THE HOME FOR TIRED PEOPLE
“To begin with,” said Jim—“what’s the place like?”
“Eighty acres, with improvements,” answered his father. “And three
farms—all let.”
“Daddy, you’re like an auctioneer’s advertisement,” Norah protested.
“Tell us what it is _like_—the house, I mean.”
“We’ll run down and see it soon,” said Mr. Linton. “Meanwhile, the
lawyers tell me it’s a good house, Queen Anne style——”
“What’s that?” queried Jim.
“Oh, gables and things,” said Wally airily. “Go on, sir, please.”
“Standing in well-timbered park lands,” said Mr. Linton, fishing a
paper out of his pocket, and reading from it. “Sorry, Norah, but I
can’t remember all these thrills without the lawyers’ letter. Lounge
hall, four reception rooms——”
“Who are you going to receive, Nor?”
“Be quiet,” said Norah, aiming a cushion at the offender. “Not you, if
you’re not extra polite!”
“Be quiet, all of you, or I will discontinue this penny reading,” said
Mr. Linton severely. “Billiard-room, thirteen bedrooms, three baths (h.
and c.)——”
“Hydraulic and condensed,” murmured Wally. Jim sat upon him with silent
firmness, and the reading was unchecked.
“Excellent domestic offices, modern drainage, central heating, electric
plant, Company’s water——”
“What on earth——?” said Jim.
“I really don’t know,” said his father. “But I suppose it means you can
turn taps without fear of a drought, or they wouldn’t put it. Grounds
including shady old-world gardens, walled kitchen garden, stone-flagged
terrace, lily pond, excellent pasture. Squash racquet court.”
“What’s that?” asked Norah.
“You play it with pumpkins,” came, muffled, from beneath Jim. “Let me
up, Jimmy—I’ll be good.”
“That’ll be something unusual,” said Jim, rising. “Yes, Dad?”
“Stabling, heated garage, thatched cottage. Fine timber. Two of the
farms let on long leases; one lease expires with lease of house. All in
excellent order. I think that’s about all. So there you are, Norah. And
what are you going to do with it?”
It was the next morning, and the treacherous September sunshine had
vanished, giving place to a cold, wet drizzle, which blurred the
windows of the Lintons’ flat in South Kensington. Looking down, nothing
was to be seen but a few mackintoshed pedestrians, splashing dismally
along the wet, grey street. Across the road the trees in a little,
fenced square were already getting shabby, and a few leaves fluttered
idly down. The brief, gay English summer had gone; already the grey
heralds of the sky sounded the approach of winter, long and cold and
gloomy.
“I’ve been thinking terribly hard,” Norah said. “I don’t think I ever
lay awake so long in my life. But I can’t make up my mind. Of course it
must be some way of helping the War. But how? We couldn’t make it a
hospital, could we?”
“I think not,” said her father. “The hospital idea occurred to me, but
I don’t think it would do. You see you’d need nurses and a big staff,
and doctors; and already that kind of thing is organized. People well
established might do it, but not lone Australians like you and me,
Norah.”
“How about a convalescent home?”
“Well, the same thing applies, in a less degree. I believe, too, that
they are all under Government supervision, and I must admit I’ve no
hankering after that. We wouldn’t be able to call our souls our own;
and we’d be perpetually irritated by Government under-strappers,
interfering with us and giving orders—no, I don’t think we could stand
it. You and I have always run our own show, haven’t we, Norah—that is,
until Jim came back to boss us!” He smiled at his tall son.
There was a pause.
“Well, Dad—you always have ideas,” said Norah, in the voice of one who
waits patiently.
Mr. Linton hesitated.
“I don’t know that I have anything very brilliant now,” he said. “But I
was thinking—do you remember Garrett, the fellow you boys used to tell
us about? who never cared to get leave because he hadn’t any home.”
“Rather!” said the boys. “Fellow from Jamaica.”
“He was an awfully sociable chap,” Wally added, “and he didn’t like
cities. So London bored him stiff when he was alone. He said the
trenches were much more homelike.”
“Well, there must be plenty of people like that,” said Mr. Linton.
“Especially, of course, among the Australians. Fellows to whom leave
can’t mean what it should, for want of a home: and without any ties
it’s easy for them to get into all sorts of mischief. And they should
get all they can out of leave, for the sake of the War, if for nothing
else: they need a thorough mental re-fitting, to go back fresh and
keen, so that they can give the very best of themselves when the work
begins again.”
