"There's isn't many broken, but I'd like to give some of the others too.
Mumsey won't mind--and pr'aps, you know, I can't send many more, for
these'll have to last me, and I'll get fonder and fonder of them. So I
think I'd better send a good lot now--don't you think so too, Lelly?"
His hands strayed lovingly over his beloved horses and dogs, squirrels
and rabbits, each one of which was known to him individually.
"It's my aminals I care most for," he said. "I want to divide them
quick, Lelly, for fear I get greedy and want to keep them all."
"You can't do that, any way," said Chrissie, who had joined the group.
"You won't have room in the new house. I daresay there'll be no nursery
at all. Look here, Japs, Nurse can give us one of the clothes-baskets,
and we'll put all for the hospital in it for Mums to look over, and then
you can pack quite comf'ably for yourself," and with the quickness and
good sense she had plenty of when she chose to use them, she helped the
little fellow in his rather painful task. And once the division was
made, and the old favourites out of sight, Jasper grew more cheerful
again, as he murmured to himself, "I daresay they'll be quite happy with
the ill children. They have such nice little white beds."
How proud Chrissie felt of herself! It was just to be regretted that
Nurse could not help saying--
"Dear me, what a pity you can't always be so kind and helping, Miss
Chrissie," for immediately came the toss of the haughty little head and
the pert reply--
"I shall do as I choose _always_, Nurse. You might know that, by this
time, I should think."
"Your father writes that he is coming home to-morrow," said Mrs
Fortescue, the next day. "I am so glad to be feeling better and
stronger than when I first got back, for now house-hunting will start in
good earnest. The agents have several chances of letting this, I hear,
and we must not lose any."
"How horrible it is," exclaimed Christabel, and though Leila did not
speak, her face grew very gloomy. Their mother glanced at them with
disappointment.
"Dears," she said, "I hoped you were going to be so brave and help me to
meet Daddy cheerfully."
"Really, Mummy," said Chrissie, "I don't see why you should scold us
before we've done anything naughty."
"_Scold_ you," repeated their mother. "I don't think you have the least
idea of what the word means, my poor little girl," and she could not
help smiling a little.
"Well," persisted the child, "you can't expect us to _like_ going to
live in some horrible poky place."
Mrs Fortescue thought it best not to answer. She knew too well what
Chrissie could be, once a "contrary" fit was on her.
"Is Aunt Margaret coming too?" asked Leila.
Her mother shook her head.
"Not yet," she said. "Poor Aunt Margaret has to stay to see the last of
things at Fareham. I don't want her to come till we are at least a
little settled. Children," she went on, rousing herself to a new
appeal, "my darlings, I know it is hard for you, and it is still harder
for your father and me, _because_ we feel it for all of you; but it is
hardest of all for Aunt Margaret to have to leave the place where she
has spent all her life, where she loves every tree and bush as if they
were living things; never to have the joy of welcoming us all there, and
arranging our rooms for us, and making us so happy. `The delight of her
life,' she called our visits the other day. It is _awfully_ hard on
her. Uncle Percy's death would have been a sad blow at any time, but
the way it came made it ten times sadder. And she is an old woman now,
though a good deal younger than he was. Yet I cannot tell you how
unselfish she is--how determined to see the bright side of things, how
thankful for the blessings we still have."
The children did not speak. Their mother's words could not but impress
them.
Then said Chrissie, still with a touch of defiance--"I know she's
awfully good, Mumsey, and we do love her, but you see I don't _pretend_
to be good and unselfish and all that. Pr'aps when I get to be old,
it'll come somehow."
Mrs Fortescue smiled a little.
"I don't want you to `pretend,' Chrissie, most certainly not. I want
you to _be_. And the longer you put off trying, the harder you will
find it. Goodness does not come all of itself like one's hair getting
grey. And though it may sometimes seem as if God left us to ourselves,
it is not really so. Sorrows and trials may have to be our teachers if
we allow happiness and prosperity to make us selfish and thoughtless."
"Well," said Leila gloomily, "perhaps they're beginning now--it doesn't
look as if there was much to be cheerful about;" and, as often happened,
Christabel turned upon her sister, though Leila was only expressing her
own discontent in different words.
"I call _that_ selfish, if you like," she said. "Mumsey has enough to
be worried about without your grumbling."
"Hush, Chrissie," said their mother, rather wearily. "I think you
_will_ both try to help your father and me, but I cannot say any more.
I have a great many letters to write, and Miss Earle has kindly offered
to stay later to do some for me. I do want to get them done before
to-morrow when Daddy comes. So run off now, dears."
All the children loved their father, though perhaps in a different way
from their sweet mother. But he was a very busy man, much engaged in
public matters, and till now he had seen but little of them,
comparatively speaking, especially of his daughters. But for this,
possibly their faults, so greatly owing to over-indulgence and
over-gentleness, would not have been allowed to have taken such root.
And just at first, on his return home, Mr Fortescue was pleased with
them all, Roland, of course, in particular, for the boy showed great
good feeling and consideration for his parents.
"And Leila and Chrissie, too," said their father, when speaking about
them to their mother, "they seem rather subdued, naturally enough, but
they will be plucky and sensible and do all they can to help us, I
hope."
