The tea-cosy was burnt. So was the table-cloth. Ann had 'stericks. I
think that is what nurse called them. Mrs. Primrose came running in with
mother from the drawing-room, and she fainted.
That was all!
At least, I was sent to bed, and now they call me Matty. Don't you think
it is unkind of them? Ginevra is such a pretty name too!
I didn't _mean_ to be naughty. And I do wish mother would make me
understand all about it; but Teddie is ill, and, of course, she can't
leave him until he's better. I shall have to wait, I suppose. But I
can't be happy again until I have had a nice talk with mother. She
makes everything so _understand-ible_.
What did nurse mean when she said, the other day, "There's one comfort;
Miss Ginevra's character is still unformed"?
[Printer's decoration]
_GULL'S "TWINSES."_
"Children of wealth or want, to each is given
One spot of green, and all the blue of heaven!"
"Mind! mind! I say, Tom, you're frizzing that 'erring black!"
"I ain't."
"My eyes! don't it smell fine? Oh! I do wish father'd come. He's allus a
long time when the supper's 'ot;" and Bob, as he spoke, heaved a sigh of
such prodigious depth that it might have come from his boots--if he had
possessed any, poor little man!
These two small boys, Tom and Bob Gull, were six years old.
"We is only twinses," Bob would say.
Perhaps he said "only" to make us understand that they were just alike
in the matter of age, but that there the likeness ended.
Bob, the merry and talkative, was the one who led Tom, the quiet and
silent. Bob's twinkling, puppy-like eyes--which peeped at you through a
tangled fringe of brown hair--were the exact contrast to Tom's shy blue
eyes, shaded by long, fair, girlish lashes. And Bob's jolly little round
figure seemed to say, "Anything, be it meagre soup or even dry bread,
fattens _me_;" while Tom's thin little limbs gave one a thought of
unconscious cravings for appetising food.
The room where they were watching for father was a third floor front
in Pleasant Court, not far from Waterloo Junction. Like many such
"living-rooms," it can be best described by telling you that everything
in it which should be large was small, and the other way about.
For instance, the fireplace was small and the crack under the door very
large. The cupboard was very roomy, but the things kept in it very much
too small and scarce. The bed was wide, but the blanket and counterpane
sadly narrow.
Was there nothing that was as big as it should be?
Yes, indeed! In spite of these unsatisfactory surroundings, there was as
large-hearted a love to be found in the small family which these four
walls sheltered from the cold outside world, as any one could wish to
see.
"I don't believe father's _never_ coming;" and Bob sighed again.
By this time the herring had found a cindery resting-place on a plate
before the fire, and the twins were sitting side by side, with their
bare toes on the fender and their eyes fixed upon the door, watching
eagerly, like two little terriers.
But the sigh was answered by a distant sound, the plod--plod--plodding
of weary feet up the two flights of uncarpeted stairs.
Then there was a grand commotion! The cushionless armchair was dragged
nearer the fire; the old slippers dropped sole uppermost into the
fender. And then Bob and Tom clung with a vice-like embrace each to
an arm of the tall, gaunt, kindly eyed man who had opened the door.
"Father, father! the 'erring's done just lubly. I _am_ glad you're come
at last!" This from Bob.
The father's hard, rough hand rested upon his tangled crop, but his eyes
were looking into Tom's upturned face.
"And Tom, eh?" he asked.
"Jolly glad," answered the child readily.
Then the three sat down to their evening meal.
Would you like to know what it consisted of?
Tea, of a watery description, but _hot_ (Bob took care of that) and
_sweet_--at least, father's cup, owing to Tom's kindly attentions with a
grimy thumb and finger. The herring. This, of course, was the chief
dish. Several tit-bits, trembling upon father's fork, find their way
into the "twinses'" mouths.
Lastly, bread and dripping.
* * * * *
Gull had tried to teach his motherless lads "to do as mother used." So
there followed a systematic cleaning and arranging of the small supply
of crockery.
Tom was the first to find a seat upon father's knee as he sat by the
fire; but Bob soon climbed opposite to him, and together they looked
with expectant eyes into father's face.
And father rubbed his head ruefully as he said, "Eh! I've got to tell
the little lads summat to-night, have I? But there's nothing new been
done, as far as I knows. It's the old dull story, bairnies. The fewest
tips when the weather's the bitterest."
Gull was an outside porter at Waterloo Junction; and a slight lameness,
caused by rheumatism, often cost him dearly. If his step could have
been quicker, it would many times have taken him in the front of the
younger porters, who darted forward and seemed to get all the jobs. The
sixpences came very slowly into his pocket.
To-night he felt more than usually _down_, as he expressed it; and when
he felt Tom's little bare toes slipping for warmth under his strong
brown hand, tears crept into his eyes, and had to be rubbed away with
the back of his sleeve.
Bob was very quick to notice this.
"I say," he cried, "you've been and gone and got something in your eye!"
"Smuts," suggested Tom.
"Oh, let me get them out, father! _Do!_ I'll be ever so gentle." And Bob
suited the action to the word by raising himself on his knees to a level
with Gull's face, and thrusting a screw of his old jacket into the
corner of the suffering eye.
The operation ended in merry laughter, and the boys never knew that the
smuts were really tears forced to the surface by an overburdened heart.
"Father was just _real_ funny," that evening, as Bob whispered to Tom,
when half the blanket covered them, later on--"just _real_ funny, wasn't
he?"