After Such Kindness Part 3

I had never been happier than at that moment. It was as much as I could do not to shout with joy. But instead I put out my hand and said, 'Is it a bargain, then? I will tell you stories and cheer you up, and you will give me your pretty smiles in return. And maybe a kiss or two if you wish. Only if you wish,' I added, afraid I may have gone too far.

She held out her little hand and I took it in mine. It was warm and slightly damp from the hot weather and her own tears. I almost shivered with delight. 'In fact,' I said, trying hard to keep my voice light, 'we could be meeting sooner than you think. I am to take some more photographs of the little fairies and I hope you and your friends will come along and have tea with me afterwards. Your mama is to arrange it very soon.'

She considered. 'Papa says you live in one of the colleges. Are children allowed to have tea there?'

'Yes, indeed. You are more than allowed; you are actively encouraged. People in colleges spend a great deal of their time having tea. Sometimes I think life in college is one great tea party that goes on for ever. But you and your friends will be my guests in my own private rooms. I have a very nice set on the first floor and a very nice servant who looks after me. He is called a "scout" and he will see to the tea. He is quite old, so I hope that all you little girls will eat up what he brings you and not send him up and down stairs for extra jam or milk.'

'Oh, no. We'll be very good.'

'I am sure you will all light up my old bachelor rooms with your happy faces.'

She hesitated. '"Bachelor" means that you aren't married, doesn't it?'

'Indeed. As I said, there is only myself and the college servant. And Benson is responsible for the whole staircase, so I have only one-sixth of his services. And he has to wait at Hall table too, so I have even less of his time. He makes but a poor wife, I fear.'

'Would you like to be married? To a lady, I mean?' She looked at me with such earnest sweetness I could hardly forbear to kiss her on the spot, but I inwardly recited pi to the twentieth decimal place and managed to retain my sangfroid.

'I prefer to have friends instead. The general rule unless you are the Caliph of Baghdad is that you may marry only one person at a time but you can have as many friends as you like. I think that is a far better arrangement.'

'You may marry and have friends too,' she persisted. 'After all, Papa is married, and you are his friend.'

'True,' I said. 'But I especially like to have child-friends, and I cannot marry a child-wife. So, all in all, it is better the way it is. I can give you and your friends all my attention when you come a-visiting. I find many adult people don't pay much attention to children, except to scold them or tell them what to do, whereas I prefer their company to that of anyone else, and hardly ever tell them what to do. Now don't you look forward to being my friend on such advantageous terms?'

She nodded, her grey eyes almost lively now. Then, at that precise moment, Benjy woke up and started to howl. Daisy's attention was immediately upon him and she flew down the path, her hair spreading behind her. By the time I had come back to the garden chair where Mrs Baxter was ensconced, she was already playing with him and diverting his attention with a rattle she had picked up from the ground. The child was so glad to see her that I felt almost sorry for him, to be deprived of his subst.i.tute mother and his best playfellow in one fell swoop. The Baxters had been cruelly obtuse in the matter, I thought. Sometimes it is as if adults have no idea of the feelings of children; as if they forget their own childhood once they pa.s.s into the years of so-called discretion. I sincerely hope that will never be my fate.

The servant Hannah, alerted by the infant's cries, came hastening down the lawn and bore him off for nursery tea, Daisy following in their wake. 'I shall see you very soon, then, Mr Jameson,' she said, giving me a very nice curtsey as she pa.s.sed.

'I hope she has not incommoded you,' said Mrs Baxter. 'She is rather an intense child and latches on excessively to adult company. We feel her reliance on Nettie was somewhat unhealthy and we're hoping she will develop a closer relationship with her sisters soon. Once the new nursemaid has arrived, she will be moving down to her own room next to them.'

I could have said something then, but I didn't. If there were to be an adult that Daisy would latch onto, I wanted it to be me.

4.

MARGARET CONSTANTINE.

I tuck my skirts around me to ward off the chill. Now I have started Daisy's journal, I cannot leave off reading it. I have time, I think. Robert won't come for at least another hour.

Monday 16th June Everything is so upside-down at the moment that it's hard to find time to write and I don't want Hannah to see me doing it as I am sure she would read what I had written and it must be Secret. But I have found a good place to hide this journal which is in a little cupboard under the eves. You have to stoop really low to get at it, and it is painted the same colour as the walls so that it is hard to see. It has a little keyhole but there is no key and Nettie told me there hadn't been one all the time she'd lived in the nursery, and what would anyone want to put there anyway as it was so small and dark and full of cobwebs? To make quite sure Hannah doesn't see it I have pulled the washstand in front, which was quite easy as it is on casters. I think Hannah noticed something was different in the way the furniture was arranged but she couldn't remember what, and decided not to bother about it.

