Squire Norman had a clerical friend whose rectory of Carstone lay some
thirty miles from Normanstand. Thirty miles is not a great distance for
railway travel; but it is a long drive. The days had not come, nor were
they ever likely to come, for the making of a railway between the two
places. For a good many years the two men had met in renewal of their
old University days. Squire Norman and Dr. An Wolf had been chums at
Trinity, Cambridge, and the boyish friendship had ripened and lasted.
When Harold An Wolf had put in his novitiate in a teeming Midland
manufacturing town, it was Norman's influence which obtained the
rectorship for his friend. It was not often that they could meet, for An
Wolf's work, which, though not very exacting, had to be done
single-handed, kept him to his post. Besides, he was a good scholar and
eked out a small income by preparing a few pupils for public school. An
occasional mid-week visit to Normanstand in the slack time of school work
on the Doctor's part, and now and again a drive by Norman over to the
rectory, returning the next day, had been for a good many years the
measure of their meeting. Then An Wolf's marriage and the birth of a son
had kept him closer to home. Mrs. An Wolf had been killed in a railway
accident a couple of years after her only child had been born; and at the
time Norman had gone over to render any assistance in his power to the
afflicted man, and to give him what was under the circumstances his best
gift, sympathy. After an interval of a few years the Squire's courtship
and marriage, at which his old friend had assisted, had confined his
activities to a narrower circle. The last time they had met was when An
Wolf had come over to Norcester to aid in the burial of his friend's
wife. In the process of years, however, the shadow over Norman's life
had begun to soften; when his baby had grown to be something of a
companion, they met again. Norman, 'who had never since his wife's death
been able to tear himself, even for a night, away from Normanstand and
Stephen, wrote to his old friend asking him to come to him. An Wolf
gladly promised, and for a week of growing expectation the Squire looked
forward to their meeting. Each found the other somewhat changed, in all
but their old affection.
An Wolf was delighted with the little Stephen. Her dainty beauty seemed
to charm him; and the child, seeming to realise what pleasure she was
giving, exercised all her little winning ways. The rector, who knew more
of children than did his, friend, told her as she sat on his knee of a
very interesting person: his own son. The child listened, interested at
first, then enraptured. She asked all kinds of questions; and the
father's eyes brightened as he gladly answered the pretty sympathetic
child, already deep in his heart for her father's sake. He told her
about the boy who was so big and strong, and who could run and leap and
swim and play cricket and football better than any other boy with whom he
played. When, warmed himself by the keen interest of the little girl,
and seeing her beautiful black eyes beginning to glow, he too woke to the
glory of the time; and all the treasured moments of the father's lonely
heart gave out their store. And the other father, thrilled with delight
because of his baby's joy with, underlying all, an added pleasure that
the little Stephen's interest was in sports that were for boys, looked on
approvingly, now and again asking questions himself in furtherance of the
child's wishes.
All the afternoon they sat in the garden, close to the stream that came
out of the rock, and An Wolf told father's tales of his only son. Of the
great cricket match with Castra Puerorum when he had made a hundred not
out. Of the school races when he had won so many prizes. Of the
swimming match in the Islam River when, after he had won the race and had
dressed himself, he went into the water in his clothes to help some
children who had upset a boat. How when Widow Norton's only son could
not be found, he dived into the deep hole of the intake of the milldam of
the great Carstone mills where Wingate the farrier had been drowned. And
how, after diving twice without success, he had insisted on going down
the third time though people had tried to hold him back; and how he had
brought up in his arms the child all white and so near death that they
had to put him in the ashes of the baker's oven before he could be
brought back to life.
When her nurse came to take her to bed, she slid down from her father's
knee and coming over to Dr. An Wolf, gravely held out her hand and said:
'Good-bye!' Then she kissed him and said:
'Thank you so much, Mr. Harold's daddy. Won't you come soon again, and
tell us more?' Then she jumped again upon her father's knee and hugged
him round the neck and kissed him, and whispered in his ear:
'Daddy, please make Mr. Harold's daddy when he comes again, bring Harold
with him!'
After all it is natural for women to put the essence of the letter in the
postscript!
Two weeks afterwards Dr. An Wolf came again and brought Harold with him.
The time had gone heavily with little Stephen when she knew that Harold
was coming with his father. Stephen had been all afire to see the big
boy whose feats had so much interested her, and for a whole week had
flooded Mrs. Jarrold with questions which she was unable to answer. At
last the time came and she went out to the hall door with her father to
welcome the guests. At the top of the great granite steps, down which in
time of bad weather the white awning ran, she stood holding her father's
hand and waving a welcome.
'Good morning, Harold! Good morning, Mr. Harold's daddy!'
