The Open Road
It was fortunate for Carmel that her first experience of England should
come in the spring and early summer. Had she arrived straight from sunny
Sicily to face autumn rains or winter snows, I verily believe her
courage would have failed, and she would have written an urgent and
imploring appeal to be fetched home. For the white, vine-covered house
that looked over the blue waters of the Mediterranean was still
essentially "home" to Carmel. She had been born and bred in the south,
and though one half of her was purely English, there was another side
that was strongly Italian. She was deeply attached to all her relations
and friends in Sicily, and from her point of view it was exile to live
so far away from them. The fact that she was owner of the Chase was, in
her estimation, no compensation whatever for her banishment from "Casa
Bianca." She made a very sweet and gentle little heiress, however. As
yet she was mistress only in name, for during her minority everything
was left in the hands of Mr. Bowden and a certain Canon Lowe, who were
guardians to all Mr. Ingleton's grandchildren, and kept the Chase open
as a home for them. The three girls returned there from Chilcombe Hall
at the end of the term, and were joined by the younger boys from their
preparatory school.
For a week or two they enjoyed themselves in the grounds and the park.
There was much to show Carmel, and she was happy sitting in the garden
or wandering in the woods. She soon made friends with the people on the
estate. The gamekeeper's children would come running out to meet her,
and stand round smiling while she hunted in her pocket for chocolates;
Milner's little girl adored her, and even the shy baby at the lodge
waxed friendly. Carmel was intensely fond of children, and the affection
which she had bestowed on younger brothers and sisters at home cropped
out on every occasion where her life touched that of smaller people. To
Roland, Bevis, and Clifford she was a charming companion. She would go
walks with them in the woods, help them to arrange their various
collections of butterflies, foreign stamps, and picture post cards, and
play endless games of draughts, halma, or bagatelle.
"You slave after those boys as if you were their nursery governess!"
remarked Lilias one day, just a little nettled that Clifford ran
instinctively to Carmel for sympathy instead of to his sister. "I
promised to help them with those caterpillar boxes to-morrow, and so I
will, if you'll leave them. I really can't be bothered to-day."
Carmel yielded instantly. Part of her intense charm was the ready tact
with which she was careful never to usurp the place of any one else. She
put aside the muslin that was to form covers for the boxes, and slipped
her scissors back into the case.
Clifford, however, who was a budding naturalist, and most keen on
collecting, was highly disgusted.
"I want my boxes to-day!" he wailed. "I've no place to put my
caterpillars when I find them. They crawl out of the old boxes. Why
shouldn't Carmel make me some? I know hers would be beauties."
"Lilias will make you some nicer ones to-morrow," urged his cousin.
"Suppose we take our butterfly nets on to the heath to-day, and try to
find some 'blues.' You haven't a really nice specimen, you know. And I
think we might find some moths on the trees in the wood, if we look
about carefully. It's worth trying, isn't it?"
"Oh yes! Do let us! Shall we start now?" agreed Clifford, much
mollified.
On the whole the three girls got along excellently, but if there was any
hint at disturbance it generally arose from Lilias, whose pride would
be up in arms at the most absurd trifles. She was annoyed that Carmel
was asked to give away the prizes at the village sports, and showed her
dissatisfaction so plainly that her sweet-tempered cousin, rather than
have any fuss, solved the situation by asking Cousin Clare to perform
the ceremony instead, considerably to the disappointment of the
committee, who had thought the new heiress was the appropriate
patroness.
Lilias and Dulcie took diametrically opposite views about the Chase. The
former stuck firmly to her opinion that it ought to have been Everard's,
that her brother was an ill-used outcast, and that it was only sisterly
feeling to resent seeing anybody else in his place. Her attitude to
Carmel was almost as strong as that of King Robert of Sicily in
Longfellow's _Tales of a Wayside Inn_ towards the angel who had
temporarily usurped his throne.
