Evening had come again to Dreams, but Ann, instead of being found at
her writing-table, was stretched flat in the largest and softest of the
many comfortable chairs the room contained, with the Tatler, a great,
furry, sleepy mass, curled in her arms.
"Dear me, Ann!" Mrs. Douglas said, looking up from her "reading." "You
seem very exhausted. Aren't you going to write to-night?"
Ann looked through half-closed eyes at her mother.
"Can't," she said lazily; "too dog-tired. A tea-party in the Green
Glen is too much for me. After such unwonted excitement I must sit all
evening with my hands before me. Mother, did we ever really entertain
people day after day--relays of them? I can't believe to-night that we
ever presided at meetings, and read papers, and gave away prizes, and
organised sales of work and cookery classes for the masses, and visited
the sick, and talked for ever and did not faint--such feeble folk as we
have become."
Mrs. Douglas sighed as she laid down _Hours of Silence_. "I was of
some use in the world then," she said, "not a mere cumberer of the
ground."
Ann sat up and laughed at her mother. "I'm not going to rise to that
fly, Motherkin. You remind me of the Glasgow woman we met in
Switzerland, who was suffering from some nervous trouble, and who said,
'I would give a thousand pounds to be the Mistress Finlay I once was.'
Perhaps you are not quite the Mistress Douglas you once were, but I can
see very little difference."
Mrs. Douglas sighed again, and shook her head. "Oh--sic a
worrit-lookin' wumman!" Ann quoted. Then, "I must say I enjoyed the
tea-party. Mother, don't you like Mr. Sharp? I do. You needn't have
rubbed it in about sermons being no use if they are read. He sat with
such a guilty look like a scolded dog. I like his painstaking sermons
and his sincere, difficult little prayers. He will never make a
preacher, but he is a righteous man. Miss Ellen Scott cheered him by
saying read sermons were generally more thoughtful. I do wish we could
see the Scotts oftener. They have promised to come to luncheon one
day, and go thoroughly into the garden question. They go south, they
told me, in the early spring, so that the servants may get the
house-cleaning done, and they weary all the time to get back. I wonder
if they carry about them in London that sort of fragrance of the open
air."
"They are nice women," said Mrs. Douglas, "and good, but they aren't my
kind of people. We don't care about the same things. But Mr. Sharp
makes me feel young again; he has the very atmosphere of a manse about
him."
"The atmosphere of Mr. Sharp's Manse is chiefly paraffin oil," said Ann.
At that moment Marget came into the room, ostensibly to remind Ann of
something needed at the village shop the next day, but really to talk
over the tea-party.
"I think the minister enjoyed his tea," she remarked, "for there was an
awfu' wheen scones eaten."
"He did, indeed, Marget," her mistress assured her. "He said he didn't
know when he had tasted such good scones. He was asking me what I
thought about him entertaining the office-bearers. He would like to,
but his housekeeper is delicate and afraid of work; and he's afraid to
suggest anything in case she departs."
"Tets!" said Marget. "That wumman fair angers me. She's neither sick
nor sair, an' she's no' that auld aither, but she keeps that puir
laddie in misery a' the time in case she's gaun to break doon. She
never bakes him a scone, juist loaf breed a' the time, an' she'll no'
bother to mak' him a bit steamed pudden' or a tert, juist aye a
milk-thing, an' a gey watery milk-thing at that. She boasts that he
carries trays for her and breaks sticks--the wumman should be ashamed
to let the minister demean himsel'. If he wants to gie an Elders'
Supper, what's to hinder me and Mysie to gang doon and gie a hand?'
"Why, Marget," Ann cried, "I haven't heard that expression since I was
a child. It was at Kirkcaple we had Elders' Suppers, wasn't it,
Mother--never in Glasgow?'
"Only in Kirkcaple. They were held after the November Communions to
purge the roll."
"_Purge the roll_," Ann murmured to herself; "of all delicious phrases!"
"If ye'll excuse me, Mem," said Marget, "I'll tak' a seat for a meenit.
Mysie has just gone doon the road a step or two wi' the lassie Ritchie
frae the cottages."
She seated herself primly on a chair and said:
"I think ye should pit in yer _Life_ about the Elders' Suppers."
Ann nodded. "I think so, Marget. I can just recall them vaguely. We
were all in bed before the elders actually came, but I remember the
preparation, and how deeply I envied you and Ellie Robbie staying up,
little dreaming, poor babe, how in after years I would envy the
children who get away to bed before the party begins."
