"Yes; I'm afraid so," replied Mr Blunt. He was gazing anxiously
through a gap in the hedge which commanded the Rectory garden-gate.
"This is my busy day. So long, old man!"
He vaulted the fence, and set off down the road at a vigorous and
businesslike trot. But after a hundred yards or so he halted, and
looked round him with an air which can only be described as furtive.
Before him the road, white and dusty, continued officiously on its way
to the village and duty. Along the right-hand side thereof ran a neat
rail-fence, skirting the confines of Tinkler's Den. The landscape
appeared deserted. All nature drowsed in the hot afternoon sun.
Mr Blunt, who was a muscular young Christian, took a running jump of
some four feet six, cleared the topmost rail, and landed neatly on the
grassy slope which ran down towards the Den.
"Now then, Sunny Jim!" remarked a reproving voice above his head,
"_pas si beaucoup de cela!_"
However sound our nervous systems may be, we are all of us liable to
be startled at times. Mr Blunt was undoubtedly startled on the
occasion, and being young and only very recently ordained, signified
the same in the usual manner.
When he looked up into the tree where Nicky was reclining, that
virtuous damsel's fingers were in her ears.
"Mr Blunt," she remarked, "I am both surprised and shocked."
"Veronica Vereker," replied Mr Blunt, turning and shaking his fist as
he retreated down the slope towards Tinkler's Den, "next time I get
hold of you I will wring your little neck!"
Miss Veronica Vereker kissed the tips of her fingers to him.
"We will now join," she proclaimed, in a voice surprisingly
reminiscent of the throaty tenor which Mr Blunt reserved for his
ecclesiastical performances, "in singing Hymn number two hundred and
thirty-three; during which those who desire to leave the church are
recommended to do so, as it is _my--turn--to--preach--the--sermon_!"
But by this time the foe, running rapidly, was out of earshot.
Half-an-hour later Stiffy, who was a gregarious animal, went in search
of his younger sister, whom he discovered, recently returned from her
sylvan skirmish with the curate, laboriously climbing into a hammock
in the orchard.
"Nicky, will you come and play cricket?" he asked politely.
"I suppose that means will I come and bowl to you?" replied Nicky.
"No. You can bat if you like."
"Well, I won't do either," said Nicky agreeably.
"What shall we do, then?" pursued Stiffy, with unimpaired _bonhomie_.
"Personally, I am going to remain in this hammock," replied the lady.
"I recommend you, dear, to go and put your head in a bucket. _Good_
afternoon! Sorry you can't stop."
"I wonder if Cilly would play," mused Stiffy.
"Cilly? I don't think! She is gloating over her clothes in her
bedroom. If you and I, my lad," continued Veronica reflectively, "were
going to be presented at Court next week, I wonder if we should make
such unholy shows of ourselves for days beforehand."
"I know her boxes are all packed," pursued Stiffy hopefully, "because
I went and sat on the lids myself after lunch. Perhaps she will come
out for half-an-hour before tea. Dad and Tony won't be back from
Tilney till seven, so they are no good."
"Well, run along, little man," said Nicky, closing her eyes. "I'm fed
up with you."
Stiffy departed obediently, and for ten minutes his younger sister
reclined in her hammock, her sinful little soul purged for the moment
of evil intent against any man. When next she opened her eyes Stiffy
was standing disconsolately before her.
"Go away," said Nicky faintly. "We have no empty bottles or
rabbit-skins at present. If you call round about Monday we shall be
emptying the dustbin----"
"Cilly's not there," said Stiffy. "Keziah thinks she has gone out for
a walk. She saw her strolling down towards the Den half-an-hour ago."
"_The Den?_" Nicky's eyes suddenly unclosed to their full radius. "My
che-ild! So _that's_ the game! _That_ was why the pale young curate
was jumping fences. Ha, _ha_! Stiffy, would you like some fun?"
Stiffy, mystified but docile, assented.
"We are going," announced Nicky, rolling gracefully out of the
hammock, "to stalk a brace of true lovers."
"What--Mr Blunt and Cilly? Do you mean----? Are they really keen on
each other?" inquired the unobservant male amazedly.
"_Are_ they? My lad, it has been written all over them for weeks! I'm
not certain, though," continued the experienced Nicky, "that the poor
dears are aware of it themselves yet. But to-day is Cilly's last for
months, so----"
"Do you mean they are down in the Den together?" demanded Stiffy.
"I do."
