly different, as, by this time, the sheets and blankets were lying in a disorderly heap upon the floor. Tommy waskneeling in the middle of the cot digging a wonderful castle in the sand, while the pillow (that is, Annabel), looked on with admiring wonder. Those others, in the shadows, tried hard to make fine castles too, but Annabel gave them never a look.
Before the curtain rose on the third act the real Annabel, accompanied by her mother, entered the house. Ungraciously Tommy thumped the pillow and flung it aside.
In vain he listened for ascending footsteps. Why didn’t Mammy at once tell Annabel that he was waiting for her, he wondered. At last, after what seemed to him hours and hours, he heard them come upstairs.
There was a stumble, and a strange voice said: “Be careful, darling,” then they came on again.
Oddly the footsteps did not stop at his door, and a moment later he knew by the sounds overhead that Annabel and her mother were in their own bedroom.
“Mammy!” he called.
At once she stood by his bed and, stooping, kissed him, with some new quality in her kiss.
“Wants to see Annabel, Mammy,” he said plaintively, rubbing tired eyes. “Bring her to see me, Mammy.”
Mrs. Tregennis hesitated, then stood in the doorway and spoke to the visitors as they came downstairs. “My little Tommy’s in bed, ma’am, and can’t go to sleep, he’s so excited about seein’ Annabel.”
Mrs. Tregennis held out her hand to draw the child into the room.
“Oh,” interposed Annabel’s mother, scarcely pausing on the stairs, “MissAnnabel will speak to your boy in the morning, it is too late to-night.”
“I wants to see her now, Mammy. I wants to see her to wanst,” wailed Tommy, losing his shyness when confronted with the dread possibility of having to wait all through the hours until morning. “I wants to see hernow, Mammy,” and his voice rose higher.
The naval officer’s wife held her daughter’s hand and tightened her lips. “He seems to be an undisciplined child,” she said, and went down to the sitting-room where supper was spread.
While Tommy sobbed in his pillow Mrs. Tregennis spoke out her mind to her husband. “A blessin’ she may be, I’m not for sayin’ that she isn’t when I think of good money for two whole years. But she be a blessin’ in a thick disguise, Tom, so there ’tis, an’ can’t be no tizzer.MissAnnabel!Miss, mind you, Thomas Tregennis. I reckon she be just like her mother though she be but a maid of five years old. Well, I be main sorry for’e. ’Tis proper glad he’ll be to be away these two years, I’m thinkin’. Real glad he be, I guess.”
When Tommy returned from school the following morning a sallow, lank-haired girl stood in the doorway of the downstairs sitting-room.
“Come here, boy,” she demanded imperiously.
Tommy looked at the unattractive stranger a full minute without speaking; then—“Go out of my house,” he said.
Two mothers rushed hurriedly forward.
“Tommy, Tommy,” cried Mrs. Tregennis, “that do be Miss Annabel.”
“What arudeboy!” said the naval officer’s wife.
Tommy took no notice of her. “’Tisn’t Annabel,” he said, shaking off his mother’s restraining hand. “Annabel has curls, an’ is pretty, an’ smiles. That do be ’n ugly girl, that be.”
Annabel ran forward and smacked him. “I hate you, boy,” she cried.
Tommy was quite ready to fight, but his mother’s grip prevented him; all he could do was to make a hideous grimace as he was pushed ignominously into the kitchen where the door was shut upon him.
Later in the morning the naval officer’s wife summoned Mrs. Tregennis to her sitting-room (the room on the ground floor on the left-hand side of the door), and expressed her wishes and views. “I must live quite economically,” she explained. “I do not wish to spend much money on food. I should like you to do all the shopping, but there must be no extravagance and no waste. We shall eat very little meat, but plenty of vegetables. I do not like to think of cows and sheep, animals that lend charm and poetry to country life, being sacrificed to the material needs of my babe and myself. Vegetarian dishes form the only Christian menu. To-day we will have haricot beans made up into some little delicacy, and for the second course a small rice pudding. Please take a half-pennyworth of milk for me eachday, and skim off the cream that rises to the top for my afternoon tea.”
“Oh, my blessed fäather; I’ve never met her like,” confided Mrs. Tregennis later to Aunt Keziah Kate who had just dropped in for a bit of newsin’. “Two years of she’ll about finish me, I reckon. Cream on the top of a ha’porth of milk; my dear soul!”
Four weeks of the downstairs visitors had made Mrs. Tregennis quite irritable and short-tempered, and when, towards the end of March, the postman brought an unstamped letter she quite crossly refused to take it in. It came by the afternoon delivery, and Tregennis went to the door as his wife was upstairs.
“Ellen,” he called, “here’s a letter for ee, an’ tuppence to pay.”
“An’ what’ll I be payin’ tuppence for?”
“It can’t be left without; there’s no stamp on ’e.”
“Then it must be taken back. I don’t want ’e.” To emphasize her words Mrs. Tregennis retreated from the head of the stairs and closed her bedroom door.
Tregennis held the letter delicately between finger and thumb and looked perplexedly at the postman, who tilted his official cap and scratched his head.
At this moment the Naval Officer’s wife came out of her room. “Are there any communications for me?” she asked.
“No ’m, nothing at all,” and Tregennis held up the unstamped letter to the light, and tried in vain to penetrate the thickness of the envelope.
“Ah, I see there is two-pence to pay,” said Annabel’s mother, who still stood in the doorway. “Perhaps you have not the money; pray use this.” She thrust forward two pennies as she spoke.
Tregennis was a man by no means given to prejudices, but for this woman he had conceived a violent dislike. “In no way thank ee, ma’am. I have plenty of money here,” and he slowly and carefully extracted from the depth of his trouser pocket one penny and one halfpenny. Shamefacedly he fumbled for a second halfpenny which could not be found. First in one pocket, then in the other he felt, until the postman showed some signs of impatience. The Naval Officer’s wife looked supercilious and returned to her room.
Tregennis, hot and uncomfortable and feeling like a thief, went to the kitchen cupboard. From the right hand corner of the second shelf he took a yellow china pig with a longways slit in its back. This rattled as he moved it, for it was Tommy’s moneybox. The only way in which the capital invested in the pig could be recovered was to turn the animal upside down and shake it in rapid jerks. Not infrequently it happened that the coins lodged right across the slit instead of slipping through. So it was to-day. At last one penny fell on the table and rolled to the floor. Stooping, Tregennis secured the penny and handing it to the now openly impatient postman received in exchange his own halfpenny and the unstamped letter addressed to his wife.
He put the letter in a prominent place on thechimney-piece, propping it up against one of the china dogs. Here Mrs. Tregennis found it a little later. “Why, my blessed fäather,” she exclaimed, when it caught her eye, “we might be made of money. We might be the quality themselves the way you do go flingin’ away tuppences right and left. Whatever made ee give tuppence for that?”