Somewhere on the West coast of England, about a hundred miles from the
metropolis, there stands a sleepy little town, which possesses no
special activity nor beauty to justify its existence. People live in it
for reasons of their own. The people who do _not_ live in it wonder for
_what_ reasons, but attain no better solution of the mystery than the
statement that the air is very fine. "We have such bracing air!" says
the resident, as proudly as if that said air were his special invention
and property. Certain West-country doctors affect Norton-on-Sea for
patients in need of restful change, and their melancholy advent
justifies the existence of the great hotel on the esplanade, and the row
of bath-chairs at the corner. There are ten bath-chairs in all, and on
sunny days ten crumpled-looking old ladies can generally be seen sitting
inside their canopies, trundling slowly along the esplanade, accompanied
by a paid companion, dressed in black and looking sorry for herself.
Occasionally on Saturdays and Sundays a pretty daughter, or a tall son
takes the companion's place, but as sure as Monday arrives they
disappear into space. One can imagine that one hears them bidding their
farewells--"So glad to see you getting on so well, mother dear! I
positively _must_ rush back to town to attend to a hundred duties. It's
a comfort to feel that you are so well placed. Miss Biggs is a
treasure, and this air is so bracing!..."
The esplanade consists of four rows of lodging-houses and two hotels, in
front of which is a strip of grass, on which a band plays twice a week
during the summer months, and the school-children twice a day all the
year long. The invalids in the hotel object to the children and make
unsuccessful attempts to banish them from their pitch, and the children
in their turn regard the invalids with frank disdain, and make audible
and uncomplimentary surmises as to the nature of their complaints as the
procession of chairs trundles by.
In front of the green, and separating it from the steep, pebbly shore,
are a number of fishermen's shanties, bathing machines, and hulks of old
vessels stretched in a long, straggling row, while one larger shed
stands back from the rest, labelled "Lifeboat" in large white letters.
Parallel with the esplanade runs the High Street, a narrow thoroughfare
showing shops crowded with the useless little articles which are
supposed to prove irresistibly attractive to visitors to the seaside.
At the bazaar a big white label proclaims that everything in the window
is to be sold at the astounding price of "eleven-three," and the
purchaser is free to make his choice from such treasures as work-boxes
lined in crimson plush, and covered with a massed pattern in shells;
desks fitted with all the implements for writing, scent bottles tied
with blue ribbons; packets of stationery with local views, photograph
frames in plush and gelatine, or to select more perishable trophies in
glass and china, all solemnly guaranteed to be worth double the price.
At the photographer's, a few yards farther along, a visitor can have his
portrait taken a yard square, the size of a postage stamp, or on a
postcard to send to his friends. Ingenious backgrounds are on hand,
representing appropriate seaside scenes in which the sitter has nothing
to do but to press his face against a hole on the canvas, and these are
extensively patronised, for what can be more convenient than to stand on
solid earth, attired in sober, everyday clothing, yet be portrayed
splashing in the waves in the spandiest of French bathing costumes,
riding a donkey along the sands, or manfully hauling down the sails of a
yacht!
Mr Photographer Sykes is a man of resource, and deserves the prosperity
which is the envy of his neighbours. Mrs Sykes wears silk linings to
her skirts on Sundays, and rustles like the highest in the land. She
had three new hats in one summer, and the fishmonger's wife knows for a
fact that not one of the number costs less than "twenty-five-six."
The High Street and the esplanade constitute the new Norton-on-Sea which
has sprung into being within the last ten years, but the real, original,
aristocratic Norton lies a couple of miles inland, and consists of a
wide, sloping street, lined with alternate shops and houses, branching
off from which are a number of sleepy roads, in which detached and semi-
detached villas hide themselves behind trees and hedges, and barricade
their windows with stiff, white curtains. The one great longing
actuating the Norton householder seems to be to see nothing, and to be
seen by none. "Is the house overlooked?" they ask the agent anxiously
on the occasion of the first application. "Does it overlook any other
house?"
"There _is_ another house across the road, madam!" the agent is
sometimes regretfully obliged to admit, "but it has been very cleverly
planted out."
So it has! by means of a fir or an elm planted within a few yards of the
windows, and blocking out something more important than another villa,
but the Norton resident desires privacy above all things. The sun and
the air have to creep in as best they may.
The more aristocratic the position of a family, the more secluded
becomes their position. Fences are raised by an arrangement of lattice-
work on the top of boards; shrubs are planted thickly inside the hedges;
even the railings of the gates are backed by discreetly concealing
boards. If there happens to be a rise in the road from which a passer-
by can catch a glimpse of white figures darting to and fro on the tennis
courts, the owner promptly throws up a bank, and plants on the top one
or two quickly growing limes. It is so disagreeable to be overlooked!