"They were terrifying occasions to me," said her mother. "Elders in
the mass are difficult to cope with. When they arrived they were shown
into the study, and when the business part of the proceedings was over
they trooped into the dining-room for supper. To keep the ball of
conversation going, to compel them to talk and save the party from
being a dismal failure was my job, and it was no light task. They were
the best of men, our Kirkcaple elders, but they let every subject drop
like a hot potato. It was from occasions like that I learned to talk
'even on,' as they say. I simply dared not let a silence fall, for,
from bitter experience, I knew that if I did and caught your father's
eye we would be sure to laugh and bring disgrace on ourselves."
"Don't I know?" said her daughter. "Will you ever forget that night in
Glasgow, when we invited your class to an evening party, and they all
arrived in a body and in dead silence seated themselves round the room,
and none of us could think of a single word to say, and in an agony we
sat, becoming every moment more petrified, and my tongue got so stiff I
felt that if I spoke it would break off, and Father suddenly broke the
awful silence with 'Quite so,' delivered in a high, meaningless voice,
and we simply fell on each other helpless with laughter?"
Mrs. Douglas laughed at the recollection. "Once you let a silence
fall," she said, "it's hopeless. Nothing seems important enough to
break it with.... To go back to the Elders' Suppers--we always had the
same menu. Hot roast beef, hot beef-steak pie, with vegetables, then
plum-pudding and apple-tart, and coffee. The oldest elder, Charles
Mitchell was his name, sat on my right hand, and the next eldest, Henry
Petrie, sat on my left. Charles Mitchell was so deaf that any attempts
to converse were thrown away on him. Henry Petrie was a man of most
melancholy countenance, and absolutely devoid of light table-talk. He
was sad, and said nothing, and might as well have been a post. One
night, having tried him on every subject with no success, I watched him
being helped to vegetables, and said, in desperation, 'Potatoes are
good this year, don't you think?' He turned on me his mournful eyes,
his knife suspended on its way to his mouth, and said, 'They'll no'
stand a boil.'"
"D'ye mind," said Marget, "thon awfu' nicht when the pie cowpit on the
gravel? We were gettin' it covered at Wilson's the baker's, for they
made uncommon guid pastry, an' it didna come till the verra last
meenit. I was oot lookin' for the laddie at the gate, an' when he came
I took it frae him in a hurry, an', eh, mercy! if the whole hypothic
didna slidder oot o' ma hand on to the grund. I let oot a yell an'
Ellie came runnin' oot, and syne she brocht a lamp, an' we fund that
the pastry wasna muckle the waur, but the meat an' the gravy was a'
amang the gravel. What could we do but juist scoop up wi' a spoon what
we could get--meat, chuckie-stanes an' a'--an' into the hoose wi' it.
I can tell ye I handit roond the plates gey feared that nicht. I tried
ma best to get them to choose the guid clean roast beef, but there was
nae takkers. Juist pie, pie, pie, one after another until I was fair
provokit. Every meenit I expectit to hear their teeth gang crunch on a
stane. I can tell ye I was glad when I got their plates whuppit awa'
frae them, an' the puddens plankit doon. It was a guid thing
appendicitis wasna invented then, or they wad a' ha' been lying wi' it,
for an orange pip's a fule to a chuckie-stane."
"Ay, Marget," said her mistress, "we had many a fright. As old Mrs.
Melville used to say, 'Folk gets awfu' frichts in this warld.' Well,
well!" Mrs. Douglas sighed as was her way. "We had many a successful
party, too."
"Folk," said Marget complacently, "likit fine to come to oor hoose.
They aye got a graund feed an' a guid lauch forbye. The maister wasna
mebbe verra divertin' in company, being naitral quiet, but you were a
great hand at the crackin', Mem."
Mrs. Douglas modestly waved away the compliment, while Ann said, "You
must have had some very smart suppers, for I have a distinct
recollection of eating ratafia biscuits and spun sugar from a trifle
one morning after a party."
"The trifle evenings were few and far between," said her mother; "but
we had many a cosy little party among our neighbours."
Marget again broke in. "No' to mention a' the folk that juist drappit
in. Oor hoose was a fair thro-gate for folk. A' the ministers that
lived a bit away kent whaur to come to in Kirkcaple for their tea.
