'And did you?'
'When he said it was a horrid sum-book all little a's and b's.What have you been doing, Cherry?'
'I have begun an abstract of the first Punic'
The door flew open with a bounce, and two hot, wild-locked boys, dust everywhere except in their merry blue eyes, burst in, and tumbled on their chairs. 'I sayisn't it a horrid sell? we ain't to have a holiday for Squire's wedding.Come, Fee, give us some grub.'
'You have not said Grace,' said Cherry.
Lance, abashed, stood up and bowed; Fulbert looked grim, and mumbled something.
'You have not washed your hands,' added Felix.
'Bosh! What's the good?' said Fulbert.
'They'll be as jolly dirty again directly,' said Lance.
'But you would be more decent company in the meantime,' said Felix.
At that moment there was a splash in his plate, a skip-jack made of the breast-bone of a chicken had alighted there with a leap.
'There's Felix's master come after him,' cried Fulbert, and Lance went off into choking laughter.
'Boys, how can you?' broke out Cherry.
'Look at Blunderbore fishing out his master!' was Fulbert's answer.
'The frog is in the bog,
And Felix is squeamish,'
chanted Lance.
'Bad rhyme, Lance,' said Felix, who could bear these things much better from the younger than the elder. Indeed, he scarcely durst notice them in Fulbert, lest he should be betrayed into violence by letting out his temper.
'I say!' cried Lance, struck by a new idea, 'what prime stuff it is for making a fort!' and he began to scrape the more solid parts of his plateful to one side.
'Oh, I say, isn't it?' echoed Fulbert: 'but I've eaten up the best part of my castle;' and he grasped at the ladle.
'No, I thank you,' said Felix, putting it on the other side. 'While I am here, you don't play tricks with that.'
Fulbert swallowed a spoonful in a passion, but a bright thought struck Lance, who always cared much more for fun than for food. 'I say, we'll empty it all into one, and eat it down.'
'You horrid boys!' plaintively exclaimed Cherry, almost cryingfor this return to savage life was perfect misery to her. 'I can't bear it.'
'I will not have Cherry tormented,' said Felix, beginning to be very irate.
'We ain't doing anything to Cherry,' said Lance, amazed.
'Don't you know it spoils Cherry's appetite to see you so disgusting?'
'Then she'll have the more next time,' said Fulbert. 'Get along, Captainyou've splashed my face!'
'Hurrah! the red-hot shot! The rice is the cannon-balls! Where's some bread?'
'O Lance!' entreated Cherry; 'no wastethink of Wilmet and the bills.'
'We'll eat it every bit up,' asseverated Lance; but Fulbert growled, 'If you bother any more, I shall crumble the whole lot out at window.'
'It is wicked to waste bread,' lisped Angela, and Martha at that moment appeared to fetch the tureen for the kitchen dinner.
'Can't you eat any more, Cherry?' asked Felix gloomily.
'Not a bit, thank you,' she said.
'We've not done!' shouted the boys, seizing on her scarcely-tasted and half-cold plate.
'You must finish after. Come, Cherry!' Then, as they left the room, and she laid her head on his shoulder'Little ruffians!' he said under his breath.
'Oh, never mind, Felix. I don'tat least I ought not to mindthey don't mean it.'
'Lance does not, but I think Fulbert does. He'll make me thrash him within two inches of his life, before he has done. And then there's no one to take me in hand for it. It is horridly bad for them, too, to live just like young bears.'
But he smoothed his brow as he came into the room where his mother was, and amused her till his time was up.
Mr. Froggatt had explained to his father long ago, that Felix's work would not be that of a clerk in a great publishing house, but veritably that belonging to the country bookseller and printer, and that he must go through all the details, so as to be thoroughly conversant with them. The morning's work was at the printing-house, the afternoon's at the shop. The mechanical drudgery and intense accuracy needed in the first were wearisome enough; and moreover, he had to make his way with a crusty old foreman who was incredulous of any young gentleman's capabilities, and hard of being convinced that he would or could be useful; but old Smith's contempt was far less disagreeable to him than the subdued dislike he met with from Redstone, the assistant in the shop, a sharp, half-educated young man, who had aspired to the very post of confidence for which Felix was trainingand being far less aware of his own utter unfitness for it than was Mr. Froggatt, regarded the lad as an interloper; and though he durst not treat him with incivility, was anxious to expose any deficiency or failure on his part. Having a good deal of quickness and dexterity, he could act as a reporter, draw up articles of a certain description for the newspaper, and had, since the death of Mr. Froggatt's eldest son, been absolutely necessary to him in carrying on the business; and now, it was a matter of delicate discretion on the master's part to avoid hurting the feelings of the assistant, whom a little more would have made his tyrant, and a dread of the appearance of favouritism made it needful to keep Felix thoroughly in a subordinate post, till real superiority of mind and education should assert itself over elder years and mere familiarity with detail. This reserved ill-will of Redstone's had much increased the natural discomfort of appearing behind the counter to former acquaintance, and had rendered the learning the duties there doubly troublesome and confusing; though, in recalling the day's doings, there was some amusement in contrasting the behaviour of different people, someof whom Mr. Ryder was the typespeaking to him freely in his own person, others leaving him as an unrecognized shop-boy; and a third favouring him with a horrid little furtive nod, which he liked least of all. But though awkward and embarrassed at first, use soon hardened him, and made the customers indifferent, so that by the spring he had begun to be useful, and to feel no particular excitement about it.
