CONVALESCENCE--MATRIMONIAL INTENTIONS--THE JOURNEY TO OAKFORD--OUR
WELCOME
On the day when I first left my sick room, and was moved to a sofa in
what had been my poor mother's boudoir, my father put fifty pounds
into Nurse Bundle's hand, and sent another fifty to Mr. Andrewes for
some communion vessels for the church, on which the rector had set his
heart. They were both thank-offerings.
"I owe my son's recovery to GOD, and to you, Mrs. Bundle," said my
father, with a certain elaborateness of speech to which he was given
on important occasions. "No money could purchase such care as you
bestowed on him, and no money can reward it; but it will be doing me a
farther favour to allow me to think that, should sickness ever
overtake yourself when we are no longer together, this little sum,
laid by, may come in useful, and afford you a few comforts."
That first evening of my convalescence we were quite jubilant; but
afterwards there were many weary days of weakness, irritability, and
_ennui_ on my part, and anxiety and disappointment on my father's.
Rubens was a great comfort at this period. For his winning ways formed
an interest, and served a little to vary the monotony of the hours
when I was too weak to bear any definite amusement or occupation. It
must have been about this time that a long cogitation with myself led
to the following conversations with Nurse Bundle and my father:--
"How old are you, Nurse?" I inquired, one forenoon, when she had
neatly arranged the tray containing my chop, wine, etc., by my chair.
"Five-and-fifty, love, come September," said Nurse Bundle.
"Do people ever marry when they are five-and-fifty, papa?" I asked
that evening, as I lay languid and weary on the sofa.
"Yes, my dear boy, sometimes. But why do you want to know?"
"I think I shall marry Nurse Bundle when I am old enough," I said,
with almost melancholy gravity. "She's a good deal older than I am;
but I love her very much. And she would make me very comfortable. She
knows my ways."
My father has often told me that he would have laughed aloud, but for
the sad air of utter weariness over my helpless figure, the painful,
unchildlike anxiousness on my thin face, and in my old-fashioned air
and attitude. I have myself quite forgotten the occurrence.
At last this most trying time was over, but the fever had left me
taller, weaker, and much in need of what doctors call "tone." All
concerned in the care of me were now unanimous in declaring that I
must have a "change of air."
There was some little difficulty in deciding where to go. Another
visit to Aunt Maria was out of the question. Even if London had been a
suitable place, the fear of infection for my cousins made it not to be
thought of.
"Where would _you_ like to go, Nurse?" I inquired one evening, as we
all sat in the boudoir discussing the topic of the day.
"I should like to go wherever it's best for your good health, Master
Reginald," was Nurse Bundle's answer, which, though admirable in its
spirit, did not further the settlement of the matter we found it so
difficult to decide.
"But where would you like to go for yourself?" I persisted. "Where
would you go if it was you going away, and nobody else?"
"Well, my dear, if it was me just going away for myself, I think I
should go to my sister's at Oakford."
This reply drew from me a catechism of questions about Oakford, and
Nurse Bundle's sister, and Nurse Bundle's sister's husband, and their
children; and when my father came to sit with me I had a long history
of Oakford and Nurse Bundle's relatives at my fingers' ends, and was
full of a new fancy, which was strong upon me, to go and stay for
awhile at Oakford with Mr. and Mrs. Benjamin Buckle.
"Nurse says they sometimes let lodgings," I said; "and I should like
Nurse to see her sister; and," I candidly added, "I should like to see
her myself."
My father's uppermost wish was to please me; and as Oakford was known
to be healthy, and the doctor favoured the proposition, it was decided
according to my wishes. If we stayed long, my father was to go
backwards and forwards, and he was to fetch us when we went away. His
anxiety was still so great, and led him to watch me in a manner which
fidgeted me so much, that I think the doctor was only too glad that
the place should be sufficiently near to induce him to leave me to
the care of Nurse Bundle.
We went by coach to Oakford. I was not allowed to sit outside on this
journey. It was only a short one, however; and, truth to say, I did
not feel strong enough for any feats of energy, and went meekly enough
into that stuffy hole, the inside! Before following me, Nurse Bundle
gave some directions to the driver, of a kind that could only be
effectual in reference to a small place where everybody was known.
"Coachman! Oakford! And drop us at Mr. Buckle's, please, the saddler."
"High Street, isn't it?" said the fat coachman, looking down on Mrs.
Bundle exactly as a parrot looks down from his perch.
"To be sure; only three doors below the 'Crown.'"
With which Mrs. Bundle gathered up her skirts, and her worsted
workbag, and clambered into the coach.
There were two other "insides." One of these never spoke at all during
the journey. The other only spoke once, and he seems to have been
impelled thereto by a three hours' contemplation of the contrast
between my slim, wasted little figure, and Nurse Bundle's portly
person, as we sat opposite to him. He was a Scotchman, and I fancy "in
business."
"You're weel matched to sit on the one side," was his remark.