I thought the best time to write would be when Hannah is taking Benjy out in his perambulater but she usually takes him in the mornings when I am at Miss Prentiss's. Then in the afternoon Mama often has Benjy in the drawing room with her and she wants me there too so I can fetch and carry while Hannah has other things to do, so I don't have much time to myself. It's strange to be in the drawing room at that time of day and even stranger that Mr Jameson is there when Papa is out. He sits on the very edge of the sofa and Mama says over and over again how grateful she is for him saving Benjy's life and he says he is glad to do anything for such a delightful family as ourselves. Then he asks, Is Benjy quite recovered? and Mama says Dr Lawrence is still coming every day but can see no ill effects. It's all very dull and Mama must think so too as usually she goes to play on the piano after a while and we both have to sit quietly and listen. Once when she was playing Mr Jameson asked if he could make a drawing of her and took out his sketchbook and made a very nice portrait of her with her head back and her eyes closed. He then asked if he could draw me as well and did a picture of a daisy flower with my face in the middle where the yellow bit should go and wrote The Prettiest Flower in the Garden underneath. And Mama said, Don't turn her head, Mr Jameson, and he said he certainly wouldn't as it was the right way on as it was. He says the funniest things but all with a straight face. I don't want to laugh as I am sad about Nettie but sometimes it is hard not to. DEB I'd forgotten those awkward afternoons. Indeed, I've only a partial recollection of the days immediately following Nettie's abrupt departure. I know that I was very angry with the world and although I was surrounded by a whole houseful of people I felt as isolated and lonely as if I were an orphan. Nettie didn't write; or, if she did, I never saw her letters. Hannah was a most unsatisfactory replacement not very much older than Christiana, and far too busy and brisk and without Nettie to help me, I felt strangely uncomfortable in my clothes; seeming either to have one too many petticoats, or a tickly collar, or an ap.r.o.n that wouldn't sit straight. And the darns on my stockings, so painstakingly executed by Nettie, seemed always to be showing at my heels. Hannah, who did my sisters' hair so beautifully, had little patience with mine, saying she had never known hair like it. It was forever in my eyes which annoyed me considerably, and I carried my comb around in my pocket and tried to sc.r.a.pe it back into place whenever I had a moment to myself. But it had a will of its own and refused to stay in ribbons, so I usually ended up throwing the comb down in a fury. Truth to tell, I felt neglected and sorry for myself. I even had fantasies of running away from home and being found dead in a ditch; my parents only then realizing the enormity of the pain they had inflicted on me. I pictured them in deep mourning bending over my coffin, while Christiana and Sarah wept in the background. For some reason, I also imagined Mr Jameson giving the funeral sermon and saying what a lovely little flower I was, and how badly looked-after I had been in my short life.

Tuesday 17th June Today Mr Jameson brought us the photographs he had taken at the picnic. He had put them into a lovely Alb.u.m and everybody thought they were very lifelike and Papa said that he would like the one of Mama to put in a frame on the mantelpiece.

Christiana and Sarah thought their portraits were very good too and they were quite nice to Mr Jameson for once, saying how clever he was. It made me sad to see Nettie in the family picture, sitting to the side with Benjy on her lap and none of us knowing what was going to happen just a few minutes later.

Although I am mainly sad, I am also a little bit excited because Mr Jameson is going to take some more photographs of me with Enid and Emma and Annie pretending to be fairies like before but this time with costumes. He has asked us to go to tea with him at his college with his old servant Benson who is like a wife to him. Mr Jameson is not married, which he told me today but which I knew must be the case as he has never brought his wife to call on Mama. Papa says lots of University Men can't get married while they live in college which seems very strange and unfair. But I think almost everything about life is unfair at the moment. Even Mr Jameson agrees that is the case, although when I begged him to talk to my parents about Nettie coming back he said it was impossible so I suppose I have to stop thinking about it. I still remember her in my prayers, though, and hope she is happy with her new family in London. DEB How easily one switches allegiances as a child! Although I felt so pa.s.sionately about my loss of Nettie (weeping quietly into my pillow every night), yet I couldn't help responding with pleasure to Mr Jameson's growing interest in me. It was the first time any adult had noticed me in that particular kind of way listening to my questions and giving me proper answers. I didn't count Nettie, of course, because she was with me every day and was required to take an interest, but it seemed that Mr Jameson had specially chosen me, and I was flattered, especially as Christiana or Sarah would have been a more obvious choice of companion. They were so much more elegant and grown up and much more accomplished. They had art lessons and music lessons and archery lessons and sometimes spoke spontaneously in French or German, which impressed me mightily. And my parents my father in particular were always singing their praises. Indeed, I had the impression Papa had hoped Mr Jameson might show a romantic interest in Christiana. He hadn't heard my sisters mimicking him behind his back, parodying his stammer and his awkward manner.

