account, but now she took up her spoon, and there was a breathless
silence in the room while she lifted it to her lips. It fell back on
the plate with a rattle and clang, and an agonised glance roamed round
the table from one face to another.
"Oh--oh--oh! How p-p-p-perfectly awful! What can have happened? It
was so nice when I left it! Has anyone"--the voice took a tone of
indignation--"have any of you boys been playing tricks on me?"
"How could we, now, if you think of it? We have been upstairs or in the
drawing-room ever since we came back. It's not the will that's wanting,
but the opportunity!" cried the boys in chorus; but it was not a time
for joking, and Bridgie smote upon the table-gong with a determined
hand.
"Then it must be Sarah's fault. She has done something to it. It is
too bad--I took such pains!" She looked pathetically at the red marks
which still lingered on her fingers from that painful cutting and
scraping, and there was a distinct air of resentment in the voice in
which she questioned her assistant a moment later.
Sarah was a round-faced, vacant-looking damsel of sixteen summers, who
had come straight from an industrial home to serve in the O'Shaughnessy
family. She was scrupulously clean, admirably willing, and so blindly
obedient that in the bosom of the family she was known by the title of
"Casabianca." She understood to a nicety how to dust and sweep, make
beds and turn out a room, but the manners and customs of gentlefolk had
been an unknown science to her before entering her present situation,
and anything that Bridgie chose to do was, in her eyes, a demonstration
of what was right and proper. She adored her young mistress, and
trembled at the new tone of severity in which she was addressed.
"Please, ma'am, I did nothing at it!"
"But something has happened to it, Sarah--that's quite certain. Think
now--think carefully what you have done since I left the kitchen. I am
not angry, only anxious to find out what has gone wrong."
It was really most embarrassing. The three young gentlemen were
watching her with laughing eyes, the pretty young lady in the pink dress
was staring at her plate and twisting her lips to keep from smiling, the
Missis sat up straight in her chair and looked so grave and masterful.
Like Topsy of old, Sarah tried hard to find something to confess, but
failed to recall any delinquencies.
"I took it out of the oven when you said, and put it on a plate. I
brought it into the room--"
"You are quite sure you didn't let anything fall into it by mistake?"
"Please, ma'am, there was nothing to fall. I had tidied the things away
before I touched it. I put the macaroni sticks back in the bag and the
beeswax along of the turpentine for to-morrow's cleaning--all that you
didn't use for the pudding."
"The--the--what?" gasped Bridgie breathlessly.
But the next moment a great burst of laughter all round the table
greeted the solution of the mystery. Pat capered about the floor, Jack
put his elbows on the table and peered at Sylvia with dancing eyes,
Miles undauntedly helped himself to another spoonful, and wagged his
head as who should say that, beeswax or no beeswax, he stuck to his
favourable verdict on the "mixture." Bridgie's soft, gurgling laugh was
full of unaffected enjoyment.
"Did ever I hear the like of that? It was a lump of beeswax, and I
mistook it for cheese! It looked just like it--so smooth, and yellow,
and hard--too hard, maybe--but I was blaming Mary for that, not the
cheese, and thinking myself so good and economical to use it up!
Beeswax and macaroni! Oh--oh--I'll never forget it while I live!"
"It's a very pretty nose you've got, dear, but it's not much use to you,
I'm afraid," said Jack teasingly. "Did it never occur to you one moment
that it was rather highly scented, and the scent a little different from
the ordinary common or garden cheese?" and Bridgie shook her head in
solemn denial.
"Never the ghost of a suspicion! It shows how easily our senses are
deceived when we get a fixed idea in our heads; but indeed you were not
much cleverer yourselves. Every man of you had something to say about
the smell, but not a hint of what it was!"
"I thought it was rather spring-cleaningey," Sylvia said mischievously.
"Never mind, Bridgie dear--it has been a great success. I do feel so
much at home--more so than I should have done after a dozen formal
dinners where everything went right. I shall always remember it too,
and how Mr Miles declared it was nice!"
"Don't call him `Mr,' please! He is only seventeen, though he _is_ the
champion eater of the world. I wonder what exactly is the effect of
beeswax taken internally! You must tell us all about it, Miles, if you
live to the morning!"