Dulcie, on the contrary, had always chafed against Everard's assumption
of superiority and authority. He had been left the same generous legacy
as the rest of the family, and had only to come back and claim his
portion when he wished. If anybody was to have the Chase, she really
preferred that it should belong to Carmel, who never obtruded her
rights, and seemed ready for her cousins to enjoy the property on an
exact equality with herself. The two girls were great friends: they
would go out riding together while Lilias went shopping in the car with
Cousin Clare; they practised duets, and both made crude attempts at
sketching the house. Their tastes in books and fancy-work were somewhat
similar, and they would sit in the shade in the afternoons stitching at
embroidery and eating chocolates.
Three weeks of the summer holidays passed rapidly away in this fashion.
Carmel was glad to have the opportunity of getting to know the Chase,
and admitted its attractions, though her heart was still in Sicily.
Towards the end of August the party broke up and scattered. Carmel had
received an invitation from English relations of her stepfather to join
them on a motor tour; the three little boys were to be taken to rooms at
the seaside by Miss Mason, their late governess; Lilias and Dulcie went
to stay with friends, and Cousin Clare had arranged to attend a
conference. She agreed, however, that when Lilias and Dulcie returned
from their visit, they should go with her in the car for a week-end to
Tivermouth, to see how the boys were getting on.
"If you'll promise we may stay at an hotel!" stipulated Lilias. "I
wouldn't spend a week-end in rooms with those three imps for the world.
I'd like to see them, but not at too close quarters."
"It's quite improbable that their landlady would have bedrooms for us,"
said Cousin Clare. "So in any case we should be obliged to stop at an
hotel. In this crowded season I shall engage rooms beforehand."
"Hurrah!" triumphed Dulcie, who was anxious for a grown-up experience.
"I must say I hate staying with the boys near the beach; the
sitting-room's always overflowing with their seaweed and other messes."
"What a joke if _I_ were to turn up at the hotel too!" said Carmel. "I
believe the Rogers are going down to Devonshire. I shall tell them the
date you'll be at Tivermouth. They'll possibly like to meet you."
"Oh, do! It would be such fun!" agreed Dulcie. "We'd have an absolutely
topping time together. Persuade them as hard as you can!"
"I'll do my best!" agreed Carmel.
As it is impossible to follow the adventures of everybody, we will
concern ourselves particularly with the experiences of our heroine, who
was to take her first motor tour among English scenery. The party in the
comfortable Rover car consisted of Major and Mrs. Rogers, their daughter
Sheila, their guest Carmel, and a chauffeur. Major Rogers was still
suffering from the effects of wounds, and was more or less of a
semi-invalid, a condition which made him fussy at times, and too
independent at others, for directly he felt a trifle better he would
immediately begin to break all the rules that the doctors had laid down
for his treatment. He was an amusing, humorous sort of man, who would
jest between spasms of pain, and generally found something to laugh at
in the various episodes of their journey. There is a laughter, though,
that is more the expression of supreme courage than of genuine mirth,
and the drawn lines round the Major's mouth told of sleepless nights and
days of little ease, and of trouble that hurts worse even than physical
pain; for one son lay on a Belgian battle-field, another on the heights
near Salonika, with no cross to mark the grave, and a third deep under
the surging waters of the Atlantic.
Mrs. Rogers was Mr. Greville's sister, and for that reason, though she
was no real relation, Carmel called her Aunt Hilda. She had been a belle
in her youth, and she was still pretty with the pathetic beauty that
often shines in the faces of those who have suffered great loss. Her
once flaxen hair was almost entirely gray, but she had kept her delicate
complexion, and there was a gentle sweetness about her that was very
attractive.
Her daughter was an exact replica of what she herself must have been at
nineteen, though Sheila was going through an uncomfortable phase, and
affected to despise the country, to be nervous of motoring, and to long
to be back in town again. She was quite kind to Carmel, but treated her
with the distantly indulgent attitude of the lately-grown-up for the
mere schoolgirl. It was evident that she regarded the whole tour as more
or less of a nuisance, and just a means of killing time until she could
start off for Scotland to join a certain house-party to which she had
been invited, and where she would meet several of her most particular
friends.
"I'm sorry we couldn't ask one of your cousins to come with you, dear,"
said Mrs. Rogers to Carmel, "but there isn't room in the car for any one
else. It's a good opportunity for you to see something of England. It's
all very different from Sicily, isn't it? You'll feel your first winter
trying, I'm afraid; we certainly lack sunshine in this climate."
