CERTAIN LITTLE GARDENS.
It is wonderful how often grown-up people walk about the world with
their eyes shut. Captain West thought himself decidedly an observant
man. He was fond of his garden, and even worked in it for hours at a
time; but he never noticed that within his domain there were sundry
other little gardens, just as carefully tended, and exhibiting a much
greater ingenuity of arrangement than his own. For instance, there was
one within a few yards of the schoolroom window, just at the corner of
the house, under the laburnum-tree. Here Betty was working hard one
morning, when, having finished her lessons with unusual quickness, she
was allowed out of the schoolroom half an hour before the others.
A more unpromising site for a garden it would have been difficult to
imagine. All that the ordinary world saw were two stone slabs, that
had something to do with lighting a cellar below the house. But the
children had long ago discovered, that one stone being several inches
higher than the other, water poured on it would rush like a miniature
cascade to the lower level. This was by no means the only possibility
of amusement that the stones afforded. A large crack ran down the
centre of each, and these when properly blocked with mud at either end
made two admirable lakes. There were other smaller cracks, in which
the children from time to time planted a daisy or a laburnum seed.
Once or twice they had been known to grow, which was distinctly
encouraging.
This little pleasure-ground had lately suffered considerable neglect,
owing to the number of exciting events that had occurred. Besides,
when Madge was out of doors she liked larger and more energetic
amusements. But Betty was devoted to arranging her little garden in
new ways, and directly she found herself alone she began to work out a
scheme for beautifying it that she had long had in her head. The lakes
were carefully formed with some nice sticky handfuls of clay at either
end to keep in the water. This had often been done before, but it was
quite a new thing, and entirely Betty's own idea, to cover the mud
banks with glittering fragments of gravel, so that they looked like
rockeries. She also stuck bits of grass round the edges to do duty for
rushes, and very well they looked. But the most happy thought of all
was making imitation water-lilies out of nasturtium leaves. When that
was done, Betty stopped to admire her work with very natural pride. It
seemed almost as perfect as human skill could make it.
At that moment up came John. He had finished his lessons before Madge,
who, it seemed, had got into difficulties over her sums, from which she
was not likely to emerge until dinner-time. John admired the new
arrangements exceedingly, and also contributed a suggestion to the
effect that there should be a fleet on the lake.
"Yes, but one of our boats will fill up the whole lake," said Betty,
who did not quite appreciate having her own arrangements interfered
with by a new-comer.
John made no direct answer, but dipping his hand deep into his pocket,
he drew out about a dozen nut-shells and deposited them on the stone.
Betty examined the heap carefully. "There isn't a single kernel left,
not half a one!" she said in a tone of disappointment. "What's the
good of bringing those?"
"Boats, don't you see?" explained John. And really the nut-shells,
such of them at least as were not too utterly smashed, made excellent
boats, in exact proportion to the size of the lake. When a little
extra excitement was required, Betty scraped away the mud that blocked
back the water on the upper stone, and a cataract rushed out, bearing
the whole fleet with it, and plunged recklessly into the depths of the
lower pool.
Once they adjourned for a short time to another little garden that had
lately been planned out in the middle of a shrubbery. To approach it,
one had first to cross a broad flower-border that edged the shrubbery.
Theoretically the children always jumped this flower-bed, leaving no
trace of their footsteps, but in practice, as it was rather wide, they
usually alighted heavily in the middle of it. Many a broken geranium
and crushed heliotrope testified to their unsuccessful efforts, and
Captain West, having no clue to their proceedings, was often driven to
wonder what charm--except naughtiness--there could be about jumping on
the flower-beds. He had not penetrated into the middle of the
shrubbery for years; never since the laurels and hollies had grown into
a solid prickly barrier against the outer world. So he could not
possibly guess that somewhere out of sight a weakly bush had been
gradually choked to death by its more robust companions, and that the
children on one of their voyages of discovery had noticed this, and
decided that since the poor thing was nearly dead it would obviously be
more sensible to pull it up and make a garden in its place. Of course,
the ground was so full of the roots of trees that ordinary digging was
quite out of the question; a spade (even if Madge stepped on it with
both feet and all her weight) would not go in more than half an inch.