"How pleased Pixie will be!" murmured Bridgie reflectively, leaving her
hearers to decide whether she referred to Miles's problematical disease
or the latest culinary disaster, and once again Sylvia admired the happy
faculty of seizing on the humorous side of a misfortune which seemed to
be possessed so universally by the O'Shaughnessy family.
CHAPTER SEVEN.
A HAPPY INSPIRATION.
Mrs Geoffrey Hilliard stood in the long gallery of Knock Castle and
drummed wearily on the window-pane with a white, heavily-ringed hand.
It had rained for a whole week without stopping, and for the happiest
girl in the world, as she proclaimed herself to be at least three times
a day, she came perilously near feeling shedding tears of depression.
Geoffrey was out shooting, and the old Castle seemed full of ghosts--
ghosts of the living, not of the dead--of those dear, gay, loving,
teasing, happy-go-lucky brothers and sisters who had filled the rooms
with echoes of song and laughter. Geoffrey was the dearest of husbands,
but he had one great, insuperable failing--he was not Irish, and one
phase of his wife's character was even yet an inexplicable riddle in his
eyes. Why should she consider it monotonous to have her meals served
regularly at a stated hour; why should she find infinite enjoyment in
arranging a festivity in a rush and scramble, instead of making her
plans with due leisure and decorum; why should she wear the latest Paris
fashions on a day when the thermometer pointed to rain, and walk about
in the sunshine in an ulster and deerstalker?--these, and many similar
questions, were as puzzling to him as the fact that she found it
absolutely impossible to do a thing twice over in the same way, or to
master the very rudiments of method.
Geoffrey inherited the business instincts which had made his fathers
successful above their competitors, and when he had become temporary
owner of Knock, he had striven hard to introduce order and punctuality
into the establishment, with more success in the servants' hall than in
those regions where the mistress reigned supreme.
Esmeralda was a devoted wife, who would have gone through fire and water
to ensure his happiness; she would have shared his poverty with a
smiling face, and have worked her fingers to the bone on his behalf, but
she seemed quite incapable of replacing the match-box on his dressing-
room mantelpiece when she had borrowed it for her own use, or of
refraining from taking his nail-scissors downstairs and then forgetting
where she had put them.
Geoffrey on his part adored his beautiful wife, and would have fought a
dozen dragons on her behalf, but when he groped in the dark for his
matches, and knocked his pet ornaments off the chimney-piece, and barked
his knee against a chair, and tried vainly to get out of the room
through a blank wall--well, he was only a man after all, and he was not
precisely lamb-like in temper.
Some such incident had happened this afternoon when the husband had made
a complaining remark, and the wife had poured oil on the troubled waters
by murmured allusions to people who were not really men, but "finnicky
old maids." Geoffrey had stalked majestically from the room, leaving
Esmeralda to reflect sadly how very unsatisfactory it was to quarrel
when your adversary was dignified and English. With either of her three
brothers such an introduction would have meant an enjoyable and lengthy
wrangle; even "Saint Bridget" could snap on occasion, while Pixie was
capable of screaming, "It is not--it is not!" until her breath failed,
for pure love of contradiction.
Esmeralda yawned, and wondered what in the world she could do to while
away the long afternoon. As the wife of a millionaire, with a
professional cook in the kitchen who tolerated her mistress's incursions
at stated hours only; with a wardrobe full of new clothes, and a French
maid to sew up every hole almost before it made an appearance; with a
gardener who did not like interference, and a patriarchal butler who
said, "Allow me, madam!" if she dared to lift a hand for herself, life
was not really half so amusing as in the dear old days, when she could
make potato cakes for tea, re-trim old dresses, with Bridgie as model,
and sit perched on one of the empty stages in the conservatory, while
Dennis confided his latest love experiences and the gossip of the
countryside.
Esmeralda had longed for riches all her life, and for the most part
found the experience to her taste, but there were occasions when she
felt fettered by the golden chains. When Bridgie wrote of her
experiences in that funny, cramped little house, of her various devices
for making sixpence do duty for a shilling, of excursions about London,
when she rode with the boys on the tops of omnibuses and dined
luxuriously at an ABC, it was not pity, but envy, which filled
Esmeralda's bosom as she drove in state behind coachman and footman to
pay dull, proper calls on the county magnates.