The meeting was a great pleasure to both the children, and resulted in an
immediate friendship. The small girl at once conceived a great
admiration for the big, strong boy nearly twice her age and more than
twice her size. At her time of life the convenances are not, and love is
a thing to be spoken out at once and in the open. Mrs. Jarrold, from the
moment she set eyes on him, liked the big kindly-faced boy who treated
her like a lady, and who stood awkwardly blushing and silent in the
middle of the nursery listening to the tiny child's proffers of
affection. For whatever kind of love it is that boys are capable of,
Harold had fallen into it. 'Calf-love' is a thing habitually treated
with contempt. It may be ridiculous; but all the same it is a serious
reality--to the calf.
Harold's new-found affection was as deep as his nature. An only child
who had in his memory nothing of a mother's love, his naturally
affectionate nature had in his childish days found no means of
expression. A man child can hardly pour out his full heart to a man,
even a father or a comrade; and this child had not, in a way, the
consolations of other children. His father's secondary occupation of
teaching brought other boys to the house and necessitated a domestic
routine which had to be exact. There was no place for little girls in a
boys' school; and though many of Dr. An Wolf's friends who were mothers
made much of the pretty, quiet boy, and took him to play with their
children, he never seemed to get really intimate with them. The equality
of companionship was wanting. Boys he knew, and with them he could hold
his own and yet be on affectionate terms. But girls were strange to him,
and in their presence he was shy. With this lack of understanding of the
other sex, grew up a sort of awe of it. His opportunities of this kind
of study were so few that the view never could become rectified.
And so it was that from his boyhood up to his twelfth year, Harold's
knowledge of girlhood never increased nor did his awe diminish. When his
father had told him all about his visit to Normanstand and of the
invitation which had been extended to him there came first awe, then
doubt, then expectation. Between Harold and his father there was love
and trust and sympathy. The father's married love so soon cut short
found expression towards his child; and between them there had never been
even the shadow of a cloud. When his father told him how pretty the
little Stephen was, how dainty, how sweet, he began to picture her in his
mind's eye and to be bashfully excited over meeting her.
His first glimpse of Stephen was, he felt, one that he never could
forget. She had made up her mind that she would let Harold see what she
could do. Harold could fly kites and swim and play cricket; she could
not do any of these, but she could ride. Harold should see her pony, and
see her riding him all by herself. And there would be another pony for
Harold, a big, big, big one--she had spoken about its size herself to
Topham, the stud-groom. She had coaxed her daddy into promising that
after lunch she should take Harold riding. To this end she had made
ready early. She had insisted on putting on the red riding habit which
Daddy had given her for her birthday, and now she stood on the top of the
steps all glorious in hunting pink, with the habit held over her arms,
with the tiny hunting-hoots all shiny underneath. She had no hat on, and
her beautiful hair of golden red shone in its glory. But even it was
almost outshone by the joyous flush on her cheeks as she stood waving the
little hand that did not hold Daddy's. She was certainly a picture to
dream of! Her father's eyes lost nothing of her dainty beauty. He was
so proud of her that he almost forgot to wish that she had been a boy.
The pleasure he felt in her appearance was increased by the fact that her
dress was his own idea.
During luncheon Stephen was fairly silent; she usually chattered all
through as freely as a bird sings. Stephen was silent because the
occasion was important. Besides, Daddy wasn't all alone, and therefore
had not to be cheered up. Also--this in postscript form--Harold was
silent! In her present frame of mind Harold could do no wrong, and what
Harold did was right. She was unconsciously learning already a lesson
from his presence.
That evening when going to bed she came to say good-night to Daddy. After
she had kissed him she also kissed 'old Mr. Harold,' as she now called
him, and as a matter of course kissed Harold also. He coloured up at
once. It was the first time a girl had ever kissed him.
The next day from early morning until bed-time was one long joy to
Stephen, and there were few things of interest that Harold had not been
shown; there were few of the little secrets which had not been shared
with him as they went about hand in hand. Like all manly boys Harold was
good to little children and patient with them. He was content to follow
Stephen about and obey all her behests. He had fallen in love with her
to the very bottom of his boyish heart.
When the guests were going, Stephen stood with her father on the steps to
see them off. When the carriage had swept behind the farthest point in
the long avenue, and when Harold's cap waving from the window could no
longer be seen, Squire Norman turned to go in, but paused in obedience to
the unconscious restraint of Stephen's hand. He waited patiently till
with a long sigh she turned to him and they went in together.
That night before she went to bed Stephen came and sat on her father's
knee, and after sundry pattings and kissings whispered in his ear:
'Daddy, wouldn't it be nice if Harold could come here altogether?
Couldn't you ask him to? And old Mr. Harold could come too. Oh, I wish
he was here!'