But in the end the children very satisfactorily scratched up the ground
for about a square yard with pointed sticks, and put in a row of
primroses upside down, because they had been told that if planted in
that position they would come up red. This experiment failed with the
greatest regularity year after year in whatever corner of the garden it
was tried. Yet both children and gardeners are such hopeful people,
that when the two are combined one may expect to see absolutely
impossible feats cheerfully embarked upon as often as the sun rises.
Betty and John did not go to this charming retreat empty-handed. The
former had some plants torn up by the roots, the latter a half-filled
watering-pot. The fact was that several small things had been left
over after finishing the naval display, and it seemed a pity to waste
them. Water, for instance, was always valuable, because there was a
certain amount of difficulty about getting it. The gardener objected
to their drawing off much from his pump, which was apt to run dry in
hot weather, while if they went indoors to get a drop from a tap they
were at once set upon by innumerable people ordering them not to make
messes and wet their frocks. So when some water was left over from
flooding the lake, it was proposed not to throw it away, but to carry
it to the shrubbery garden, where there were several languishing
plants. There was the inevitable little struggle for possession of the
watering-pot; but Betty was not unreasonable, so she gave it up when
John pointed out that she had the undivided enjoyment of it while he
was at lessons. And in its place she carried two or three very
drooping nasturtium plants, that had unfortunately come up by the roots
while she was picking their leaves. They would do very well to plant
in the shrubbery, where the sun could never manage to pierce the screen
of overhanging boughs even at mid-day. All gardeners know that a hot
sun has a very disastrous effect on newly-moved plants, especially if
their roots are mostly torn off.
"I'll hold the watering-pot while you jump over the geranium-bed," said
Betty. "You know we broke two last week, and Papa said if he caught--"
"Nonsense! It's only you girls with your skirts who break things,"
interrupted John, clutching his watering-pot tighter than ever, for he
strongly suspected his sister of intending to wile it away from him.
He jumped, the watering-pot was heavy, and the weight all on one side.
Consequently he fell, and his fall was unusually disastrous, being
marked by more than the ordinary number of crushed geraniums and
scattered earth. Of course the water was all upset, principally into
his boots: and Betty threw away her nasturtiums in disgust, for it was
quite useless to plant them dry, and they had both been warned off the
pump and the tap that very morning. There might easily have been some
rather bitter reproaches at this point, but fortunately Madge was sent
out to summon them to dinner.
"I want you to do something for me this afternoon," she said to Betty
and John as they returned to the house. "Miss Thompson is going to
take me to Churchbury shopping, and I think Lewis will be expecting me
at the Eagle's Nest. I said something about it yesterday before I knew
that I was going shopping."
"But why can't John and I go and talk to him?" answered Betty. "We
aren't all going shopping."
"You don't think he will care to talk to little things like you?"
laughed Madge. "Why, he is two years older than me even; but, of
course, that isn't much. I only want you to tell him why I haven't
come, and that we shall have the usual afternoon holiday on Saturday.
Then you can come straight back, for I am sure he won't stop with you."
Since the day that Jack jumped over the wall Lewis had talked to the
children several times, standing close under the tree, and keeping an
anxious eye in the direction of Mrs. Howard's house all the while. Of
course he could not climb up to play with them since the rope-ladder so
mysteriously disappeared. There had been no explanation of that
strange disappearance. At first the children feared that Barton had
found their hiding-place, and recovered his missing property; but they
soon made up their minds that this could not be the case, when the old
man continued to meet them every day without any signs of anger. For
when Barton suspected that they had been in mischief, he did not
hesitate to scold them severely himself, and also complain to their
father. They often got into trouble this way when he found them
hunting the pigs too vigorously, or playing tricks with the milk-pails.
He would certainly have made a great fuss about their borrowing his
ropes without leave, and knotting them all over. So, as he said
nothing, it was pretty certain that he knew nothing.
But though Lewis Brand was now completely cut off from the Eagle's
Nest, being on a lower level by about a dozen feet than the children
who were sitting in it, he contrived to tell them a wonderful number of
stories about himself and the bad treatment which he suffered, speaking
all the while in a loud whisper that was very impressive. In this way
they heard, among other curious facts, that the gray-bearded man was
the jailer of whose cruelties Lewis had already told them. The
children were surprised at this, for the gray-bearded man had not
looked either very powerful or very savage. But they accepted from
Lewis the explanation that he was a hypocrite.