It was cold and dark in the gallery this December afternoon, so she went
downstairs into the room which had been dedicated to lessons, when Miss
Minnitt the governess tried to instil knowledge into half a dozen
ignorant heads. It was now metamorphosed into a luxuriant little
boudoir, with pots of hothouse plants banked on the table, a couch piled
with silken cushions taking the place of the old horsehair sofa, a
charming grate, all glowing copper and soft green tiles, and beside it a
deep arm-chair and a pile of books to while away an idle hour.
Esmeralda yawned and flicked over the pages of the topmost of the pile,
looked at the beginning to see if it promised excitement, peeped at the
last sentence of all to make sure there was no heart-breaking
separation, finally sank down into the chair, and settled herself to
read.
There was something wanting for perfect enjoyment, however, for in the
old days she and Bridgie had agreed that the charms of an interesting
book could only be thoroughly appreciated to an accompaniment of crisp
sweet apples. Esmeralda O'Shaughnessy had been wont to climb up into
the loft and bring down as many rosy baldwins as she could carry in the
crown of her cap; but Mrs Geoffrey Hilliard crept down her own passages
like a thief, listened breathlessly at the pantry door to make sure that
Montgomery was absent, then abstracted an apple from each of the two
pyramids of fruit already prepared for dinner, and flew back to her
room, aghast at her own temerity.
The presence of the apples seemed to bring back other schoolgirl
impulses, for instead of seating herself in dignified, grown-up fashion,
she stretched herself on the rug before the fire, her back supported
against the chair, her head drooping ever nearer and nearer the
cushions, as warmth and quiet wrought their usual work. She slept and
dreamt, and awoke with a start to hear a voice observing, "Tea is
served, madam!" and to see Montgomery the immaculate standing over her
with an unmoved expression, as if, in the many noble families in which
he had served, it was an invariable custom to find his mistress fast
asleep on the floor, with a half-gnawed apple in her hand!
Esmeralda crawled to her feet, trying vainly to look dignified, but she
had no appetite for muffins. She felt like a child who has been found
out, and blushed at the thoughts of her embarrassment that evening when
the fruit pyramid was handed for her selection. Tea did not taste half
so nice out of the Queen Anne silver as when it had been poured from the
old brown pot, which had to be refilled so many times to satisfy
clamorous appetites, and the longing for companionship made her hurry
through the meal, and run upstairs to a wide room overlooking the park.
With the opening of the door came that sweet, flannely, soapy, violet-
powdery smell which is associated with a well-kept nursery, and there on
the rocking-chair sat Mistress Nurse with a bundle of embroidery on her
knee, which purported to be O'Shaughnessy Geoffrey, the heir of the
Hilliards.
"Oh, I'm so glad you have come, ma'am! I did so want you to see him.
He has been so pert this afternoon. I don't know what to do with him,
he is so pert! I never saw such a forward child for his age!"
Esmeralda's face softened to a beautiful tenderness as she turned down
the Shetland shawl and looked at her little son. The pert child had a
fat white face, with vacant eyes, a button of a nose, and an expression
of preternatural solemnity. His head waggled helplessly from side to
side as his nurse held him out at arm's length, and stared fixedly into
space, regardless of his mother's blandishments.
"There now, _isn't_ he pert?" repeated the triumphant nurse. "You know
your mammie, my precious--yes, you do! The cleverest little sing that
was ever seen! He will begin to talk, ma'am, before he is many months
old, I'm sure he will! I was speaking to him just now, and he tried so
hard to copy me. I said `Goo-oo!' and he said `Coo-oo!' Oh, you would
have loved to hear him! He is a prince of babies, he is! A beautiful
darling pet!"
Esmeralda beamed with maternal pride.
"He _is_ clever!" she cried. "Fancy talking at three months old! I
must write and tell Bridgie. And he looks so intelligent, too--doesn't
he, nurse? So wise and serious! He stares at the fire as if he knew
all about it. I believe his hair has grown since yesterday! I do,
indeed!"
"He has beautiful hair--so fine! It's going to curl, too," declared the
optimistic nurse, holding the child's head against the light, when the
faintest of downs could be dimly discerned across the line of the
horizon. "He will smile in a moment if you go on talking to him, ma'am.
Perhaps you would like to sit down and take him for a bit?"