Naturally, the gift of the parasol was the first inkling that Mr Jameson might value my company. And then, on the picnic, he gave me such kind looks, and I noticed that whenever he made one of his funny remarks he always looked at me to see if I was smiling. Although Annie was more forward and delighted him with her bold answers, I somehow knew in my heart that it wasn't Annie he liked best. Of course, the catastrophe with Benjy overshadowed all our jollity that day, and on the silent journey home Mr Jameson had said very little. But he'd stood up for me when Nettie had suggested that my opening the parasol might be to blame for the whole affair. I'd given him a quick smile of thanks then, and he'd smiled back at me very warmly indeed.

And so I became attracted to him, not because of his looks (which were plain), but because he was kind and took trouble with me, and noticed things about me that no one else had noticed. In saying I was 'attracted', I use a phrase common in romantic love, but I am, of course, talking about friendship. At the age of eleven, having lost the one person I could truly rely on, I was open to tenderness, understanding and good humour.

So, I began to look forward to the times when he visited us, and then to the times when I visited him. The first time I called on him in his college was quite an adventure for me and I drove Hannah half mad with my demands that she should curl my hair extremely tightly and starch my dress extremely crisply. The prospect of a grown-up tea in the private rooms of a grown-up gentleman combined with a chance to dress up and have my photograph taken yet again, seemed the most wonderful opportunity: a debut into a different, more adult world. I spurned my childish playthings, especially poor Nettie's rubber ball, which now seemed far too infantile for me in my new, exalted role. I was indeed in danger of having my head turned.

Thursday 19th June Today Annie, Emma, Enid and I all went to tea with Mr Jameson. Hannah walked us through the centre of Oxford and said she had never been inside any of the colleges before. None of the rest of us had either, and we were excited when we came to the one where Mr Jameson lived, which was apparently one of the oldest. Hannah took us into a kind of lodge by the entrance gate and said we were looking for a Mr Jameson. The porter said Reverend John Jameson you mean? And when Hannah said yes, he asked a younger porter to show us where to go. He said we needed Staircase Five Three (which is different from fifty-three) and then we crossed a big quadrangle where there were undergraduits walking about in their gowns reading and laughing and then the porter's boy showed us up some stone stairs under a pointed archway which was marked V (that is five in Roman numbers). We went up one flight of stairs and the boy knocked on a door marked III (which is three in Roman numbers). It was a big heavy door, with old, cracked wood and large metal hinges. I heard Mr Jameson call out 'Come in' and the boy opened the latch. It was a very nice room with windows that overlooked some gardens at the back, and there was a big fireplace with a looking-gla.s.s over the mantelpiece and a nice carpet and two comfortable chairs. Mr Jameson was sitting in one and a white cat was sitting in the other. When the cat saw us all come in, she leaped down and fled and Mr Jameson said, 'Oh you have frightened Dinah away but she will come back when she knows there is milk to be had.' And then he got up and shook each of us by the hand and nodded respectfully to Hannah, who curtseyed. Then he asked us to take off our hats and gloves and he hung them on some hooks behind the door, putting the gloves very neatly inside the hats.

Then we looked around at all the books in the bookcases, and the beetles and b.u.t.terflies in the gla.s.s cases and he let us peep under the white cloths that were covering the sandwiches. Then he said he would show us where he kept his Photographic Equipment as we had to earn our tea before we could eat so much as a crust. But first he said that we should go with Hannah and put on the fairy costumes which were laid out ready on his bed. His bedroom was next to the drawing room, through a door in the corner, which was very odd but colleges are not the same as ordinary houses. As well as having lots of staircases, they are more like monastries with carved stone and cloisters, and each one has its own chapel. I don't know why, but Hannah didn't like the idea of going into Mr Jameson's bedroom, although she goes into my parents' room every day to do Mama's hair. 'I hope you are not coming too,' she said rather rudely, and he looked upset and said 'Oh no' except he wanted to point out where the costumes were. Hannah said she thought she could manage to dress us without his help and I felt quite sorry for him as his stammer started to get very bad and he said it was all right and he'd leave it to her except that we had to take our shoes and stockings off as fairies were always barefoot.