“So you think of making Sir John’s place into a Home for Tired people?”
said Norah, excitedly. “Dad, it’s a lovely plan!”
“What do you think, Jim?” asked Mr. Linton.
“Yes, I think it’s a great idea,” Jim said slowly. “Even the little bit
of France we had showed us what I told you—that you’ve got to give your
mind a spring-cleaning whenever you can, if you want to keep fit. I
suppose if people are a bit older they can stick it better—some of
them, at least. But when you’re in the line for any time, you sometimes
feel you’ve just _got_ to forget things—smells and pain, and—things you
see.”
“Well, you’d forget pretty soon at a place like the one you’ve been
reading about,” said Wally. “Do you remember, Jim, how old poor old
Garrett used to look? He was always cheery and ragging, and all that
sort of thing, but often he used to look like his own grandfather, and
his eyes gave you the creeps. And he couldn’t sleep.”
“’M!” said Jim. “I remember. If Garrett’s still going, will you have
him for your first patient, Nor? What will you call them, by the
way—guests? patients? cases?”
“Inmates,” grinned Wally.
“Sounds like a lunatic asylum,” rejoined Jim. “How about lodgers? Or
patrons?”
“They’ll be neither, donkey,” said Norah pleasantly. “Just Tired
People, I think. Oh, Dad, I want to begin!”
“You shouldn’t call your superiors names, especially when I have more
ideas coming to me,” said Jim severely. “Look here—I agree with Dad
that you couldn’t have a convalescent home, where you’d need nurses and
doctors; but I do think you might ask fellows on final sick-leave, like
us—who’d been discharged from hospitals, but were not quite fit yet.
Chaps not really needing nursing, but not up to much travelling, or to
the racket and fuss of an hotel.”
“Yes,” said Wally. “Or chaps who had lost a limb, and were trying to
plan out how they were going to do without it.” His young face looked
suddenly grave; Norah remembered a saying of his once before—“I don’t
in the least mind getting killed, but I don’t want Fritz to wing me.”
She moved a little nearer to him.
“That’s a grand idea—yours too, Jimmy,” she said. “Dad, do you think
Sir John would be satisfied?”
“If we can carry out our plan as we hope, I think he would,” Mr. Linton
said. “We’ll find difficulties, of course, and make mistakes, but we’ll
do our best, Norah. And if we can send back to the Front cheery men,
rested and refreshed and keen—well, I think we’ll be doing our bit. And
after the War? What then?”
“I was thinking about that, too,” said Norah. “And I got a clearer
notion than about using it now, I think. Of course,”—she hesitated—“I
don’t know much about money matters, or if you think I ought to keep
the place. You see, you always seem to have enough to give us
everything we want, Dad. I won’t need to keep it, will I? I don’t want
to, even if I haven’t got much money.”
“I’m not a millionaire,” said David Linton, laughing. “But—no, you
won’t need an English income, Norah.”
“I’m so glad,” said Norah. “Then when we go back to Billabong, Dad,
couldn’t we turn it all into a place for partly-disabled
soldiers,—where they could work a bit, just as much as they were able
to, but they’d be sure of a home and wouldn’t have any anxiety. I don’t
know if it could be made self—self—you know—earning its own living——”
“Self-supporting,” assisted her father.
“Yes, self-supporting,” said Norah gratefully. “Perhaps it could. But
they’d all have their pensions to help them.”
“Yes, and it could be put under a partly-disabled officer with a wife
and kids that he couldn’t support—some poor beggar feeling like
committing suicide because he couldn’t tell where little Johnny’s next
pair of boots was coming from!” added Jim. “That’s the most ripping
idea, Norah! What do you think, Dad?”
“Yes—excellent,” said Mr. Linton. “The details would want a lot of
working-out, of course: but there will be plenty of time for that. I
would like to make it as nearly self-supporting as possible, so that
there would be no idea of charity about it.”
“A kind of colony,” said Wally.
“Yes. It ought to be workable. The land is good, and with
poultry-farming, and gardening, and intensive culture, it should pay
well enough. We’ll get all sorts of expert advice, Norah, and plan the
thing thoroughly.”
“And we’ll call it ‘The O’Neill Colony,’ or something like that,” said
Norah, her eyes shining. “I’d like it to carry on Sir John’s name,
wouldn’t you, Dad?”
“Indeed, yes,” said David Linton. “It has some sort of quiet,
inoffensive name already, by the way—yes, Homewood.”