"But--Mr Blunt has gone off to do parish work. He told me so himself."
"Parish work my foot!" commented Nicky simply. "Come on! Let's go and
mark down their trail! We can pretend to be Red Indians, if you like,"
she added speciously.
But the sportsmanlike Stiffy hung back.
"Let's play cricket instead," he said hesitatingly.
"Not me! Come on!"
"Nicky," said Stiffy, searching his hand, so to speak, for trumps,
"Preston is killing a pig this afternoon at four o'clock. I've just
remembered. He promised not to begin till I came. We shall just be in
time. Hurry up!"
"I am going," said Nicky firmly, "to stalk that couple. Are you
coming?"
"No. It's not playing the game," said Stiffy bravely.
Nicky, uneasily conscious that he spoke the truth, smiled witheringly.
"All right, milksop!" she said. "I shall go by myself. You can go and
hold the pig's hand."
So they departed on their several errands.
* * * * *
Meanwhile Cilly and the curate sat side by side beneath a gnarled and
venerable oak in Tinkler's Den.
... "Then your name is called out," continued Cilly raptly, "and you
give one last squiggle to your train and go forward and curtsey--to
_all_ the Royalties in turn, I think, but I'm not quite sure about
that part yet--and then you pass along out of the way, and somebody
picks up your train and throws it over your shoulder, and you find
yourself in another room, and it's all over. Won't it be heavenly?"
"Splendid!" replied Mr Blunt, without enthusiasm.
"After that," continued Cilly, "my sister is going to take me simply
everywhere. And I am to meet lots of nice people. It's too late for
Henley and Ascot and that sort of thing this summer, but I am to have
them all next year. Later on, we are going to Scotland. I'm not at all
a lucky girl, am I?"
It was one of those questions to which, despite its form, an
experienced Latin grammarian would have unhesitatingly prefixed the
particle _nonne_. But the Reverend Godfrey Blunt merely replied in a
hollow voice--
"What price me?"
Cilly, startled, turned and regarded his hot but honest face, and then
lowered her gaze hastily to the region of her own toes.
The Reverend Godfrey was a fine upstanding young man, with merry grey
eyes; and there was a cheerful and boisterous _bonhomie_ about his
conversation which the exigencies of his calling had not yet intoned
out of him. No one had ever considered him brilliant, for his strength
lay in character rather than intellect. He was a perfect specimen of
that unromantic but priceless type with which our public schools and
universities never fail to meet the insatiable demands of a voracious
Empire. The assistant-commissioner, the company officer, the junior
form-master, the slum-curate--these are they that propel the ship of
State. Up above upon the quarter-deck, looking portentously wise and
occasionally quarrelling for the possession of the helm, you may
behold their superiors--the Cabinet Minister, the Prelate, the
Generalissimo. But our friends remain below the water-line, unheeded,
uncredited, and see to it that the wheels go round. They expect no
thanks, and they are not disappointed. The ship goes forward, and that
is all they care about. Of such is the British Empire.
The Reverend Godfrey Blunt was one of this nameless host. At school he
had scraped into the Sixth by a hair's-breadth; at the University he
had secured a degree of purely nominal value. He had been an unheroic
member of his House eleven; thereafter he had excoriated his person
uncomplainingly and unsuccessfully upon a fixed seat for the space of
three years, not because he expected to make bumps or obtain his Blue,
but because his College second crew had need of him. Since then he had
worked for five years in a parish in Bermondsey, at a stipend of one
hundred pounds a-year; and only the doctor's ultimatum had prevailed
on him to try country work for a change. His spelling was shaky, his
theology would have made Pusey turn in his grave, and his sermons
would have bored his own mother. But he was a man.
Cilly, whom we left bashfully contemplating her shoe-buckles under an
oak-tree, was conscious of a new, sudden, and disturbing thrill. Young
girls are said seldom to reflect and never to reason. They have no
need. They have methods of their own of arriving at the root of the
matter. Cilly realised in a flash that if a proper man was the object
of her proposed journey through the great and enticing world before
her, she need never set out at all. Something answering to that
description was sitting beside her, sighing like a furnace. Her face
flamed.
"What did you say?" she inquired unsteadily.
"I said 'What price me?'" reiterated the curate mournfully.
"What do you mean?"
"I mean----" he spoke hesitatingly, like a man picking his words from
an overwhelming crowd of applicants--"well, I mean this. You and I
have seen a lot of each other since I came here. You have been awfully
good to me, and I have got into the way of bringing you my little
troubles, and turning to you generally if I felt dismal or humpy.
