AN ARRIVAL
"What can the dogs be barking at, Elizabeth?" asked Margaret, looking up
from the table-cloth she was examining. "I'm afraid they have got a
squirrel again."
"I thought I heard the sound of wheels, Miss," said the sedate
Elizabeth, who had just entered, her arms full of shining damask. "Just
as I was coming up the stairs, Miss Margaret. I told Polly run and see
who it was, and send 'em away if they was a tramp. It do be mostly
tramps, these days; Frances says she'll poison the next one, Miss, but
she always feeds 'em so as they go off and send all their friends."
At this moment Polly appeared, red-cheeked and breathless. A gentleman
was below, asking for Mr. Montfort, and she couldn't find Mr. Montfort
nowhere in the house; so then he said could he see Miss Margaret?
"Is it any one I know, Polly?" asked Margaret.
"I don't know, Miss Marget; I niver see him. A lame gentleman with a
crutch; he looks just lovely!" added Polly, with effusion.
"Miss Margaret didn't ask you how he looked, Polly!" said Elizabeth,
severely. "You let your tongue run away with you."
"Tell him I will be down directly, Polly," said Margaret.
"Now, Miss Margaret, do you think you'd better?" asked Elizabeth. "If
it's not a tramp--"
"Indeed, and he's no tramp!" broke in Polly, indignantly. "He's a
gentleman, if ever I see one, Miss Margaret; and him in lovely white
clothes and all, just like young Mr. Pennyfeather as was here last
year."
"Polly, will you learn to speak when you are spoken to, and not
interrupt your elders?" demanded Elizabeth. "If he's not a tramp, I was
saying, Miss Margaret, he's likely an agent of some kind, and why
should you be annoyed, with all the linen to go over? He can call again,
most likely."
Elizabeth spoke with some feeling under her grave and restrained words.
The examination of the house-linen was to her mind the most important
event of the week, and already they had been disturbed once by a sudden
incursion of the dogs, bringing a dead squirrel.
"No, Elizabeth," said Margaret, "I must go down. Tell the gentleman I
will be down directly, Polly; show him into the library, please. Dear
Elizabeth, you can finish the table-cloths just as well without me. You
always did it before I came."
"Not at all, Miss," said Elizabeth, with patient resignation; "you'll
find me in the sewing-room, Miss, whenever you are ready for me. It's
best that you should go over the things yourself, and then you will be
satisfied, and no mistakes made."
Margaret nodded, with a little inward sigh over the rigidity of
Elizabeth's ideal of a perfect housekeeper; patted her hair hurriedly to
make sure that it was neat, confirmed the pat by a glance in the
mirror, and went quickly down-stairs.
A tall, slender figure rose, leaning on a stick, as she entered the
library. "What a sad face!" was Margaret's first thought; but, when the
stranger smiled, it changed to "What a beautiful one!"
"Cousin Margaret?" said the young man, inquiringly.
"Yes--I am Margaret," said the girl. "But who--oh! are you--can it be
Peggy's Hugh? It is, I see. Oh, how do you do, Cousin? I am so very,
very glad to see you."
They shook hands cordially, scanning each other with earnest and
friendly eyes.
"I should have known you, of course, from your picture, if not from
Peggy's ardent descriptions," said Hugh Montfort.
"And I ought to have known you, surely," cried Margaret; "only, not
knowing you were in this part of the country, you see--"
"Uncle John did not get my letter? It ought to have reached him some
days ago. I was coming on to Cambridge, and wrote as soon as I started.
No wonder you were surprised, being hailed as cousin by an unheralded
vagabond with a stick."
"Oh, why do you stand?" cried Margaret. "Sit down, Cousin Hugh; to think
of its being really you; I have wanted to see and know you ever
since--oh, for ever so long. Hark! there comes Uncle John now. How
delighted he will be!"