At the date at which this history opens, there were several large places
in the neighbourhood of Norton, foremost among them were the Manor
House, occupied by the young squire, Geoffrey Greville, and Madame, his
mother; Green Arbour, owned by Admiral Perry, who had married the widow
of the late High Sheriff; and The Meads, the ofttime deserted seat of a
rich London banker.
With these exceptions, quite the most aristocratic dwellings were
situated in what was known as "The Park," though perhaps "The Crescent"
would have been the more appropriate name, for the twelve houses were
built on one side of a curving road, looking out on a charming stretch
of land, dipping down to a miniature lake, and rising again to a soft
green knoll, surmounted by a bank of trees. The carefully-mowed grass
looked like softest velvet, and might be seen, but not touched, being
surrounded by tiny wire arches, and protected by wooden boards,
requesting visitors to keep to the paths, and not trespass on the
"verges." Impressive title! Visitors were likewise requested not to
touch the flowering shrubs; not to pick the flowers; not to throw
rubbish into the lake, or to inscribe their initials on the seats.
These rules being carefully observed, the twelve householders who paid
for the upkeep of these decorous gardens were free to enjoy such
relaxations as could be derived from gravel paths, and wooden benches.
The view from their windows the residents apparently did not wish to
enjoy, for they planted their trees and heightened their fences as
industriously as the owners of the fifty-pound villas in Hill Street.
Mrs Garnett, at Buona Vista, having a garden deficient in foliage, had
even erected a temporary trellis at the end of the lawn, and covered it
with creepers, rather than face the indignity of an open view. It gave
her such a "feeling of publicity" to see the neighbours pass to and fro!
It was only the residents themselves who enjoyed the proud privilege of
pacing the Park unmolested, for at either entrance stood small eaved
lodges in which were housed the two gardeners and their wives. To be
lodge-keeper to the Park was as great a guarantee of respectability in
Norton as to be vicar of the parish church itself. Only middle-aged,
married, teetotal, childless churchmen could apply for the posts, and
among their scant ranks the most searching inquiries were instituted
before an appointment was finally arranged. It is safe to affirm that
no working couples on earth were more clean, industrious, and alive to
their duty towards their betters, than the occupants of the North and
South Lodges of Norton Park!
All day long the two husbands mowed grass, clipped hedges, and swept up
gravel paths; all day long the wives scrubbed and dusted their
immaculate little houses, keeping a weather-eye on the door to see who
passed to and fro. Their duty it was to pounce out on any stranger who
dared attempt to force an entrance through the hallowed portals, and
send them back discomfited.
"You can't come this way, madam! This road is private!"
"Can't I just walk straight through on the path? It is so much nearer
than going all the way round!"
"The park is private, madam; there is no thoroughfare."
Occasionally some child of sin would endeavour to prevaricate.
"I wish to pay a call!"
"Which house did you wish to go to, madam?"
"Er--Buona Vista!"
"Buona Vistas is away from home. They won't be back till the end of the
month."
Foiled in her attempts the miscreant would have to retrace her steps, or
make her way round by the narrow lane by means of which the tradesmen
made their way to the back-doors of these secluded dwellings.
Perhaps the most unpromisingly decorous house in the Park was christened
"The Nook," with that appalling lack of humour which is nowhere
portrayed more strikingly than in the naming of suburban residences. It
stood fair and square in the middle of the crescent; and from garret to
cellar there was not a nooky corner on which the eye could light. Two
drawing-room windows flanked the front door on the left; two dining-room
windows on the right. There was not even a gable or a dormer to break
the square solidity of the whole. Fourteen windows in all, each
chastely shrouded in Nottingham lace curtains, looped back by yellow
silk bands, fastened, to a fraction of an inch, at the same height from
the sill, while Aspidistra plants, mounted on small tables, were
artfully placed so as to fill up the space necessarily left in the
centre. They were handsome plants of venerable age, which Mason, the
parlourmaid, watered twice a week, sponging their leaves with milk
before she replaced them in their pots.
