"But doesn't she ever eat?"
"I bring her her food. She takes it then without knowing what she is
taking. She is a very strange child."
"Well," I said as I helped myself to a very nice piece of hot cake, "I
don't think I should have got her here to-day without pinching and
poking her. She took me quite a long way round. I believe," I added,
"that I shall not be able to get back, for I don't know this part of
London well."
"I will take you to the Twopenny Tube myself, dear. Don't imagine for a
single instant that you will see anything more of Augusta."
When I discovered that this was really the case I gave myself up to the
enjoyment of Mrs Moore's pleasant society. She was a very nice woman,
not at all commonplace--at least, if that meant commonplace, it was a
very good thing to be. She was practical, and had a great deal of
sense. She talked to me about my life, and about my father, and said
she wished we lived a little nearer.
"You must sadly want a lady friend, my dear," she said.
Then she stared at me very hard, and I saw a curious change come over
her face.
"Perhaps you will have one in the future," was her next remark.
"Oh yes," I answered briskly, "I have one now--a most dear, sweet lady.
She came to see me quite a short time ago, and I went to stay with her
last Saturday, and came home only last night. I love her dearly; her
name is Miss Grace Donnithorne."
"Then that is excellent--excellent," said Mrs Moore. She looked at me
wistfully, as though she meant to say something, but her next remark
was, "It is a very nice, suitable arrangement."
When tea was over I said I thought I ought to be going home. I had a
hunger which was filling my heart. My body had been well fed--
surprisingly well fed for me--that day. Had not Hannah supplied me with
mutton-chops and potatoes, and Mrs Moore with hot cakes and fragrant
tea? But I was hungry in another sort of way. I wanted to look at my
mother's picture. I wanted to gaze at the face of my very own mother.
I meant to do so when I was quite alone in my bedroom that night. So I
said hastily, "I must go back now;" and Mrs Moore went to put on her
bonnet.
While she was away I knocked at Augusta's door.
"Who's there?" she called out.
"It's I. I want to say good-bye."
"Don't come in, I beg of you. Good-bye."
"Good-bye," I answered, feeling somewhat offended. I heard her
muttering words inside the room. They became louder:
"And like a dying lady, lone and pale,
Who totters forth wrapped in a gauzy veil."
Mrs Moore opened her door.
"What is the matter with Augusta?" I said.
"Nothing; she is only reciting. She is mad on Shelley at present.--
Good-bye, Gussie; I am going to see your friend, Miss Grant, to the
Twopenny Tube."
Augusta replied in a still louder rendering of the words:
"Art thou pale from weariness
Of climbing heaven and gazing on the earth--"
We went into the street. Mrs Moore took me to the station, and saying
she had something to do in another part of the street, she bade me on
affectionate good-bye.
I returned to our own house, and when I got there I found Alex and
Charley and Von Marlo, as we always called him, waiting for me.
"Then it's quite true," said Alex, "that we are to have the whole
evening to ourselves? I have brought some grub in, and we are going to
cook it ourselves in the parlour. You must help us, Dumps. It doesn't
matter how shabby your frock is; you have got to be the cook."
"Oh, how scrumptious!" I cried. I felt just in the humour.
"And we can be as noisy as ever we like," said Charley.
"Only we won't do anything to hurt your feelings, Miss Rachel," said Von
Marlo.
"The main thing of all is," said Charley, "that Hannah isn't to know."
"Oh, we can easily manage that," I said. "She won't come upstairs
unless we ring for her. She never does."
"I've taken precious good care that she doesn't come upstairs," said
Alex, "for I've locked the door at the top of the kitchen stairs;" and
he produced the key in triumph from his pocket.
"Oh Alex, suppose by any sort of manner or means she wanted to come!
Why, she would never forgive us."
"Serve her right. She won't answer our rings of late, so now we'll keep
her downstairs in that sweet spot in which she so loves to dwell."
"But," I said, "our dinner?"
"Oh, here it is--a mutton bone, barer than usual, and a few potatoes. I
thought we'd have a real feast. Did father give you any of the needful
when he was going away to-day, Dumps?"
"Why, yes," I said, "he gave me five shillings."
"And he gave me the same."
"And me the same," said Charley.
"You'll have to pay us back your share of the grub to-morrow," said
Alex; "but we bought it beforehand."
"Well, we can't cook without cooking things," I said.
"Sakes!" replied Alex; "do you suppose that while you were wandering
about London by yourself--highly improper for any young lady, I call
it--that we were idle? Charley and Von Marlo and I went down into the
kitchen and purloined a frying-pan, a saucepan, a kettle, cups and
saucers, glasses, knives and forks galore, and plates. Table-cloths
don't matter. Now then, to see the array of eatables."
Alex produced out of his bag first of all, in a dirty piece of paper, a
skinned rabbit, next a pound of sausages, next a parcel of onions.
"These will make a jolly good fry," said Alex, smacking his lips as he
spoke.
From Charley's pockets came a great piece of butter, while Von Marlo rid
himself of a huge incubus in the shape of a loaf of very fresh bread.
"There are lots of things beside," said Charley: "potatoes--we're going
to fry them after the rabbit and sausages--and fruit and cakes. We
thought if we had a good, big, monstrous fry, and then satisfied the
rest of our appetites with cake and fruit, as much as ever we can eat,
that we'd do."
"What about tea or coffee?" I said.
"Bother tea or coffee!" said Alex. "We'll have ginger-beer. We brought
in a whole dozen bottles. It was that that nearly killed us. If it
hadn't been for Von Marlo we'd never have done it. Now then, Dumps,
who'll cut up the rabbit, and who'll put it into the pan with the
sausages? They ought to be done in a jiffy. We'll cut up the onions
and strew them over the rabbit and sausages. I want our fry to be real
tasty."