"Yes, I hope so," she agreed, and Mr Fortescue was too busy about other
things to notice the want of confidence and cheerfulness in her tone.
Then followed a week or two of extreme "busyness" for the children's
parents. Strange men were constantly coming to the house, with
note-books, in which they made long lists of the furniture, and
pictures, and ornaments--what were to be sold and what to be kept.
House agents, too, and several times, parties of ladies and gentlemen to
be shown over all the rooms--some of whom were already friends or
acquaintances of the Fortescues, some complete strangers.
It was all very queer, but there was a certain kind of excitement about
it, though once or twice Chrissie grew red and angry at hearing some
murmured expressions of pity, such as--"Poor people, _isn't_ it sad for
them?" or, "I do feel so for them all."
"Impertinent things," muttered the child, though fortunately in a
whisper.
Then at last came the day on which their mother with a little touch of
relief in her voice, told them that the new house was chosen and decided
upon.
"We shall move into it in about a fortnight," she said, "and it will not
be so very difficult to manage. A great deal of the furniture has been
bought by the people who have taken this house, and as they are not
coming in here for a month or more, we can send off all that we shall
require at Spenser Terrace next week, and have it fairly in order before
we go ourselves."
"Spenser Terrace," repeated Leila, "I never heard of it. Where is it,
Mummy?"
"Some way out, of course," was the reply. "Still, not in the suburbs,
which I am glad of. It will be easier in many ways, especially for
Daddy and Roland coming and going. Daddy has got a post, my dears--
nothing very much, but we are very thankful. We shall _just_ be able to
get on with great care, for Aunt Margaret insists on joining the little
income left to her, to ours. And I hope and think we can manage Roley's
school," she added as she hurried off.
"Of course," said Christabel, when she and Leila were alone, "of course
Roland is the one they care about. You and I are to be educated anyhow
or nohow, I suppose, so long as he goes to Winton. Why, we shan't even
be able to be governesses!"
"What's the good of your saying those horrid things to me," replied
Leila, almost in tears. "You'd better say them to Dads."
To this there was no response. Even Chrissie's audacity would have
failed her at such an idea.
Notwithstanding their mother's continued cheerfulness, and Nurse's
assurances that they were not going to live in so poor a place as
Jasper's "quite nice and clean" row of houses, the imaginations of both
little girls had been running riot, almost without their knowing it, on
the subject of their new home, and on the whole they were rather
pleasantly surprised when the day came for the move to it.
It was, of course, at a considerable distance from the first-rate part
of the West End where they had hitherto lived, and as the rumbling
four-wheeler made its slow way along, it seemed to Chrissie, with the
boxes outside and packages inside, as if all that had happened in the
last few weeks must be a dream, and that they were on their way to
King's Cross Station, to travel down for one of their happy visits to
Fareham!
"Doesn't it seem just like that?" she said to the others. "You know
we've often gone with Nurse and Jap in a four-wheeler, when Daddy and
Mummy were in the carriage."
Leila gave a little shiver.
"_Don't_, Chrissie," she exclaimed. "It only makes things worse
thinking of it all like that."
Jasper slipped his hand into hers.
"Pr'aps we'll be very happy in the new house," he said. "_I'd_ not mind
if only Nursie was going to stay."
For, alas! Nurse was only to be a few days longer with them--"just to
see you a little bit settled," she had pleaded with Mrs Fortescue. Her
remaining permanently would have been impossible in the changed
circumstances of the family, and as she was looking forward to being
married in two or three years, it was of importance for her to save what
she could of her wages. But she had done all in her power to help; it
was a cousin of hers who was one of the two servants which were all Mrs
Fortescue could afford to have, and she had privately begged this girl
to be very patient with the young ladies if they were sometimes
troublesome and thoughtless.
"It will all be such a change for them, you see," she explained, and
Harriet, who was good-natured and willing, delighted to come to London,
and not troubled with nerves, promised to do her very best.
Hers was the face which met them as the cab at last drew up at one of a
row of houses in a quiet, rather dull, but by no means "slummy"
side-street.
"It isn't so very bad," said Chrissie, "and that new servant looks
rather nice. I suppose she'll be instead of Fanny."
"Of course not," said Leila, "there'll be no Fanny and no Nurse and no
anybody except a cook and housemaid. You certainly will have to put on
your own shoes and stockings _now_!"
And Chrissie's face, which had brightened a little, clouded over again.
But it was not in human nature, above all not in child, even
spoilt-child nature, not to try to smile and look pleased, when at the
open door of the little drawing-room the sisters caught sight of their
mother, and heard Jasper's joyful cry, "Oh Mumsey, what a sweet little
room."
"Come in, darlings. I've been longing so for you," she exclaimed, "and
tea is all ready in the dining-room. Nurse, you must have it with us.
Daddy, darlings, won't be back till seven, but Roley is here." It _was_
a pretty little room. Mrs Fortescue had wisely kept only such
furniture as was really suitable, especially as to size, so there was no
look of crowding or "not-at-home-ness" about it. And as the whole house
had been freshly painted and papered, there was nothing dark or dingy.
"If I could fancy it was a little house we had got for a few weeks at
the seaside somewhere, I'd think it was quite nice," thought Christabel.
"I wonder how many rooms there are. We really need one each if we're
not to be always knocking against each other!"