It was a typical early Victorian residence, inhabited by a spinster lady
of early Victorian type and her four henchwomen--Heap the cook, Mary the
housemaid, Mason the parlourmaid, and Jane the tweeny. Four women, plus
a boot-boy, to wait upon the wants of one solitary person, yet in
conclave with the domestic at The Croft to the right, and The Holt to
the left, Miss Briskett's maids were wont to assert that they were
worked off their feet. It was, as has been said, an early Victorian
household, conducted on early Victorian lines. Other people might be
content to buy half their supplies ready-made from the stores, but Miss
Briskett insisted on home-made bread, home-made jams and cakes; home-
made pickles and sauces; home-cured tongues and hams, and home-made
liqueurs. Cook kept the tweeny busy in the kitchen, while Mary grumbled
at having to keep half a dozen unused bedrooms in spick and span
perfection, and Mason spent her existence in polishing, and sweeping
invisible grains of dust from out-of-the-way-corners.
As a rule the domestic wheel turned on oiled wheels and Miss Briskett's
existence flowed on its even course, from one year's end to another,
with little but the weather to differentiate one month from another, but
on the day on which this history begins, a thunderbolt had fallen in the
shape of a letter bearing a New York post-mark, which the postman handed
in at the door of The Nook at the three o'clock delivery. Miss Briskett
read its contents, and gasped; read them again, and trembled; read them
a third time, and sat buried in thought for ten minutes by the clock, at
the expiration of which time she opened her own desk, and penned a note
to her friend and confidant, Mrs Ramsden, of The Holt--
"My dear Friend,--I have just received a communication from America
which is causing me considerable perturbation. If your engagements
will allow, I should be grateful if you will take tea with me this
afternoon, and give me the benefit of your wise counsel. Pray send a
verbal answer by bearer.--Yours sincerely,--
"Sophia A Briskett."
The trim Mason took the note to its destination, and waited in the hall
while Mrs Ramsden wrote her reply. The reference to a verbal answer
was only a matter of form. Miss Briskett would have been surprised and
affronted to receive so unceremonious a reply to her invitation--
"My dear Friend,--It will give me pleasure to take tea with you this
afternoon, as you so kindly suggest. I trust that the anxiety under
which you are labouring may be of a temporary nature, and shall be
thankful indeed if I can in any way assist to bring about its
solution.--Most truly yours,--
"Ellen Bean Ramsden."
"The best china, Mason, and a teapot for two!" was Miss Briskett's order
on receipt of this cordial response, and an hour later the two ladies
sat in conclave over a daintily-spread table in the drawing-room of The
Nook.
Miss Briskett was a tall, thin woman of fifty-eight or sixty, wearing a
white cap perched upon her grey hair, and an expression of frosty
propriety on her thin, pointed features. Frosty is the adjective which
most accurately describes her appearance. One felt a moral conviction
that she would suffer from chilblains in winter, that the long, thin
fingers must be cold to the touch, even on this bright May day; that the
tip of her nose was colder still, that she could not go to sleep at
night without a hot bottle to her feet. She was addicted to grey
dresses, composed of stiff and shiny silk, and to grey bonnets
glittering with steely beads. She creaked, as she moved, and her thin
figure was whale-boned into an unnatural rigidity.
Mrs Ramsden was, in appearance at least, a striking contrast to her
friend, being a dumpy little woman, in whose demeanour good-nature vied
with dignity. She was dressed in black, and affected an upright feather
in front of her bonnets. "To give me height, my dear!"
In looking at her one was irresistibly reminded of a pouter pigeon
strutting along on its short little legs, preening its sleek little head
to and fro above its protuberant breast.
"Read that!" said Miss Briskett, tragically, handing the thin sheet of
paper to her friend, and Mrs Ramsden put on her spectacles and read as
follows--
"My dear Sister,--Business connected with mines makes it necessary for
me to go out West for the next few months, and the question has arisen
how to provide for Cornelia meantime. I had various notions, but she
prefers her own (she generally does!), and reckons she can't fill in
this gap better than by running over to pay you a visit in the Old
Country. I can pick her up in the fall, and have a little trot round
before returning. She has friends sailing in the _Lucania_ on the
15th, and intends crossing with them. You will just have time to
cable to put her off if you are dead, or otherwise incapacitated; but
I take it you will be glad to have a look at my girl. She's worth
looking at! I shall feel satisfied to know she is with you. She
might get up to mischief over here.
"Looking forward to seeing you later on,--Your brother, Edward
Briskett."
"_P S_--Dear Aunt Soph, don't you worry to prepare! I'll just chip
in, and take you as you are. We'll have some high old times!--Your
niece, Cornelia."
Letter and eye-glasses fell together upon Mrs Ramsden's knee. She
raised startled eyes, and blinked dumbly at her friend.
Miss Briskett wagged her head from side to side, and heaved a sepulchral
sigh.
The halcyon days of peace were over!