The worst of his business was that it kept him so late, that he had but a very short evening, and no time for exercise. He was on his feet most of the day, but indoors, and his recreation chiefly consisted in choir-practice twice a week. Not that he missed more positive amusement; the cares of life and Edgar's departure seemed to have taken the boyish element of frolic out of him; and left him gravely cheerful indeed, but with no greater desire of entertainment than could find vent in home conversation, or playing with the little ones.
Wilmet and the two boys were at liberty full two hours before him. The latter generally stayed out as long as light and hunger permitted. Mr. Audley continually stumbled on them playing at marbles, racing headlong in teams of pack-thread harness with their fellows, upsetting the nerves of quiet folkstaring contentedly at such shows as required no outlay, or discontentedly at the outside of those that demanded the pennies they never had. They were thorough little street-boys; and all that he could do for them was to enforce their coming in at reasonable hours, and, much to their sister's relief, cause their daily lessons to be prepared in his room. Otherwise their places in their classes would have been much less creditable.
Wilmet's return was always Geraldine's great relief, for the afternoon of trying to amuse her mother, and keep the peace between the children, was almost more than she was equal to; though, on fine days, Sibby always took out the two elder babies, with an alternate twin, for an hour's air, and Mr. Audley daily visited the invalid. Mr. Bevan did so twice a week, with a gentle sympathising tone and manner that was more beneficial than Lady Price's occasional endeavours to make her 'rouse herself.' Miss Pearson and a few humbler friends now and then looked in, but Mrs. Underwood had been little known. With so large a family, and such straitened means, the part of the active clergyman's wife was impossible to her; she had shrunk from society, and most people knew nothing more of her than that the faded lady-like figure they used to see among her little flock at church, was Mrs. Underwood.
Wilmet's coming home was always a comfort; and though to her it was running from toil to care, the change was life to her. To have been either only the teacher or only the housewife might have weighed over heavily on her; but the two tasks together seemed to lighten each other. She had a real taste and talent for teaching, and she and her little class were devoted to one another, while the elder girls loved her much better since Alda had been away. The being with them, and sharing their recreation in the middle of the day, was no doubt the best thing to hinder her from becoming worn by the depressing atmosphere around her mother. She always brought home spirits and vigour for whatever lay before her, brightening her mother's face, dispelling squabbles between Angela and Bernard, and taking a load of care from Geraldine.
There was sure to be some anecdote to enliven the home-keepers, or some question to ask Cherry, whose grammar and arithmetic stood on firmer foundations than any at Miss Pearson's, and who was always pleased to help Wilmet. The evening hours were the happiest of the day, only they always ended too soon for Cherry, who was ordered up by Sibby as soon as her mother was put to bed, and had, in consequence, a weary length of wakeful solitude and darknessonly enlivened by the reflection from the gas belowwhile Felix and Wilmet sat downstairs, she with her mending, and he either reading, or talking to her.
On Saturday, which she always spent at home, and in very active employment in the capacities of nurse, housemaid, or even a slight taste of the cook and laundress, the evening topic was always the accountsthe two young heads anxiously casting the balanceproud and pleased if there were even a shilling below the mark, but serious and sad under such a communication as, 'There's mutton gone up another half-penny;' or, 'Wilmet, I really am afraid those boots of mine cannot be mended again;' or again, 'See what Lance has managed to do to this jacket. If one only could send boys to school in sacking!'
'Are not there a few pence to spare for the chair for Cherry? She will certainly get ill, if she never goes out now spring is coming on.'
'Indeed, Felix, I don't know how! If there is a penny over, it is wanted towards shoes for Bernard; and Cherry begs me, with tears in her eyes, not to let her be an expense!'
Poor Geraldine! the costing anything, and the sense of uselessness, were becoming, by the help of her nightly wakefulness, a most terrible oppression on her spirits. Her father was right. His room had been a hot-bed to a naturally sensitive and precocious character, and the change that had come over her as time carried her farther and farther away from him, affected her more and more.
Her brother and sister, busy all day, and scarcely ever at home, hardly knew what was becoming a sore perplexity to Mr. Audley.
A young tutor, not yet twenty-six, could not exactly tell what to do with a girl not fourteen, who fell into floods of tears on the smallest excuse.