"Margaret, my dear!" called Mr. Montfort from the hall. "I have just had
a letter--most surprising thing--from--hallo! what's all this? Hugh, my
dear fellow, I'm delighted to see you. Got here before your letter, eh?
How did that happen? Never mind, so long as you are here now. Well,
well, well! sit down here, and let me look at you. This is a pleasure
indeed. Your father's eyes; I should know them in a Chinaman; not that
you look like a Chinaman. How are they all at home? How's your father?
When did you leave home? Have you had anything to eat? What would you
like? Margaret, my dear, get Hugh something to eat, he's probably
starved."
Hugh laughingly disclaimed starvation, and begged to wait till their
tea-time. "I am not hungry, truly I am not," he said. "There is so much
to say, too, isn't there, Uncle John? Father is very well and hearty. I
have a pipe for you in my bag. I brought a bag with me; do you suppose
you could put me up for a few days, Uncle?"
Reassured by Mr. Montfort's earnest assurance that he should keep him
all summer, Hugh leaned back in his chair, and looked about him with
eager eyes.
"This is the library!" he said. "Uncle John, ever since I learned to
read, one of my dreams has been to see this room. Father has always told
us about it, and where his favorite books were, and where you all used
to sit when you came here to read."
He rose and, crossing the room, took a book from a shelf without a
moment's hesitation. "Here is the 'Morte d'Arthur,'" he said; "you see I
knew where to find it. And Father used to sit on top of that
stepladder."
"So he did!" cried Mr. Montfort, delighted. "I can see him now, with one
leg curled under him, eating apples and shouting about Lancelot and
Tristram."
"And you sat in the great copper coal-hod--ah! there it is!--and read
Froissart, the great folio with the colored prints. I see it, just in
the place father described."
"Uncle John," said Margaret, reproachfully, "you never told me that you
sat in the coal-scuttle. I know papa's perch, the mantel-piece, because
he could get at the little Shakespeares from there."
Mr. Montfort laughed.
"Leave me some remnant of dignity, Meg," he said. "How can you expect me
to confess that I sat in the coal-scuttle? Have you no reverence for
gray hairs?"
"Oh, a very great deal, dear Uncle; but there were no gray hairs in the
coal-scuttle days; and my only regret about you is the not having known
you when you were a boy."
"Horrid monkey, I have been given to understand," said her uncle,
lightly. "Go on, Hugh; tell us some more of the things that Jim--your
father--remembers. Old Jim! it's a great shame that he never comes to
look up the old place himself."
"It is indeed, sir!" said Hugh. "I've always thought so, and now that I
see the place--oh, I shall send him, that's all, as soon as ever I get
home. There are the Indian clubs; oh, the carved one--is it true that
that was given to Grandfather Montfort by a Fiji chief, or was the Pater
fooling us? He sometimes makes up things, he acknowledges, just for the
fun of it."
"True enough, I believe!" said Mr. Montfort, taking down the great club,
covered from end to end with strange and delicate carving.
"Did he ever tell you how near he came to breaking my head with this
club? He may have forgotten; I have not. We used to keep it in our room,
the great nursery up-stairs, Margaret; you must show that to Hugh by and
by. I woke up one night, and was afraid the crow that I was taming in
the back garden might be hungry. I got out of the window and shinned
down the spout. The crow was all right; but when I came back, Jim woke
up, and took me for a burglar, and went for me with the club, thinking
it the chance of his life. I was only half-way through the bars when he
caught me a crack--I can hear my skull rattle with it now."
"Oh, Uncle John! and you held on?"
"My dear, I held on; it would have been rather unfortunate for me to let
go at the moment. I sung out, of course; and when I got through I fell
upon my friend James, and Roger had to wake up and come and drag us from
under the bed before he could separate us. Sweet boys! do you and your
brothers indulge in these little endearments, Hugh? Jim was a glorious
fighter."