(There _are_ more joyful spots, you know, to spend one's leisure hours
in than Mrs Tice's first-floor-front.) And now--now you are going away
from me, to meet all sorts of attractive people and have the time of
your life. You will have a fearful lot of attention paid to you. Nine
out of ten men you meet will fall in love with you----"
"Oh! nonsense!" said Cilly feebly.
"But I _know_ it," persisted Blunt. "I simply can't conceive any man
being able to do anything else. Do you know----" the words stuck in
his throat for a moment and then came with a rush--"do you know that
you are the most adorable girl on God's earth? I love you! I love you!
_There_--I've said it! I had meant to say a lot more first--work up to
it by degrees, you know--but it has carried me away of its own accord.
I love you--dear, _dear_ Cilly!"
There was a long stillness. All nature seemed to be watching with
bated breath for the next step. Only above their heads the branches of
the oak-tree crackled gently. Cilly's head swam. Something new and
tremulous was stirring within her. She closed her eyes, lest the spell
should be broken by the sight of some mundane external object. A
purely hypothetical fairy prince, composed of equal parts of Peer of
the Realm, Lifeguardsman, Mr Sandow, Lord Byron, and the Bishop of
London, whom she had cherished in the inmost sanctuary of her heart
ever since she had reached the age at which a girl begins to dream
about young men, suddenly rocked upon his pedestal. Then she opened
her eyes again, and contemplated the homely features of the Reverend
Godfrey Blunt.
Not that they appeared homely any longer. Never had a man's face
undergone such a transformation in so short a time. To her shy eyes he
had grown positively handsome. Cilly felt her whole being suddenly
drawn towards this goodly youth. The composite paragon enshrined in
her heart gave a final lurch and then fell headlong, to lie
dismembered and disregarded, Dagon-like, at the foot of his own
pedestal.
... Slowly their hands met, and they gazed upon one another long and
rapturously. How long, they did not know. There was no need to take
count of time. They seemed to be sitting together all alone on the
edge of the universe, with eternity before them. The next step was
obvious enough; they both realised what it must be: but they did not
hurry. They sat on, this happy pair, waiting for inspiration.
It came--straight from above their heads.
"Kiss her, you fool!" commanded a hoarse and frenzied voice far up the
tree.
Crackle! Crash! _Bump!_
And Nicky, overestimating in her enthusiasm the supporting power of an
outlying branch, tumbled, headlong but undamaged, a medley of arms and
legs and blue pinafore, right at their feet.
A few hours later Daphne, preceded by a rather incoherent telegram,
drove up to the Rectory in the station fly.
She was met at the door by Cilly, and the two, as if by one impulse,
fell into each other's arms.
"Daphne, _dear_ Daph," murmured the impetuous Cilly, "I am the
happiest girl in all the world."
"And I," said Daphne simply, "am the most miserable."
CHAPTER THIRTEEN.
THE COUNTERSTROKE.
The scene is the Restaurant International, a palatial house of
refreshment in Regent Street; the time half-past one. At a table in
the corner of the Grand Salle a Manger, set in a position calculated
to extract full value from the efforts of a powerful orchestra, a
waiter of majestic mien, with a powdered head, and a gold tassel on
his left shoulder, stands towering over two recently arrived patrons
with the _menu_.
The patrons, incredible as it may appear, are Stephen Blasius Vereker
and Veronica Elizabeth Vereker. Stiffy, in the gala dress of a
schoolboy of eighteen, is perspiring freely under the gaze of the
overpowering menial at his elbow; Nicky, in a new hat of colossal but
correct dimensions (the gift of her eldest sister), with her hair
gathered into the usual _ne plus ultra_ of the "flapper,"--a
constricted pigtail tied with a large black bow of ribbon,--is
entirely unruffled.
How they got there will appear presently.
"Will you lunch _a la carte_ or _table d'hote_, sir?" inquired the
waiter, much as an executioner might say--"Will you be drawn or
quartered?"
The flustered Stiffy gazed helplessly at his sister.
"He means, will you pay for what you eat or eat what you pay for,
dear," explained that experienced and resourceful young person. "You
must excuse him," she added, turning her round and trustful orbs upon
the waiter. "He is not accustomed to being given a choice of dishes."
The waiter, realising that here was a worthy opponent, maintained a
countenance of wood and repeated the question.