'No, no, Cherrythat is not the nominative.'
The voice faltered, struggled to go on, and melted away behind the handkerchief. Then'O Mr. Audley, I am so sorry'
'That's exactly what I don't want you to be, Cherry.'
'Oh, but it was so careless,' and there was another flood.
Or, 'Don't you see, Cherry, you should not have put the negative sign to that equation. My dear Cherry, what have I said?'
'Oh, ohnothing. Only I did think'
'We shall have you a perfect Niobe, if you go on at this rate, Cherry. Really, we must not have these lessons, if they excite you so much.'
'Oh! that would be the worst punishment of all!' and the weeping became so piteously violent, that the Curate looked on in distressed helplessness.
'I know it is very tiresome of me; I would help it, if I couldindeed I would.' And she cried the more because she had cried.
Or, as he came in from the town, he would hear ominous sounds, that his kind heart would not let him neglect, and would find Cherry sitting on the landing-place in a paroxysm of weeping. She always crept out of her mother's room on these occasions, for the sight of tears distressed and excited Mrs. Underwood; and the poor child, quite unable, in her hysterical condition, to drag herself alone up that steep stair, had no alternative but to sit, on what Mr. Audley called her stool of repentance, outside the door, till she had sobbed herself into exhaustion and calmor till either Sibby scolded her, or he heard her confession.
She had been 'so cross' to Bernard, or to Angelor, once or twice, even to Mamma. She had made an impatient answer when interrupted in her lessons or in a dream over a drawing; she had been reluctant to exert herself when wanted. She had scolded fretfullyor snatched things away angrily, when the little ones were troublesome; and every offence of this sort was bewailed with an anguish of tears; that, by weakening her spirits and temper, really rendered the recurrence more frequent. 'The one thing they trust to me, I fail in!'
He was very kind to her. He did not yield to the mannish loathing for girlish tears that began to seize on him, after the first two or three occasions. He thought and studiedtried comfort, and fancied it relaxed hertried rebuke, and that made it worse; tried the showing her François de Sales' admirable counsel to Philothée, to be 'doux envers soi,' and saw she appreciated and admired it; but she was not an atom more douce envers soi when she had next spoken peevishly.
At last he fairly set off by the train, to lay the case before Sister Constance.
'What is to be done, when a child never does anything but cry?'
Sister Constance listened to the symptoms, and promptly answered, 'Give her a glass of port wine every day, before you let her out of your room.'
'If I can!'
'Tell her they are my orders. Does she eat?'
'I imagine not. I heard Felix reproaching her with a ghoul's dinner of a grain of rice.'
'Does she sleep?'
'She has told me a great deal of midnight meditation on her own deficiencies.'
'She must be taken out of doors somehow or other! It is of no use to reason with her; the tears are not temper, or anything else! Poor Charlie! it is an odd capacity for you to come out in, but I suppose no one else can attend to her.'
'No, poor child, she is rather worse than motherless! WellI will find some excuse for taking her out for a drive now and then; I don't know how to speak to the others about having the chair for her, for they are barely scraping on.'
'Poor children! Well, this year is probably the worst. Either they will get their heads above water, or there will be a crisis. But they do scrape?'
'Yes. At Lady-day there was great jubilation, for the rent was paid, the taxes were ready, there was not a debt; and there was seven-pence over, with which Felix wanted to give Cherry a drive; but Wilmet, who is horribly prudent, insisted that it must go to mend Fulbert's broken window.'
'Wellpoor Wilmet! one can't blame her. How does she treat Cherry's tears?'
'I don't think she has much pity for them. Felix does much better with Cherry; he rocks her and pets her; though, indeed, she hardly ever breaks down when he is there; but even his Sundays are a good deal taken upand I always hunt him out for a walk on the Sunday afternoons.'
'Is he still in the choir and teaching at the Sunday school?'
'Yesthough it is not Mowbray Smith's fault.'
'What, is your colleague what you apprehended?'
'My Lady could not have found a curate more to her mind, or more imbued with her dislike to all that bears the name of Underwood. I own it is hard to have one's predecessor flung constantly in one's teeth, and by the very people who were the greatest thorns to dear Underwood himself. Then Clem, who is a born prig, though a very good boy, gave some of his little interfering bits of advice before he went away, and it has all been set down to Felix's account! One Sunday, Smith made a complaint of Felix having the biggest boys in the school. It was the consequence of his having taken them whenever his father could not, till it came to his having them entirely. He always took great pains with them, and there was a fellow-feeling between him and them that could hardly be with an older person. I said all thistoo strongly, most likelyand the Rector put in a mild word, as to his goodness in coming at all. Smith thought there was nothing wonderful in liking what ministered to his conceit; and at last it came out that a baker's boy had met Felix and Smith consecutively in the street, and only touched his hat to one, and that the wrong one.'