Yes, Esmeralda was only too willing, for it was only by act of grace and
when Mistress Nurse felt inclined for a gossip in the servants' hall
that she was allowed to nurse her own baby. She took the dear little
soft bundle in her arms and rocked gently to and fro, studying the
little face and dreaming mother dreams of the days to come.
If God spared him, the tiny form would grow strong, the vacant face
would become bright and alert with life, the mite of a hand would be
bigger than her own--a man's hand with a man's work as its inheritance.
There was something awful in the thought, and in her own responsibility
towards his future. Esmeralda never felt so serious, so prayerful, so
little satisfied with herself, as when she sat alone with her baby in
her arms. She knew nothing about children--very little, poor girl, of
the wise training of father and mother, but the very consciousness of
her own defects added earnestness to the resolve to bring up this child
to be wise, and strong, and noble--a power for good in the world.
That was her resolve, renewed afresh from day to day, and after the
resolve followed the relentless conviction that the change must be
wrought in herself before she would have power to teach another. It
would need a noble mother to train a noble son, a mother who was
mistress over her own tongue to teach the lessons of self-control; a
mother who had fought her own giants of vanity and self-seeking before
she could hand on the sword. Esmeralda trembled and shrank weakly from
the conflict, but the baby turned its wondering eyes upon her and
straightway she was strong again.
"My son!" she murmured tenderly. "My little son! We shall love one
another. Oh, how we shall love one another--you and I!"
The beautiful dark head bent low over the shapeless little bundle, and
the croon of a cradle song accompanied the regular rocking of the chair.
It was the most peaceful and charming of pictures, and the husband and
father stood noiselessly on the threshold, almost unwilling to speak and
destroy the effect.
All the afternoon he had been regretting his hasty words, and
reproaching himself for want of forbearance towards his impetuous girl-
wife. It was unreasonable to expect the habit of a lifetime to be
outlived in a few short months, and at this season there were especial
reasons for judging her tenderly. Poor darling! She had suffered a
bitter disappointment!
Bridgie and the boys had found it impossible to spend Christmas at
Knock, and although Joan had not confessed as much in words, the
slackness of her preparations showed that she had lost all zest in the
season. She had had a dull time of it since the birth of the boy, and
it was only natural that she should long for her own people, especially
those two dear sisters whose names were so constantly on her lips. If
it were only possible to indulge her--to hit upon some plan by which
Christmas could be made all she could desire!
Geoffrey knitted his brows in thought, then suddenly came the
inspiration, and with it an exclamation of satisfaction which brought
Esmeralda's eyes upon him. She smiled softly, and held up her face to
receive his kiss--such a different face from the one which he had seen
two hours before, with its curling lips and flushed, contemptuous smile!
In its sweetness and subdued tenderness it was a type of the youthful
Madonna, and Geoffrey's own expression softened in sympathy.
"Well, my dearie! Nursing your boy?"
Esmeralda turned back the shawl once more and held up the child for his
father's inspection.
"There! Isn't he splendid? Nurse is quite excited about him this
afternoon. She says it is wonderful how he gets on. He has been so
`pert,' as she calls it, that she hardly knew how to manage him."
"H'm!" The young father regarded the little face with amused,
speculative eyes. "`Pert' does not commend itself to me as precisely
the best word which could be found. Solemn little beggar, I call him!
He seems quite oppressed by the wickedness of the world. I say, that's
rather a peculiar mouth, isn't it? Something funny about the upper
lip!"
"It's exactly like yours--the image of it!" said Esmeralda firmly. "You
can't judge because naturally you can't see yourself. But it really is.
Look at that old picture when you were two years old."
Geoffrey stroked his moustache to one side, and regarded himself
critically in the mirror.
"Oh, well, there's hope for him yet!" he pronounced complacently. "I
suppose babies are all ugly in the beginning, but considering his
parentage he ought to come out all right by and by. How long do you
suppose it will be before he gets his hair, and begins to be
intelligible?"
"He has hair now, and he is beginning to speak. He said `Coo-oo!' this
afternoon quite distinctly. It's horrid of you, Geoff, to call him
ugly! Everyone says he is a beautiful boy and the image of you!"
"Much more chance of being beautiful if he were like you, darling!