I became quite interested. What girl would not? To have the whole of
the great house to ourselves, to have three lively, hungry boys gloating
greedily over the food, and to think that I alone knew how to cook it!
But, alas and alack! my pride was soon doomed to be humiliated; for Von
Marlo, who had poached the egg so beautifully, now came forward and told
me that I was not cutting up the rabbit with any sense of its anatomical
proportions. He took a sharp clasp-knife out of his pocket, and in a
minute or two the deed was done. He then objected to my mode of
preparing the sausages, declaring that they ought to be pricked and the
skins slightly opened. In the end he said it would be much better for
him to prepare the fry, and I left it to him.
"Yes, yes," I said; "and I'll put on the table-cloth. Oh, but there
isn't a table-cloth!"
"Who wants a table-cloth?" said Alex. "Let's have newspapers. Here's a
pile."
We then proceeded to spread them on the centre table, and placed the
knives and forks and glasses upon them. The sausages popped and
frizzled, the rabbit shrank into tiny proportions, the onions filled the
air with their odorous scent, and by-and-by the fry was considered done.
When we had each been helped to a goodly portion, Von Marlo began to
fry the potatoes, and these turned out to be more delicious than the
rabbit and sausages. What a meal it was! How we laughed and joked and
made merry!
"Three cheers for father's absence!" shouted Alex, holding his glass
high, as he prepared to pour the foaming contents down his throat.
There came a knocking--a violent and furious knocking--in a part of the
house which was not the front door.
"It's Hannah! Hannah!" I cried. "She wants to come out. Oh Alex, we
must let her out!"
"Nothing of the sort," exclaimed Charley. "Let her knock until she's
tired of knocking."
The door was shaken violently. We heard a woman's voice calling and
calling.
"Charley, I must go," I said. "I cannot eat anything. Poor old Hannah!
Oh, do let me open the door!"
"When the feast is over we'll cook a little supper for her, and bring
her in and set her down in front of the fire, and make her eat it," said
Von Marlo. "Now, that will do, won't it? Sit down and eat your nice,
hot supper," he continued, looking attentively at me with his honest
brown eyes.
I coloured and looked at him. It was so pleasant to have eyes glancing
at you that did not disapprove of you all the time.
Von Marlo drew a chair close to the table for me, and placed another
near it for himself, and we ate heartily--yes, heartily--to the
accompaniment of Hannah's knocks and shrieks and screams to us to let
her out of her prison.
By-and-by the meal came to an end, and then it was Von Marlo himself who
went to the door. We three, we Grants, were sufficiently cowardly to
remain in the parlour. By-and-by Von Marlo reappeared, leading Hannah.
Hannah had been reduced to tears. He had her hand on his arm, and was
conducting her into the parlour with all the grace with which he would
conduct a duchess or any other person of title.
"Here's your supper," he said. "Sit here; you must be very cold. Sit
near the fire and eat, eat."
She sat down, but she did not eat.
"Come, come," he said, and he placed an appetising plate of food close
to her. She went on sobbing, but her sobs were not quite so frequent.
"It smells good, doesn't it?" said Von Marlo; and now he put a tender
piece of rabbit on the end of a fork and held it within an inch of her
mouth.
"You will be much better after you have eaten," he said in a coaxing
tone.
He had managed to place himself in such a position that when she did
stop crying she could only see him; and after a time the smell of the
delicious stew, and something about the comfort of her present position
close to the fire, caused her to open her eyes, and then she opened her
mouth, and in was popped the piece of tender rabbit. She ate it, and
then Von Marlo fed her by popping piece after piece into her mouth; and
he gave her ginger-beer to drink; and when the supper was quite ended
and the platter clean, he stepped back and said, "You must forgive the
Grants; it was rather mischievous of them. But it was not Miss Rachel;
it was Alex and Charley, and in especial it was Von Marlo's fault. Now
you will forgive Von Marlo?"
He dropped on one knee, and put on the most comical face I had ever
seen; then he looked up at her, wiping one of his eyes, and winking and
blinking with the other. Hannah absolutely laughed.
"Oh, you children, you children!" she exclaimed.
It was a most wonderful victory. We knew now she would not scold, and
it had a marvellous effect upon us. I rushed to her and flung my arms
round her neck and kissed and hugged her. Alex said, "Good old Hannah!"
and Charley crouched down by her side and said, "Rub my hair the wrong
way; you know how I like it, Hannah."
Then Von Marlo said, "I'm not going to be out of it," and he planted
himself with his broad back firmly against her knees; and thus we all
sat, with Hannah in the centre, making a sort of queen in the midst.
She had ceased to weep, and was smiling.
"Dear, dear!" she said; "but I never was too hard on real
mischievousness; it's naughtiness as angers me. Oh, my sakes! Charley,
my lamb, I remember you when you were nothing more than a baby."
"But I was your pet, Hannah," I said. "Tell me that I was your pet."
"But you were nothing of the sort," said Hannah. "I will own that I was
always took with looks. Now, Alex has looks."
"And I. I have looks too," said Charley. "I was gazing at my face in
the glass this morning, and I saw that I had beautiful, dark,
greyey-blue eyes."
"It's very wrong to encourage vanity," said Hannah. "Well, Dumps will
always be spared that temptation. But sakes! I must take away the
things. What a mess you have made of the place! And whoever in the
name of fortune fried up that rabbit? It was the most appetising morsel
I ever ate in the whole course of my life."
"I shall have much pleasure in writing out the recipe and giving it to
you," said Von Marlo, dropping again on one knee, and now placing his
hand across his heart. "Fairest of women, beloved Hannah, queen of my
heart, I shall write out that recipe and give it to you."
"Oh my!" said Hannah, "you are worse than the Dutch dolls; but you do
make me laugh like anything."