"You had better give _me_ the _menu_," said Miss Vereker. "How much is
the _table d'hote_ lunch?"
"Four shillings, madam."
Madam mused.
"Let me see," she said thoughtfully. "Can we run to it, dear?"
"Of course!" said Stiffy in an undertone, reddening with shame. "You
know Daphne gave me----"
Nicky smiled joyfully.
"So she did. I had forgotten. Two and nine, wasn't it?"
Stiffy, with a five-pound-note crackling in his pocket, merely gaped.
"Then," continued Nicky, calculating on her fingers, "there is the
three and a penny which we got out of the missionary-box. That makes
five and tenpence. And there is that shilling that slipped down into
your boot, Stiffy. You can easily get under the table and take it off.
Six and tenpence. I have elevenpence in stamps, and that, with the
threepenny-bit we picked up off the floor of the bus, makes eight
shillings. We can just do it. Thank you," she intimated to the waiter
with a seraphic smile--"we will take _table d'hote_. I suppose," she
added wistfully, "there would be no reduction if I took my little boy
on my knee?"
"None, madam."
And the waiter, still unshaken, departed to bring the _hors
d'oeuvres_.
"Nicky, don't play the goat!" urged the respectable Stephen in a low
and agitated voice. "That blighter really _believes_ we are going to
pay him in stamps. We shall get flung out, for a cert!"
"It's all right," said Nicky. "I am only going to try and make him
laugh."
"You'll fail," said her brother with conviction.
At this moment a mighty tray, covered with such inducements to
appetite as anchovies, sliced tomatoes, sardines, radishes, chopped
celery, Strasburg sausage, _et hoc genus omne_--all equally
superfluous in the case of a schoolboy up in town on an _exeat_--was
laid before him with a stately flourish. Then the waiter came stiffly
and grimly to attention, and stood obviously expectant. _Hors
d'oeuvres_ are rather puzzling things. Here was a chance for the tyros
before him to show their mettle.
They showed it.
"One gets tired of these everlasting things," mused Nicky wearily.
"I'll just peck at one or two. You can fetch the soup, waiter: we
shall be ready for it immediately."
"Thick or clear soup, madam?"
"We'll have thick to begin with, please: then clear," replied Nicky
calmly. "Stiffy, I will take an anchovy."
The waiter was not more than two minutes absent, but ere he returned a
lightning transformation scene had been enacted.
Certainly the Briton, with all his faults, surpasses the foreigner in
the control of the emotions. What a Gaul or a Teuton would have done
on witnessing the sight which met the eyes of the imperturbable
Ganymede of the Restaurant International when he returned with the
thick soup, it is difficult to say. The first would probably have
wept, the second have sent for a policeman. For lo! the richly dight
_hors d'oeuvres_ tray had become a solitude--the component parts
thereof were duly discovered by the charwoman next morning amid the
foliage of an adjacent palm--and the tail of the last radish was
disappearing into Stiffy's mouth. Stiffy, once roused, made an
excellent accomplice, though he had no initiative of his own.
The waiter's face twitched ever so slightly, and there was an
undulating movement in the region of his scarlet waistcoat. But he
recovered himself in time, and having served the thick soup, departed
unbidden in search of the clear.
"Nicky," said Stiffy in a concerned voice, "are we really going to
have everything on the _menu_?"
"You are, my son," replied Nicky. "I, being a lady, will make use of
this palm-tub."
The waiter brought the clear soup, and asked for instructions with
regard to the fish.
"What sort of fish have you?"
The man proffered the card.
"_Sole: Sauce Tartare._ That means sole with tartar sauce," Nicky
translated glibly for the benefit of her untutored relative. "We had
better not have that. Tartar sauce always makes him sick," she
explained to the waiter, indicating the fermenting Stiffy. "What else
is there? Let me see--ah! _Blanchailles!_--er--_Blanchailles!_ A very
delicate fish! Quite so. You may bring us"--her brain worked
desperately behind a smiling face, but fruitlessly--"a _blanchaille_,
waiter."
There was an ominous silence. Then the waiter asked, in a voice
tinged with polite incredulity--
"A _whole_ one each, madam?"
"Certainly," said madam in freezing tones.
The waiter bowed deferentially, and departed.
"Stiffy," inquired Nicky in agonised tones, "what _is_ a
_blanchaille?_ Don't say it's a cod!"
Stiffy devoted three hours a-week to the study of Modern Languages,
but so far no _blanchaille_ has swum into his vocabulary.