Spoke, did he? Well, I take your word for it, but it's rather a stretch
of imagination. He is a jolly little chap, anyway, and I'm very proud
of him. Here is nurse coming to take possession. Hand him over and
come along with me. I have something to tell you."
"Something nice, I hope! I want a distraction," said Esmeralda
wistfully. She slid her hand through her husband's arm as they walked
down the corridor and peered up in his face. "Somebody was rather
vicious this afternoon! I'm sorry you put me in a temper. It's stupid
to quarrel when we are so fond of one another. You'll never do it
again, will you?"
"Never, never! It was all my fault, and I apologise abjectly to your
temper for taking liberties with it. I ought to know by this time that
it's in delicate health. Never mind, I've planned a delightful
programme for you! What would you like best for a Christmas present if
you had the choice?"
He was all radiant with smiles, but Esmeralda sighed, and a far-away
expression came into her beautiful grey eyes.
"I'd like--Oh, what's the use of speaking of it, Geoff? They can't
come, and that's all about it! I haven't thought of any present. I
don't seem to care about anything else."
"Whisper!" cried Geoffrey triumphantly. "Whisper!" He bent his head,
and Esmeralda put her ear to his lips, her face alight with expectation.
"Oh!" she cried rapturously, and again, "Oh!" and "_Oh_" in ever-
ascending tones of delight. "Do you mean it, Geoff--really--really?
It's like a fairy-tale--so perfectly lovely and charming! I shan't
sleep a wink--I know I shan't! Geoffrey, you darling, I do love you for
thinking of it!" and in an ecstasy of delight she threw her arms round
his neck and kissed him rapturously.
"Any letters for the post, madam?" asked an even voice from the end of
the corridor, and the husband wrenched himself free, while the wife
stared after the departing figure with gloomy eyes.
"He saw me kiss you! The only marvel is he didn't offer to do it for
me. The strain of behaving properly before that man will be the death
of me, Geoffrey Hilliard!"
CHAPTER EIGHT.
A SURPRISE VISIT.
The next two days Jack came home early from the city, where a remarkable
cessation of work had happened simultaneously with the arrival of Miss
Sylvia Trevor at Number Three, Rutland Road. Bridgie trotted about the
house preparing for the festival on Thursday, and Sylvia lay idly upon
the couch, with nothing better to do than to listen, sympathise, and
admire.
It was easy to listen, for in truth Jack gave her no opportunity to do
anything else; it was impossible to resist admiring, for he made a
handsome figure, with his broad, muscular shoulders, graceful carriage,
and clean-shaven face; it had seemed at first sight as if sympathy were
not required, but Master Jack invented a fresh crop of imaginary woes
every time that he met a pretty girl, for the express purpose of
receiving consolation. Sylvia beheld in him an exile from home and
country, toiling at an uncongenial task, for the maintenance of his
orphaned brothers and sisters, and was vaguely given to understand that
since meeting her, his poverty had become an even more painful barrier
to his hopes. He confided in her details of business, which she
understood as well as a buried language, and asked her advice on knotty
points in such a flattering manner that she forgot to notice that he
never paused for a reply, and when at last he reluctantly rose to leave
the room he sighed profoundly, and in a voice touched with emotion
declared that she had helped him as he had never before been helped!
"I cannot thank you enough for your sympathy and counsel, but I shall
never forget what you have said to me to-day. It will help me through
many a dark hour!" he declared, and Sylvia blushed and gasped, and lay
back on her cushions, all tremulous with excitement. It was her first
experience of the art of flirtation, and she was pleased and flattered
as it was natural for a girl to be, but she was a sensible little woman,
despite her hasty speeches, and her vanity was not big enough to cloud
either her judgment or a remarkably accurate memory. She carefully
recalled to mind the late conversation, and found that her own share
therein had been limited to monosyllabic assents and denials; an
occasional, "Really!" and three or four exclamations of, "How sad!"
These, then, were the vaunted sympathy and counsel, these the eloquent
words which Mr Jack had vowed to treasure in deathless remembrance, and
which were to strengthen him in hours of trial! Sylvia blushed once
more, from mortification this time, and registered a vow to adopt a new
tone with this disciple of the Blarney stone, and put an end forthwith
to sentimental confidences. She was still looking hot and flurried when
Bridgie came into the room to prepare for tea, and to rest after the
day's labours.