Old England
The holiday in Sicily, like all pleasant things, came to an end at last,
and the Ingleton family, leaving the Casa Bianca with many regrets,
returned to their own country in time to welcome Roland, Bevis, and
Clifford back from school for Easter. Carmel, who had seemed keenly to
feel the parting from her mother, and who had been so quiet on the
journey that her cousins suspected a bad attack of homesickness, cheered
up when they were once more settled at the Chase. The beauties of the
English country-side, with plum-blossom, primroses, cowslips, green
meadows, and budding woodlands, compared very favorably with even the
lovely Sicilian landscape, and Carmel acknowledged frankly that
Cheverley had a charm all of its own.
"I never knew how much I loved it till I left it, and then saw it
again!" she declared. "There's something about the place that grips."
"Your Ingleton blood showing, of course," remarked Everard. "All your
ancestors have lived at the Chase, and it would be queer if you hadn't
some sort of a natural feeling for it. People mostly have for the place
where their ancestors were born."
"Indeed! I believe my ancestors were all of them born in bed, so no
doubt that's why I have such a natural feeling for bed, and don't want
to get up in the mornings!" piped Dulcie, who never could resist a quip
at Everard. "I don't despise Old England, but Sicily's the land for me,
and I'm going back to Montalesso some day. Aunt Nita says so! Lilias can
please herself, but, as soon as Mr. Bowden lets me leave school, I shall
say 'Ta-ta! I'm off to the land of oranges and lemons!'"
"And in the meantime you'll have to make up at school for this long
holiday," reminded Cousin Clare. "I'm afraid you'll find yourself
terribly behindhand when you get back to Chilcombe!"
The occupants of the Blue Grotto had much to talk about when they met
again.
"It was hateful having the dor. all to ourselves," confided Gowan. "We
never had such a slow time in our lives. We had a fearful scare, too! We
thought Miss Walters was going to put Laurette with us! She'd had a
terrible quarrel with Truie and Hester, and things were rather hot in
the Gold bedroom. Fortunately, however, they cooled down, and patched up
their quarrels. Bertha and I were simply shaking, though. I heard Miss
Walters say to Laurette: 'There's a spare bed at present in the Blue
room,' and we thought she was moving in for the rest of the term! Think
of being boxed up with Laurette! Wouldn't it have been absolutely
grisly?"
"Nothing at all particularly exciting happened while you were away!"
groused Bertha. "We got all the drudgery, and you had all the fun!"
"But we brought you some presents! Just wait till I get to the bottom of
my box!" put in Carmel.
"Oh, have you?" cried Bertha excitedly. "What have you brought? Don't
stop to arrange those blouses! Dump your things out anyhow: I can't
wait! I've never had a foreign present in my life before. O-o-oh! What
an absolutely ducky little locket! Carmel, you're a darling! You
couldn't have given me anything in the whole of this wide world that I
should have liked better. I just love it!"
Though the Ingletons' immediate friends at Chilcombe had been rather
inclined to look with the green eyes of envy upon their long holiday in
Sicily, and consequent immunity from Easter examinations, they were
mollified by the pretty gifts which the girls had brought them, and
while they still proclaimed them "luckers out of all reason," they
forgave them their good fortune, and received them back once more into
the bosom of their special clique. The Mafia had indeed languished
considerably during their absence. Nobody had troubled very much to keep
up its activities, and it had held only one or two half-hearted
meetings. Now that its nine members were together again, however, the
secret society set to work with renewed vigor. Insensibly it had rather
altered its scope. It had begun originally for the purpose of resisting
the aggressions of Laurette, Hester, and Truie, but had grown into a
sort of confraternity for private fun. The meetings held in each other's
dormitories were of a hilarious description, and included games. At
Gowan's suggestion they even went a step farther, and produced literary
contributions--"of a sort," as she wisely qualified the rather appalling
innovation.
"I don't mean exactly Shakespeare, you know," she explained. "But you
can write poetry if you care to, or make up something funny like
_Punch_. Everybody has got to do something!"
"Not really?" objected Dulcie, wrinkling her forehead into lines of
acute distress. "Oh, Goody! It's as bad as lessons every bit. Look here,
I'm not clever, and I don't make any pretence at poetry or the rest of
it. You'll just have to leave me out."