Hugh laughed. "Jim and George used to have pretty lively scraps
sometimes," he said. "It wasn't so much in my line, but I took it out in
airs, I fancy. The poor fellows couldn't punch my head, and it must have
been hard lines for them sometimes. As for Max and Peter, they are
twins, you know. I doubt if either of them knows exactly which is
himself and which is the other, so they don't have real scraps, just
puppy-play, rolling over and over and pounding each other."
"Oh, what good times they would have with Basil and Susan D.!" cried
Margaret. "What a pity they cannot know one another, all these dear
boys!"
"So it is! so it is!" said Mr. Montfort, heartily. "We must bring it
about, one of these days; we must surely bring it about. Fond of dogs,
Hugh? I've got a pair of nice puppies here; like to go and see them
before tea, or shall Margaret show you your room?"
Hugh elected in favor of the puppies, and uncle and nephew walked off
together, well content. Margaret looked after them, thinking what a
noble pair they made. Hugh walked lame, to be sure, yet not
ungracefully, she thought; and though slender, still his shoulders were
square and manly.
Then her thoughts turned to matters of practical hospitality, and she
sped to the kitchen, to tell the good news to Frances.
"Oh, Frances, Mr. Hugh has come, my Uncle Jim's son; Miss Peggy's
brother, Frances! He has come all the way from Ohio, and I want you to
give him the very best supper that ever was, please!"
Now Frances had that moment discovered that her best porcelain saucepan
was cracked; she therefore answered with some asperity. "Indeed, then,
Miss Margaret, what is good enough for Mr. Montfort must be good enough
for his nephew or any other young gentleman. My supper is all planned,
and I can't be fashed with new things at this time of day."
"Now, Frances, don't be cross, that's a dear! I want you to see Mr.
Hugh. Look, there he is this minute, crossing the green with Uncle
John."
Frances looked; looked again, long and earnestly; then straightway she
fell into a great bustle. "Dear me, Miss Margaret, run away now, that's
a good young lady. How can I be doing, and you all about the kitchen
like a ball of string? He's lame, the beautiful young gentleman; you
never told me he was lame. I did think as how we might be doing with the
cold fowl, and French fried potatoes and muffins, but that's nothing to
show the heart. Run away now, Miss, and if you was going up-stairs, be
so good as send me Polly. She's idling her time away, I'll be bound, and
not a soul to help me with my salad and croquettes. Dear! dear! I be
pestered out of my life, mostly."
"Don't kill us, Frances!" cried Margaret, as she ran away, laughing. "I
really think the cold fowl will be quite enough."
Frances deigned no reply; and Margaret hastened up-stairs, to tell the
good news to Elizabeth. Elizabeth was in the sewing-room, waiting, with
plaintive dignity, till Margaret should please to go over the rest of
the table-cloths; but at the tidings of the advent of a dear and honored
guest, she dropped thimble and scissors, and rose hastily, declaring
that the Blue Room must be cleaned instantly, and put in order for Mr.
Montfort's nephew.
"But you swept it yesterday, Elizabeth, and I dusted all the ornaments
myself, and put them back in place. It only needs a few fresh flowers, I
am sure," said Margaret.
Elizabeth turned on her a face of affectionate reproach. "Miss Margaret,
you don't mean that. Mr. Montfort's own nephew, and the room not touched
to-day! I'll go this minute and see to it. But if you would pick out the
towels you think he would like best, Miss, please; gentlemen do be that
fussy about towels, as there's no pleasing some of them, though being
Mr. Montfort's nephew, likely he'll be different. Give him the finest
huckaback, and Mr. Montfort is easy satisfied, so long as there's no
fringes. He never could abide fringe to his towels, and there's no
person with sense as wouldn't agree with him. And if you would see to
the bureau-scarf and the flowers, Miss Margaret--there! she's gone, and
not a word about what table-napkins I am to use! I like to see them
young, so I do, but they're terrible heedless. I expect I'd best put the
finest out, for Mr. Montfort's nephew."