Ye'll mind, Mem, that Mr. and Mrs. Dewar were never muckle away. When
Mr. Dewar walkit in frae Buckie and fund naebody in, he wad say to me,
'I'll be back for my tea, Marget. Isn't this baking-day?'" (Marget
adopted a loud, affected tone when imitating anyone; this she called
"speaking proper.") "Then Mistress Dewar wad come hoppin' in--'deed
she was often in afore I got to the door, for I wad mebbe be dressin'
when the bell rang. I wad hae to put on my wrapper again, an' there
she wad be sittin' on a chair in the lobby, knittin' awa' like mad.
'Always busy, you see, Marget,' she would say; 'I belong to the
save-the-moment society.' Then she wad gie that little lauch o' hers.
Sic a wee bit o' a thing she wis, mair like a bairn than a mairret
wumman."
"Once," said Ann, "I went somewhere to spend a day with Mrs. Dewar, and
coming home we had to wait awhile for a train. Mrs. Dewar, of course,
was knitting, and as the light was bad in the waiting-room she calmly
climbed up on the table and stood, picking up a stitch, as near to the
gas-jet as she could get. She made the oddest spectacle with her
bonnet a little on one side, as it always was, her little blunt face
and childish figure. And to make matters worse she sang as she knitted:
'Did you ever put a penny in a missionary box?
A penny that you might have gone and spent like other folks?'
It was torture to a self-conscious child to hear the giggles of the few
spectators of the scene."
Mrs. Douglas laughed softly as if remembering something precious.
"Little Mrs. Dewar cared who laughed at her. That was what made her so
unusual and so refreshing. The queer, dear, wee body! There was no
one I liked so much to come to the house. She was so companionable and
so unfussy. If she could only stay ten minutes she was calm and
settled for that ten minutes, and then went. I have seen people who
meant to stay for hours keep me restless and unhappy all the time by
their fluttered look. Whenever I got tired of my house, or my work, or
myself, I went to Buckie to Mrs. Dewar. They had a delightful old
manse, with a charming garden behind, but in front it faced a blank
wall. Someone condoled with Mrs. Dewar on the lack of view. 'Tuts,'
she said, 'we've never time to look at a view.''
"Like old Mary Hart at Etterick, when a visitor said to her, 'What a
lovely view you have!' 'An' what aboot it?' was the disconcerting
answer. I remember the Dewars' manse, Mother. I once stayed there for
a week. What a pity Mrs. Dewar had no children of her own! She was a
wonder with children. I was only a tiny child, but she taught me so
much, and interested me in so many different things and people. After
breakfast I had to help her to 'classify' the dishes; put all the
spoons together, and wipe the knives with soft paper and make them all
ready to be washed. Then we saw that the salts and mustards were tidy,
and the butter and jam in dainty dishes. Then we would take a bundle
of American papers to a woman who had a son in the United States, and
on our way home she would take me down to the shore and point out the
exact spot on the rocks where she had once found a beautiful coral
comb, and where the next day she had found a mermaid sitting crying for
the loss of it. It was a long story, but I know it finished with the
grateful mermaid giving a large donation to the Sustentation Fund!
Mrs. Dewar had an extraordinary number of relations, who all seemed to
be generals and admirals, and things like that, and the tales of the
Indian nephews who had come to her as babies were enthralling to me.
They were grown up by that time, and, I suppose, on their way to become
generals, too. There was always something rather military about Mrs.
Dewar's small, alert figure. 'Mustard to mutton,' she would say to me
at dinner; 'child, you would be expelled from the mess.' She was
really too funny. When Mr. Dewar would say, 'My dear, have you seen my
spectacles?' she would reply, 'Seek and ye shall find, not speak and ye
shall find.' And if the servants worried her she walked about saying
the hymn beginning, 'Calm me, O God, and keep me calm.'"
"I likit Mrs. Dewar," said Marget; "she had queer ways, but she was a
leddy. She was yin o' the Keiths o' Rathnay--rale gentry. Eh, Mem,
d'ye mind the black that was preachin' for Maister Dewar, an' they
couldna keep him in the hoose, for there was illness, and he cam' to
us? Eh, I say!"
"Poor man! I remember your face, Marget, when I met you on the stairs
the morning he left. You were holding some towels away from you and
you said, 'I'm no verra sure aboot that black's towels.'"
"Neither I wis," said Marget; "I'm aye feared the black comes off."