"Give me Egypt," said Major Rogers. "It's this perpetual damp in the air
that makes things melancholy over here. Why, except in the height of
summer it's hardly ever fit to sit out-of-doors. I like a place where I
need a sun helmet."
"You and Mother are salamanders, Daddy!" declared Sheila. "I believe
you'd enjoy living in a hot-house! Now, I like Scotland, with a good
sharp wind across the moors, and a touch of mist in it to cool your
face. I like either town or mountains. If I can't walk down Regent
Street, then I'd tramp over the heather, but I don't admire ordinary
English scenery. It's too tame."
"You surely don't call this tame?" replied her father, pointing at the
village through which they were motoring, "it's one of the show bits of
the Midlands, and an absolute picture. Where are your eyes, child?"
But Sheila was perverse, and refused to evince any enthusiasm, and ended
by pulling out a novel over which she chuckled, quite regardless of the
scenery, and only tore herself from the book to ask for the box of
chocolate marsh mallows that she had bought at the last town where there
was a good confectioner's.
Carmel would certainly have found Dulcie, or even Lilias, a more
congenial companion than Sheila, but she nevertheless managed to enjoy
herself. She loved the country, and was delighted with the variety of
the English landscape. Though less rich than the vineclad south, the
greenness of its fields and hedges never failed to amaze her, and she
was fascinated by the quaint villages, their thatched roofs, church
spires, and flowery gardens. They had been running through
Gloucestershire _en route_ for Somerset and Devon, and were to call a
halt at various show places on the way. Major Rogers, poring over map
and guide books, would plan out their daily route each morning at the
breakfast table in the hotel.
"With good luck and no punctures we ought to reach Exeter to-night
easily," he remarked, looking through the window of an old-fashioned
country inn into the cobbled street where their luggage was being
strapped on to the car.
"But, my dear!" remonstrated his wife. "Why in such a hurry to reach
Exeter? Let us stay the night at Wells, and look over the cathedral;
then we can spend a few hours in Bath too."
"Daddy and Johnson always like to tear along at about a hundred miles an
hour," said Sheila. "Except as a means of getting along the road, I hate
motoring! I always think Johnson is going to run into everybody. He
shaves his corners so narrowly, and doesn't give conveyances enough
room. I call him very reckless."
"Nonsense! He's an excellent driver!" declared her father. "One of the
best chauffeurs we've ever had, though he's only a young chap. He's
wonderfully intelligent too. I'd trust him with repairs as well as any
man at a garage. A civil fellow, too."
"Yes, his manners are really quite superior," agreed Mrs. Rogers,
stepping on to the balcony and watching the smart, good-looking figure
of the young chauffeur, who was opening the bonnet of the car for some
last inspection. "Personally I feel perfectly safe when Johnson is
driving me. I'm never nervous in the least!"
"And I'm in such a perpetual panic that I often read so as not to look
at the road," confessed Sheila. "I do wish you'd ask him to sound his
horn oftener in these narrow roads. The banks and hedges are so high,
you can't see anything that's coming till it's almost upon you."
"Well, it certainly might be a wise precaution," said Major Rogers. "In
motoring you have to guard against the stupidity of other people, and
that fellow in the gray two-seater nearly charged straight into us
yesterday. A regular road-hog he was!"
If Johnson had hitherto been a little slack in respect of sounding his
horn, it was the only fault of which his employers could complain. He
kept the fittings of the car at the very zenith in the matter of polish,
he was punctuality personified, and most skilful at the tedious business
of repairing or changing tires; he rarely spoke addressed, but when
questioned he seemed to have a good acquaintance with the country, knew
which were the best roads, and what sights were worth visiting in the
various places through which they passed. All of which are highly
desirable qualities in a chauffeur, and a satisfaction to all
concerned.
It was the general plan of the holiday to start about ten or eleven
o'clock, take a picnic-basket with them, lunch somewhere in the woods,
arrive at their next halting-place about three or four, and spend the
remainder of the day in sight-seeing, or in Major Rogers' case resting,
if he were suffering from a severe attack of pain.