"Pull yourself together, Dulcie, my child!" said Gowan calmly. "You'll
either be turned bodily out of the Mafia, or you'll do your bit the
same as everybody else. Don't for a moment imagine you're coming to
listen to other people's industry, and bring nothing of your own with
you! That's not the way we manage things here. If you don't show up with
a manuscript in your hand, you'll find yourself walking down the passage
with the door slammed behind you. Yes, I mean it! You're a decent enough
little person, but you're apt to be slack. You must get some stiffening
into you this time."
"Poor little me!" wailed Dulcie.
"No poorer than all the rest of us!"
"Yes, I am, for I haven't got the same thingumbobs in my brains!
Couldn't make up poetry to save my life! May I write a letter?"
"Why, yes, if you'd rather!"
"I feel it would be my most adequate form of self-expression," minced
Dulcie, mimicking Miss Walters' very best literary manner. "I trust my
contribution will be kept for publication. Later on, when I'm famous, it
may become of value. The world will never forget that I was educated at
Chilcombe Hall. A neat brass plate will some day be placed upon the door
of the Blue Grotto to mark the dormitory I slept in, and my bed will be
preserved in the local museum!"
"With you (stuffed) inside it, labeled 'Specimen of a Champion
Slacker'!" snorted Gowan. "Now, no nonsense! If you don't turn up at
the meeting with a manuscript, you won't be admitted!"
"Bow-wow! How very severe we've grown, all of a sudden!" mocked Dulcie,
as she danced away. "You take it for granted," she called over her
shoulder, "that my contribution is going to mark the literary low tide.
Perhaps, after all, it will make as big an impression as anybody else's.
There!"
On the evening fixed for the meeting, nine girls put in an appearance at
the Blue Grotto, all flaunting manuscripts in a very conspicuous
fashion. They seated themselves upon Bertha's and Dulcie's beds, and
having as a kind of foregone conclusion, elected Gowan as President of
the Ceremonies, got straight to business. Gowan was justice personified,
and fearful of even unintentional favoritism, she insisted upon the
company drawing lots for the order in which their effusions were to be
read. The Fates decided thus: Carmel, Noreen, Edith, Lilias, Gowan,
Bertha, Prissie, Phillida, Dulcie.
Carmel, hustled off the bed to be given first hearing, took the chair of
honor reserved for each literary star in turn, and having waited a
moment to allow undue giggling to subside, opened her sheets of exercise
paper and began:
"OLD ENGLAND
"I never can quite see why it is called 'Old' England, because I
don't suppose it is any older than any other part of the world,
really, but perhaps 'Old' is a term of endearment, because I notice
when any girl likes me, she generally calls me 'old sport,' or 'old
thing.' Well, at any rate here I am back in Old England, and it is
a wonderfully nice sort of a country. I specially like the
policemen, who wave their white gloves and stop all the traffic in
the street in a second, and the railway porters who yell out the
names of the stations, and the little boys who cry the newspapers.
There are no beggars in Old England like there are in Sicily, and
no mosquitoes, and no earthquakes. At least not proper ones. I
thought we were all beggars when we tried to raise money for the
'Waifs and Strays'; Bertha buzzes worse than any mosquito when she
wants to borrow my penknife, and I thought there was an earthquake
the last time Laurette danced.
"I like all the old houses and castles and cathedrals in Old
England, and especially the old gardens. What I don't like are my
old lessons. Old England is a jolly, hospitable, comfortable, green
sort of country, and I am quite at home here now, so hurrah! Old
England for ever!"
Carmel, having read her manuscript as rapidly as possible, vacated the
chair in a breathless condition, and pushed Noreen into her place.
Noreen had been struggling with Pegasus, and had produced a spring poem.
It was short, but perhaps a trifle over-sweet.
"TO MY DEARIE-OH!
"Spring is comen back again,
(Daisy buds for my dearie!)
Gone is winter's snow and rain,
(Cherry lips for my dearie!)
Blossom clothes the orchards now,
(Apple cheeks for my dearie!)
Nests of birds on every bough,
(And kisses for my dearie!)
"It's one of those old-fashioned sort of things--I believe you call them
madrigals," she ventured.