"I've a notion," he said after a prolonged mental effort, "that it is
a sturgeon."
"How big is a sturgeon?"
"It's about the size of a shark, I think."
"Mercy! And we have ordered a whole one each!"
But their capacity was not to be taxed after all. The waiter returned,
and with the nonchalant demeanour of a hardened clubman playing out an
unexpected ace of trumps, laid down two plates. In the centre of each
reposed a single forlorn diminutive whitebait.
But it was here that Veronica Elizabeth Vereker rose to her greatest
heights. She inspected her own portion and then her brother's.
"Waiter," she said at last, "will you kindly take away this young
gentleman's fish and ask the cook to give you a rather longer one?
About three-quarters of an inch, I should say. The child"--indicating
her hirsute and crimson senior--"gets very peevish and fretful if his
portion is smaller than any one else's."
Without a word the waiter picked up Stiffy's plate and bore it away.
His broad back had become slightly bowed, and his finely chiselled
legs had a warped and bandy appearance. The strain was telling.
Stiffy gazed upon his sister in rapt admiration.
"Nicky, you _ripper_!" he said.
After this it was mere child's play to request a stout gentleman with
a chain round his neck to submit the wine list--an imposing volume of
many pages--and after a heated and highly technical discussion on the
respective merits of Pommery and Cliquot, to order one stone-ginger
and two glasses.
Nicky next instructed the waiter to present her compliments to the
leader of the band, and to request as a special favour that he and his
colleagues would oblige with a rendering of _Shall We Gather at the
River?_ The waiter returned with a reply to the effect that the _chef
d'orchestre_ would be delighted. Unfortunately he had not the full
score by him at the moment, but had sent along to the Cafe Royal to
borrow a copy. Everything would be in readiness about tea-time. It was
then a little after two, and it was admitted by both Nicky and Stiffy
that honours on this occasion were divided.
So far both sides, as the umpires say on Territorial field-days, had
acquitted themselves in a manner deserving great credit; but the
waiter scored the odd and winning trick a little later, in a
particularly subtle manner. Age and experience always tell. Nicky,
unduly inflated by early success, insisted upon Stiffy ordering a
liqueur with his coffee. Green Chartreuse was finally selected and
brought.
"Shall I pour it into your coffee, sir?" asked the waiter
respectfully.
"Please," said the unsuspecting Stiffy.
The man obeyed, and directly afterwards emitted a sound which caused
both children to glance up suddenly. They glared suspiciously, first
at one another, then at the back of the retreating foe.
"Do people drink Green Chartreuse _in_ their coffee?" asked Nicky
apprehensively.
"I don't know," said Stiffy. He tasted the compound. "No, I'm _blowed_
if they do! Nicky, we've been had. He's one up!"
"It would score him off," replied the undefeated Nicky, "if you could
manage to be sick."
But Stiffy held out no hope of this happy retaliation; and they
ultimately produced the five-pound note and paid the score with
somewhat chastened mien, adding a _douceur_ which was as excessive as
it was unnecessary. Waiters do not get much entertainment out of
serving meals as a rule.
II.
"Now we must meet Daphne," said Stiffy, as they left the restaurant
and hailed a cab.
They were in town for an all-too-brief sojourn of twenty-four hours,
to assist at the inspection of Daphne's new house. It was now
February, and Lady Carr had not seen her husband since the eruption at
Belton last summer. Juggernaut had made no attempt to prevent her
going home, and when she wrote later, requesting that Master Brian
Vereker Carr might be sent to her, had despatched him without
remonstrance. No one save Cilly and her beloved Godfrey--least of all
the Rector--knew of the true state of affairs; and all during that
autumn and winter Daphne was happier in a fashion than she had ever
been. To a large extent she resumed command of the household, setting
Cilly free for other very right and natural diversions; and a sort of
_edition de luxe_ of the old days came into being, with first-hand
food at every meal and a boy to clean the boots and drive the pony.
Daphne was entirely impervious to the gravity of the situation. There
are certain women who are curiously wanting in all sense of
responsibility. They preserve the child's lack of perspective and
proportion even after they grow up, and the consequences are sometimes
disastrous. If love arrives upon the scene no further harm ensues, for
the missing qualities spring up, with that Jonah's-gourd-like
suddenness which characterises so many feminine developments, at the
first touch of the great magician's wand. The retarded faculties
achieve maturity in a flash, and their owner becomes maternal,
solicitous, Martha-like; and all is well.