As they motored across Somerset in the direction of Wells, they chose
for their mid-day stop a lovely place on the top of a range of low
hills. A belt of fir trees edged the roadside, and through these a gate
led into a field. As the gate was open they felt licensed to enter, and
to encamp upon a sunny bank under a hedge. One of the motor rugs was
spread for Major Rogers, and Mrs. Rogers, Sheila, and Carmel sat
severally on an air cushion, a tree-stump, and on the grass. There was a
grand view over a slope of cornfields and pastures, and though the sun
was warm there was a delicious little breeze to temper the heat. Not
that it was too hot for any one except Sheila, who panted in the shade
while the others exulted in the sunshine. Carmel, outstretched upon the
grass, basked like a true daughter of the south, throwing aside her hat,
somewhat to Mrs. Rogers' consternation.
"You'll spoil your complexion, child! I'm sure your mother never allows
you to go hatless in Sicily! Put your handkerchief over your face. Yes,
I like to feel the warmth myself, though not on my head. This is the
sort of holiday that does people good, just to sit in the open air."
"It's a rabbit holiday here," murmured the Major lazily. "Didn't you
read that supreme article in _Punch_ a while ago? Well, it was about a
doctor who invented a drug that could turn his patients into anything
they chose for the holidays. A worried mother of a family lived an
idyllic month at a farm as a hen, with six children as chickens, food
and lodging provided gratis; a portly dowager enjoyed a rest cure as a
Persian cat at a country mansion; some lively young people spent a
fortnight as sea-gulls, while the hero of the article was just about to
be changed into a rabbit when----"
"When what happened?"
"The usual thing in such stories; the maid broke the precious bottle of
medicine that was to have worked the charm, and when he hunted for the
doctor to buy another, the whole place had disappeared."
"How disappointing!"
"Yes, but a field like this, with burrows in it, is a near substitute. I
feel I could live up here. Suppose I buy a shelter and get leave to
erect it?"
"Then it would promptly rain, Daddy, and you'd be in the depths of
misery and longing for a decent hotel!" declared Sheila.
To suit Major Rogers' humor they stayed nearly two hours in the field.
The quiet was just what his doctor had ordered for him. He had spent a
restless night, and, though he could not sleep now, the air and the
sunshine calmed his nerves. He seemed better than he had been for days,
and enjoyed the run downhill into Wells.
As they were stepping out of the motor at the hotel, Carmel gave an
exclamation of concern.
"I've lost my bracelet!" she declared. "What a nuisance! Wherever can it
have gone?"
Johnson, the chauffeur, immediately searched on the floor and cushions
of the car, but without success. No bracelet was there.
"When did you have it last?" asked Mrs. Rogers.
"In the rabbit field where we had lunch. I remember clasping and
unclasping it, and I suppose it must have slipped off my wrist without
my noticing. Never mind!"
"I'm sorry, but it certainly is too far to go back and look for it,
dear," said Mrs. Rogers.
"Was it valuable?" asked Sheila.
"Oh no, not at all! Only Mother gave it to me on my last birthday. It
doesn't really matter, and of course it can't be helped now."
Carmel was vexed, nevertheless, with her own carelessness. The little
bracelet had been a favorite, and she hated to lose it. She missed the
feel of it on her wrist. Her first thought when she woke next morning
was of annoyance at the incident. As she walked down to breakfast in the
coffee-room, the chauffeur was standing by the hall door. He came up at
once, as if he had been expressly waiting for her, and handed her a
small parcel. To her utter surprise it contained the missing bracelet.
"Johnson!" she called, for he had turned quickly away. "Johnson--oh,
where did you find this? Not in the car, surely?"
"No, Miss Carmel, it was just where you thought you had left it--in the
field where you had lunch. I got up early and fetched it before
breakfast," replied Johnson pausing on the doorstep.
"You went all that way! How kind of you! Thank you ever so much!"
exclaimed Carmel, clasping her bangle on her wrist again. "I can't tell
you how pleased I am to have it!"
But Johnson, avoiding her eyes, and seeming anxious to get away from her
thanks, was already out of the front door, and half-way across the
courtyard to the garage.
"I wonder if English men-servants are always as shy as that?" thought
Carmel. "An Italian would certainly have waited to let me say 'Thank
you!'"