“Well, that sounds nice and restful,” said Jim. “Sort of name you’d
like to think of in the trenches. When do we go to see it, Dad?”
“The lawyers have written to ask the tenants what day will suit them,”
said his father. “They’re an old Indian Army officer and his wife, I
believe; General Somers. I don’t suppose they will raise any objection
to our seeing the house. By the way, there is another important thing:
there’s a motor and some vehicles and horses, and a few cows, that go
with the place. O’Neill used to like to have it ready to go to at any
time, no matter how unexpectedly. It was only when War work claimed him
that he let it to these people. He was unusually well-off for an Irish
landowner; it seems that his father made a heap of money on the Stock
Exchange.”
“Horses!” said Norah blissfully.
“And a motor.”
“That will be handy for bringing the Tired People from the station,”
said she. “Horses that one could ride, I wonder, Daddy?”
“I shouldn’t be surprised,” said her father, laughing. “Anyhow, I
daresay you will ride them.”
“I’ll try,” said Norah modestly. “It sounds too good to be true. Can I
run the fowls, Daddy? I’d like that job.”
“Yes, you can be poultry-expert,” said Mr. Linton. “As for me, I shall
control the pigs.”
“You won’t be allowed to,” said Wally. “You’ll find a cold, proud
steward, or bailiff, or head-keeper or something, who would die of
apoplexy if either of you did anything so lowering. You may be allowed
to ride, Norah, but it won’t be an Australian scurry—you’ll have to be
awfully prim and proper, and have a groom trotting behind you. With a
top-hat.” He beamed upon her cheerfully.
“Me!” said Norah, aghast. “Wally, don’t talk of such horrible things.
It’s rubbish, isn’t it, Dad?”
“Grooms and top-hats don’t seem to be included in the catalogue,” said
Mr. Linton, studying it.
“Bless you, that’s not necessary,” said Jim. “I mean, you needn’t get
too bucked because they’re not. Public opinion will force you to get
them. Probably Nor will have to ride in a top-hat, too.”
“Never!” said Norah firmly. “Unless you promise to do it too, Jimmy.”
“My King and Country have called me,” said Jim, with unction.
“Therefore I shall accompany you in uniform—and watch you trying to
keep the top-hat on. It will be ever so cheery.”
“You won’t,” said Norah. “You’ll be in the mud in Flanders——” and then
broke off, and changed the subject laboriously. There were few subjects
that did not furnish more or less fun to the Linton family; but Norah
never could manage to joke successfully about even the Flanders mud,
which appeared to be a matter for humorous recollection to Jim and
Wally. Whenever the thought of their return to that dim and terrible
region that had swallowed up so many crossed her vision, something
caught at her heart and made her breath come unevenly. She knew they
must go: she would not have had it otherwise, even had it been certain
that they would never come back to her. But that they should not—so
alive, so splendid in their laughing strength—the agony of the thought
haunted her dreams, no matter how she strove to put it from her by day.
Jim saw the shadow in her eyes and came to her rescue. There was never
a moment when Jim and Norah failed to understand each other.
“You’ll want a good deal of organization about that place, Dad,” he
said. “I suppose you’ll try to grow things—vegetables and crops?”
“I’ve been trying to look ahead,” said Mr. Linton. “This is only the
second year of the War, and I’ve never thought it would be a short
business. It doesn’t seem to me that England realizes war at all, so
far; everything goes on just the same—not only ‘business as usual,’ but
other things too: pleasure, luxuries, eating, clothes; everything as
usual. I reckon that conscription is bound to come, and before the Hun
gets put in his place nearly every able-bodied man in these islands
will be forced to help in the job.”
“I think you’re about right,” Jim said.
“Well, then, other things will happen when the men go. Food will get
scarcer—the enemy will sink more and more ships; everything that the
shops and the farmers sell will get dearer and dearer, and many things
will cease to exist altogether. You’ll find that coal will run short;
and live stock will get scarce because people won’t be able to get
imported food stuffs that they depend on now. Oh, it’s my idea that
there are tight times coming for the people of England. And that, of
course, means a good deal of anxiety in planning a Home for Tired
People. Tired People must be well fed and kept warm.”
“Can’t we do it, Daddy?” queried Norah, distressed.
“We’re going to try, my girl. But I’m looking ahead. One farm comes in
with the house, you know. I think we had better get a man to run that
with us on the shares system, and we’ll grow every bit of food for the
house that we can. We’ll have plenty of good cows, plenty of fowls,
vegetables, fruit; we’ll grow potatoes wherever we can put them in, and
we’ll make thorough provision for storing food that will keep.”