Nobody else knew what a madrigal was, so they took Noreen's word for it,
and allowed her to retire in favor of Edith, who had also been trying to
cultivate the muse of poetry. Her effort at verse was entitled:
"MIRANDA'S MUSIC
"Miranda had learnt the piano to play,
And when seated one day on the stool,
At her latest new piece she was strumming away,
For old Thomas, who sweeps out the school.
"Thought she: ''T will impress him if anything will,
For the left hand goes over the right.
He will surely admire my exquisite skill,
And perhaps will express his delight.'
"But ah! fondest hopes may be dashed to the ground,
Despite what ambition can raise.
Ill pleased by this banquet of beautiful sound,
Old Thomas was scant in his praise.
"'Ay, ay, yes, I hear. 'T is not bad, to be sure!
They may teach you in time!' so he grumbled.
But 'twas plain that he thought the performance but poor,
And Miranda felt terribly humbled.
"One morn when six months had swift glided away,
Again at the instrument seated,
Miranda a nocturne had just ceased to play,
When old Thomas desired it repeated.
"'Why, Miss,' he declared, 'I can hardly believe
That you've made such improvement so soon!
The last time you played, you'd to jump your hand o'er
Before you could pick out the tune!
"'You'd humpety lump in the treble at top,
Then same hand would return to the bass.
But now I can see they have taught you to keep
Each hand in its own proper place!'
"It's a really true story!" persisted Edith, as the girls giggled. "It
happened to my sister. She always plays at the Band of Hope concerts in
our village at home, and she goes down to the school to practise her
solos on the piano there. Old Thomas is the verger, and he's such a
queer old character. He really _did_ think she didn't know how to play
properly when she crossed her hands over, and he told her so. It was a
tremendous joke in our family, because Maisie considers herself musical.
She was squashed absolutely flat!"
Neither Lilias, Gowan, Bertha, Prissie, nor Phillida had written
anything very original or outstanding in their manuscripts, so we will
pass them over, and only record that of Dulcie, who came last of all.
She took the honored seat with a great air of _empressement_, nodded
triumphantly to Gowan, cleared her throat, commanded strict silence, and
began:
"CHILCOMBE HALL.
"MY DEAR EVERARD,
"I must write at once and tell you of the terrible things that have
been happening at this school. On Monday last the cook made a
mistake, and used a packet of rat poison instead of sugar in our
pudding. It was the day for ginger puddings, and we all thought
they tasted rather queer, somehow, but it is not etiquette here to
leave anything on your plate, so we made an effort and finished our
rations. Well, about ten minutes afterwards most of us were taken
with umpteen fits. We writhed about the room in agony, and thought
our last hour had come. The doctor was sent for, and he motored
over so fast that he killed two little boys and a cow on the road,
but he said he did not care, and it was all in the way of business.
He stood us up in a line and gave us each an emetic of mustard and
water which was very horrid, and felt like a poultice inside. We
are beginning to get better now, but Carmel's legs are stiff, and
she has a tendency to go black in the face every now and then. The
doctor says she will do so for a fortnight, until the rat poison
wears itself out of her system. He does not think she will be lame
always. At least he hopes not. Lilias squints a little in
consequence of the umpteen fits she had, which turned her eyes
round, and my face is still swollen, and three front teeth dropped
out, but otherwise we are quite well, and the Doctor says things
might have been much worse, for at least our lives were spared. I
think we ought to see a specialist, but Miss Walters won't hear of
it.
"Hoping you are quite well,
"With love,
"Your affectionate sister
"DULCIE."
"Don't say I can't write fiction!" proclaimed Dulcie, making a grimace
at Gowan. "It's as good as a novel (though I say it myself) and as
interesting as anything in a newspaper. Improbable? Not at all! Cooks
make mistakes sometimes, like other people! I don't exactly know the
symptoms of rat poisoning, but I dare say they are very much what I've
described. It's thrilling reading, anyhow, and you ought to give me a
good clap for it."
"Tootle-too! Somebody has lost a trumpeter!" returned Gowan.
"I don't care! I'm sure if we took votes for the most thrills, my piece
would win. I'm going to keep it! Hand it back to me, Gowan! I want to
show it to Everard some time. He'd laugh ever so over it. He says my
home letters are tame. This would wake him up, at any rate! He'd say his
sister was breaking out into an authoress! What sport!"