Once, when I was feeling faint, he opened the window without my having
spoken, and only acknowledged my thanks by a silent nod. When the
coach stopped in the High Street of Oakford, and Nurse Bundle had
descended, he so far relaxed, as he handed out me and the worsted
workbag, as to indulge his national thirst for general information by
the inquiring remark:
"You'll be staying at the 'Crown' the night, mem?"
"No, sir. We stop here," said Nurse Bundle.
I caught his keen blue eye at the window whilst the coach was delayed
by the getting out of our luggage. I do not think he missed one
feature of our welcome on the threshold of the saddler's shop.
I feel sure that Scotchmen do greatly profit by the habit they have of
"absorbing into their constitutions," so to speak, all the facts of
every kind that come within their ken. They "go in for general
information," like the Tom Toddy in Mr. Kingsley's 'Water Babies;' but
their hard heads have, fortunately, no likeness to turnips.
This, however, is a digression.
Mr. Benjamin Buckle, Mrs. Benjamin Buckle, Jemima Buckle, their
daughter, Mr. Buckle's apprentice, and the "general girl," or
maid-of-all-work, were all in the shop to receive us. I believe the
cat was the only living creature in the house who was not there. But
cats seldom exert themselves unnecessarily on behalf of other people,
and she awaited our arrival upstairs. I had a severe if not
undignified struggle with the string before I could get my hat off.
Then I advanced, and, holding out my hand to Mr. Buckle, said,
"Mr. Buckle, I believe?"
[Illustration: "Mr. Buckle, I believe?"]
"The same to you, sir, and a many of them," said Mr. Buckle, hastily;
being, I fancy, rather put out by the touch of my frail hand, which
was certainly very unlike the leather he handled daily. He saw his
mistake, and added quickly,
"Your servant, sir. I hope your health's better, sir?"
"Very well, thank you," said I (all children make that answer, I
think).
"What a little gentleman!" said Mrs. Buckle, in an audible "aside" to
my nurse. She was as good-natured a woman as Mrs. Bundle herself, but
with less brains. She lived in a chronic state of surprises and
superlatives.
"You are Nurse's sister, aren't you, please?" I asked, going up to
her, and once more tendering my hand. "I wanted to see you very much."
"Now just to think of that, Jemima! did you ever?" cried Mrs. Buckle.
"La!" said Jemima; in acknowledgment of which striking remark, I bent
my head, and said,
"How do you do, Jemima?" adding, almost without an instant's pause,
"Please take me away, Nurse! I am so very tired."
By one immediate and unbroken action, Mrs. Bundle cut her way through
our hospitable friends and the scattered rolls of leather and other
trade accessories in the shop, and conveyed me into an arm-chair in
the sitting-room upstairs, where I sat, the tears running down my face
for very weakness.
I had longed for the novelty of a residence above a saddler's shop;
but now, too weary for new experiences, I was only conscious that the
stairs were narrow, the room dingy and vulgar after the rooms at home,
and as I wept I wished I had never come.
At this day, I am glad that I had the courtesy to restrain my
feelings, and not to damp the delighted welcome of Nurse and her
friends by an insulting avowal of my disappointment. I really was not
a spoilt child; and indeed, the insolent and undisciplined egotism of
many children "now-a-days," was not often tolerated by the past
generation. As I sat silent and sad, Nurse Bundle ransacked her bag,
muttering, "What a fool I be, to be sure!" and anon produced a flask
of wine, from which she filled a wine-glass with a very big leg, which
was one of the chimney ornaments. I emptied it in obedience to her
orders, and in a few minutes my tears ceased, and I began to take a
more cheerful view of the wallpaper and the antimacassars.
"What a pretty cat!" I said, at last. The said cat, a beauty, was
lying on the hearthrug.
"Isn't it a beauty, love?" said Nurse Bundle; "and look, my dear, at
your own little dog lying as good as gold in the rocking-chair, and
not so much as looking at puss."
Rubens did not _quite_ deserve this panegyric. He lay in his chair
without touching puss, it is true; but he kept his eye firmly and
constantly fixed upon her, only restrained from an attack by my known
objection to such proceedings, and by the immovable composure of the
good lady herself. Half a movement of encouragement on my part, half a
movement of flight on the cat's, and Rubens would have been after her.
All this was so plainly expressed in his attitude, that I burst out
laughing. Rubens chose to take this as a sound to the chase, and only
by the most peremptory orders could I induce him to keep quiet. As to
the cat, I saw one convulsive twitch of the very tip of her tail,
eloquent of wrath; otherwise she never moved.
"Now, my dear," said Mrs. Bundle, "suppose you come upstairs to bed,
and get a good night's rest. I can hear Jemima a-shaking of the coals
in the warming-pan now, on the stairs."
Warming-pans were not much used at home, and I was greatly interested
in the brazen implement which Jemima wielded so dexterously.
"It's like an ironing cloth," was my comment when I got between the
sheets. I had often warmed my hands on the table where Nurse ironed my
collars at home.
Rubens duly came to bed; and I fell asleep, well satisfied on the
whole with Oakford and the saddler's household.