“Eggs—in water glass,” said Norah. “And I’ll make tons of jam and
bottle tons of fruit and vegetables.”
“Yes. We’ll find out how to preserve lots of things that we know
nothing about now. I don’t in the least imagine that if real shortage
came private people would be allowed to store food; but a house run for
a war purpose might be different. Anyhow, there’s no shortage yet, so
there’s no harm in beginning as soon as we can. Of course we can’t do
very much before we grow things—and that won’t be until next year.”
“There’s marmalade,” said Norah wisely. “And apple jam—and we’ll dry
apples. And if the hens are good there may be eggs to save.”
“Hens get discouraged in an English winter, and I’m sure I don’t blame
them,” said Jim, laughing. “Never mind, Nor, they’ll buck up in the
spring.”
“Then there’s the question of labour,” said Mr. Linton. “I’m inclined
to employ only men who wouldn’t be conscripted: partially-disabled
soldiers or sailors who could still work, or men with other physical
drawbacks. Lots of men whose hearts are too weak to go ‘over the top’
from the trenches could drive a plough quite well. Then, if
conscription does come, we shall be safe.”
“I’ll like to do it, too,” said Norah. “It would be jolly to help
them.”
“Of course, it will cut both ways,” Mr. Linton said. “There should be
no difficulty in getting men of the kind—poor lads, there are plenty of
disabled ones. I’m inclined to think that the question of women
servants will be more difficult.”
“Well, I can cook a bit,” said Norah—“thanks to Brownie.”
“My dear child,” said her father, slightly irritated—“you’ve no idea of
what a fairly big English house means, apart from housekeeping and
managing. We shall need a really good housekeeper as well as a cook;
and goodness knows how many maids under her. You see the thing has got
to be done very thoroughly. If it were just you and the boys and me
you’d cook our eggs and bacon and keep us quite comfortable. But it
will be quite another matter when we fill up all those rooms with Tired
People.”
“I suppose so,” said Norah meekly. “But I can be useful, Daddy.”
He patted her shoulder.
“Of course you can, mate. I’m only afraid you’ll have too much to do. I
must say I wish Brownie were here instead of in Australia.”
“Dear old Brownie, wouldn’t she love it all!” said Norah, her eyes
tender at the thought of the old woman who had been nurse and mother,
and mainspring of the Billabong house, since Norah’s own mother had
laid her baby in her kind arms and closed tired eyes so many years ago.
“Wouldn’t she love fixing the house! And how she’d hate cooking with
coal instead of wood! Only nothing would make Brownie bad-tempered.”
“Not even Wal and I,” said Jim. “And I’ll bet we were trying enough to
damage a saint’s patience. However, as we can’t have Brownie, I suppose
you’ll advertise for some one else, Dad?”
“Oh, I suppose so—but sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof,”
returned Mr. Linton. “I’ve thought of nothing but this inheritance of
Norah’s all day, and I’m arriving at the conclusion that it’s going to
be an inheritance of something very like hard work!”
“Well, that’s all right, ’cause there shouldn’t be any loafers in
war-time,” Norah said. She looked out of the window. “The rain is
stopping; come along, everybody, and we’ll go down Regent Street on a
’bus.” To do which Norah always maintained was the finest thing in
London.
They went down to see Norah’s inheritance two days later. A quick train
from London dropped them at a tiny station, where the stationmaster, a
grizzled man apparently given over to the care of nasturtiums, directed
them to Homewood. A walk of a mile along a wide white road brought them
to big iron gates, standing open, beside a tiny lodge with
diamond-paned windows set in lattice-work, under overhanging eaves; and
all smothered with ivy out of which sparrows fluttered busily. The
lodgekeeper, a neat woman, looked at the party curiously: no doubt the
news of their coming had spread.
From the lodge the drive to the house wound through the park—a wide
stretch of green, with noble trees, oak, beech and elm; not towering
like Norah’s native gum-trees, but flinging wide arms as though to
embrace as much as possible of the beauty of the landscape. Bracken,
beginning to turn gold, fringed the edge of the gravelled track. A few
sheep and cows were to be seen, across the grass.
“Nice-looking sheep,” said Mr. Linton.
“Yes, but you wouldn’t call it over-stocked,” was Jim’s comment. Jim
was not used to English parks. He was apt to think of any grass as
“feed,” in terms of so many head per acre.
The drive, well-gravelled and smoothly rolled, took them on, sauntering
slowly, until it turned in a great sweep round a lawn, ending under a
stone porch flung out from the front of the house. A wide porch, almost
a verandah; to the delighted eyes of the Australians, who considered
verandah-less houses a curious English custom, verging on lunacy. Near
the house it was shut in with glass, and furnished with a few lounge
chairs and a table or two.
“That’s a jolly place!” Jim said quickly.
The house itself was long and rambling, and covered with ivy. There
were big windows—it seemed planned to catch all the sunlight that could
possibly be tempted into it. The lawn ended in a terrace with a stone
balustrade, where one could sit and look across the park and to woods
beyond it—now turning a little yellow in the sunlight, and soon to glow
with orange and flame-colour and bronze, when the early frosts should
have painted the dying leaves. From the lawn, to right and left, ran
shrubberies and flower-beds, with winding grass walks.
“Why, it’s lovely!” Norah breathed. She slipped a hand into her
father’s arm.
Jim rang the bell. A severe butler appeared, and explained that General
and Mrs. Somers had gone out for the day, and had begged that Mr.
Linton and his party would make themselves at home and explore the
house and grounds thoroughly: an arrangement which considerably
relieved the minds of the Australians, who had rather dreaded the
prospect of “poking about” the house under the eyes of its tenants. The
butler stiffened respectfully at the sight of the boys’ uniforms. It
appeared presently that he had been a mess-sergeant in days gone by,
and now regarded himself as the personal property of the General.
“Very sorry they are to leave the ’ouse, too, sir,” said the butler. “A
nice place, but too big for them.”
“Haven’t they any children?” Norah asked.
“Only the Captain, miss, and he’s in Mesopotamia, which is an ’orrible
’ole for any gentleman to be stuck in,” said the butler with a fine
contempt for Mesopotamia and all its works. “And the mistress is tired
of ’ousekeeping, so they’re going to live in one of them there family
’otels, as they call them.” The butler sighed, and then, as if
conscious of having lapsed from correct behaviour, stiffened to
rigidity and became merely butler once more. “Will you see the ’ouse
now, sir?”
They entered a wide hall in which was a fireplace that drew an
exclamation from Norah, since she had not seen so large a one since she
left Billabong. This was built to take logs four feet long, to hold
which massive iron dogs stood in readiness. Big leather armchairs and
couches and tables strewn with magazines and papers, together with a
faint fragrance of tobacco in the air, gave to the hall a comforting
sense of use. The drawing-room, on the other hand, was chillingly
splendid and formal, and looked as though no one had ever sat in the
brocaded chairs: and the great dining room was almost as forbidding.
The butler intimated that the General and his wife preferred the
morning-room, which proved to be a cheery place, facing south and west,
with a great window-recess filled with flowering plants.
“This is jolly,” Jim said. “But so would the other rooms be, if they
weren’t so awfully empty. They only want people in them.”
“Tired people,” Norah said.
“Yes,” Wally put in. “I’m blessed if I think they would stay tired for
long, here.”
There was a long billiard-room, with a ghostly table shrouded in
dust-sheets; and upstairs, a range of bedrooms of all shapes and sizes,
but all bright and cheerful, and looking out upon different aspects of
park and woodland. Nothing was out of order; everything was plain, but
care and taste were evident in each detail. Then, down a back
staircase, they penetrated to outer regions where the corner of Norah’s
soul that Brownie had made housewifely rejoiced over a big, bright
kitchen with pantries and larders and sculleries of the most modern
type. The cook, who looked severe, was reading the _Daily Mail_ in the
servants’ hall; here and there they had glimpses of smart maids,
irreproachably clad, who seemed of a race apart from either the cheery,
friendly housemaids of Donegal, or Sarah and Mary of Billabong, who
disliked caps, but had not the slightest objection to helping to put
out a bush-fire or break in a young colt. Norah tried to picture the
Homewood maids at either task, and failed signally.
From the house they wandered out to visit well-appointed stables with
room for a dozen horses, and a garage where a big touring car
stood—Norah found herself quite unable to realize that it belonged to
her! But in the stables were living things that came and nuzzled softly
in her hand with inquiring noses that were evidently accustomed to
gifts of sugar and apples, and Norah felt suddenly, for the first time,
at home. There were two good cobs, and a hunter with a beautiful lean
head and splendid shoulders; a Welsh pony designed for a roomy tub-cart
in the coach house; and a good old stager able for anything from
carrying a nervous rider to drawing a light plough. The cobs, the groom
explained, were equally good in saddle or harness; and there was
another pony, temporarily on a visit to a vet., which Sir John had
liked to ride. “But of course Killaloe was Sir John’s favourite,” he
added, stroking the hunter’s soft brown muzzle. “There wasn’t no one
could show them two the way in a big run.”
They tore themselves with difficulty from the stables, and, still
guided by the butler, who seemed to think he must not let them out of
his sight, wandered through the grounds. Thatched cottage, orchard, and
walled garden, rosery, with a pergola still covered with late blooms,
lawns and shrubberies. There was nothing very grand, but all was
exquisitely kept; and a kind of still peace brooded over the beauty of
the whole, and made War and its shadows seem very far away. The farms,
well-tilled and prosperous-looking, were at the western side of the
park: Mr. Linton and Jim talked with the tenant whose lease was
expiring while Norah and Wally sat on an old oak log and chatted to the
butler, who told them tales of India, and asked questions about
Australia, being quite unable to realize any difference between the
natives of the two countries. “All niggers, I calls them,” said the
butler loftily.
“That seems a decent fellow,” said Mr. Linton, as they walked back
across the park. “Hawkins, the tenant-farmer, I mean. Has he made a
success of his place, do you know?”
“’Awkins ’as an excellent name, sir,” replied the butler. “A good,
steady man, and a rare farmer. The General thinks ’ighly of ’im. ’E’s
sorry enough that ’is lease is up, ’Awkins is.”
“I think of renewing it, under slightly different conditions,” Mr.
Linton observed. “I don’t wish to turn the man out, if he will grow
what I want.”
“Well, that’s good news,” said the butler heartily. “I’m sure
’Awkins’ll do anything you may ask ’im to, sir.” A sudden dull flush
came into his cheeks, and he looked for a moment half-eagerly at Mr.
Linton, as if about to speak. He checked himself, however, and they
returned to the house, where, by the General’s orders, coffee and
sandwiches awaited the visitors in the morning-room. The butler flitted
about them, seeing to their comfort unobtrusively.
“If I may make so bold as to ask, sir,” he said presently, “you’ll be
coming to live here shortly?”
“As soon as General Somers leaves,” Mr. Linton answered.
The man dropped his voice, standing rigidly to attention.
“I suppose, sir,” he said wistfully, “you would not be needing a
butler?”
“A butler—why. I hadn’t thought of such a thing,” said Mr. Linton,
laughing. “There are not very many of you in Australia, you know.”
“But indeed, sir, you’ll need one, in a place like this,” said the
ex-sergeant, growing bold. “Every one ’as them—and if you would be so
kind as to consider if I’d do, sir? I know the place, and the General
’ud give me a good record. I’ve been under him these fifteen years, but
he doesn’t need me after he leaves here.”
“Well——” said Mr. Linton thoughtfully. “But we shan’t be a small
family—we mean to fill this place up with officers needing rest. We’re
coming here to work, not to play.”
“Officers!” said the ex-sergeant joyfully. “But where’d you get any one
to ’elp you better, sir? Lookin’ after officers ’as been my job this
many a year. And I’d serve you faithful, sir.”
Norah slipped her hand into her father’s arm.
“We really would need him, I believe, Daddy,” she whispered.
“You would, indeed, miss,” said the butler gratefully. “I could valet
the young gentlemen, and if there’s any special attention needed, I
could give it. I’d do my very utmost, miss. I’m old to go out looking
for a new place at my time of life. And if you’ve once been in the
Army, you like to stay as near it as you can.”
“Well, we’ll see,” Mr. Linton said guardedly. “I’ll probably write to
General Somers about you.” At which the butler, forgetting his
butlerhood, came smartly to attention—and then became covered with
confusion and concealed himself as well as he could behind a
coffee-pot.
“You might do much worse,” Jim remarked, on their way to the station.
“He looks a smart man—and though this place is glorious, it’s going to
take a bit of running. Keep him for a bit, at any rate, Dad.”
“I think it might be as well,” Mr. Linton answered. He turned at a bend
in the drive, to look back at Homewood, standing calm and peaceful in
its clustering trees. “Well, Norah, what do you think of your
property?”
“I’m quite unable to believe it’s mine,” said Norah, laughing. “But I
suppose that will come in time. However, there’s one thing quite
certain, Dad—you and I will have to get very busy!”