His bedroom was very plain and rather dark and his bed was a narrow one like mine. He had laid out four sets of fairy dresses in a row on top of the counterpane. They were made of white muslin and had muslin wings attached to the backs which looped over our fingers at the other end. The skirts had silk petals around the waist pointing downwards. And there were four head-dresses made of silk flowers. The dresses didn't fit very well, but luckily Hannah had her needle and thread with her so she tacked them to fit. When Mr Jameson saw us come out he was very excited and said we were just how he imagined. Hannah said she hoped he'd be quick as although it was summer we weren't used to going without stockings and shoes and she didn't want the blame if we all caught our deaths. So we went straight in to Mr Jameson's studio which was on the same bit of staircase, but more like a large dark pantry with no windows. Then he showed us all how we should stand, pretending we were moving our wings but not really moving at all. He put my arms higher and Annie's lower, and told Emma she should look at the ground and Enid should look at the ceiling. When he was satisfied he put in the plates and took the photographs. Then he explained how everything worked and showed us how he developed the pictures from the plates. It was like magic watching the shapes gradually appear all four of us looking like real fairies, almost transparent against the dark background. Then we dressed again and Mr Benson brought up the tea and Hannah drank a cup standing up before going home to attend to Benjy. Then the rest of us sat down around the table and Mr Jameson asked Annie if she would like more tea and she said she couldn't have more as she hadn't had any yet. And he said what she really meant was she couldn't have less. And we all laughed because it was true, although Annie looked annoyed.

We had a very nice tea with cuc.u.mber sandwiches and Mr Benson did not have to go for more milk or jam, but he put a saucer of milk in the grate for Dinah, and she came back from wherever she was hiding and lapped it up. We all wanted to stroke her but Mr Jameson said she was an old cat and set in her ways and those ways were of an old Oxford don and not the ways of sprightly young ladies and so she was best left alone. Annie asked Mr Jameson why, if his ways were those of an old don, he had invited us to his rooms in the first place, and he said he was the opposite of Dinah as he loved sprightly young ladies more than anything. And after tea he said would we like to know how to turn a cat into a dog and we all said yes, thinking he was going to do magic with Dinah. And then he gave each of us a small notepad with our names written on very neatly and a very sharp pencil, and showed us how to change one letter at a time of the word cat so it changed to cot, then lot, then log and lastly dog. He said we could change pig into sty the same way and suggested we wrote down as many others as we could think of. Enid thought up fourteen and I did twelve and Annie and Emma both did ten. The he asked us to make up the first line of a poem and he would carry on with it. And he made up the funniest Limericks and put us all in them, including Benson and Miss Prentiss and Dinah, and we all laughed until we were red in the face. Then Benson cleared away the dishes and Mr Jameson said he would take us all home, and he handed us down our hats and gloves and put on his top hat. He held my hand on one side and Annie's on the other, and Emma and Enid held on to us in turn. When we walked out through the quadrangle some of the undergraduits seemed to be laughing behind their hands and making comments which we couldn't hear but which seemed to be rather condersending but he took no notice and nor did we. We walked back along the High past the colleges, and he pointed out all sorts of interesting things and where famous poets and other important people had once been students. He said the poet Sh.e.l.ley had been sent away for aitheyism and serve him right but when I asked what aitheyism was he said never mind, my fault for mentioning it. When I got home I asked Hannah and she said it was not believing in G.o.d, which I don't understand as everybody knows there is a G.o.d, except the Heathen, of course. I don't understand how a great poet can be a Heathen when he has grown up in this country and has read the Bible. I shall have to ask Mr Jameson. He has arranged for Hannah to take me to tea again next week, but this time with only one friend as four young ladies are far too trying for Dinah's nerves. But no doubt I shall see him here tomorrow in the drawing room as usual. I shall be disappointed if he does not come. DEB He was in many ways a strange companion for a child of eleven. I suppose he was about thirty-five years of age at the time a little younger than our father, although he didn't look it. Father was handsome and well-built, and had elegant clothes, even though they were mostly clerical black; and when he came into a room, you always noticed him. But Mr Jameson was thin, awkward and weak-looking, and his clothes, although immaculately tidy, looked droopy and slightly odd; and when he came into a room, no one at all noticed. Of course, he had that terrible stammer that came and went, but seemed to be at its worst in company, so I understood in a way why he preferred intimate chats with one person at a time to the generality of polite conversation. And in fact he was not particularly polite, now that I recall. He was quiet, and that can be taken for politeness; but when there was something that interested him, he talked very fast, and was not above contradicting everybody in the room. He had very decided ideas, and expected his friends young and old to conform to them. For some reason, I was always happy to conform. I made no effort; he and I simply seemed to share some common understanding, an appreciation of each other that the world at large did not share. I didn't realize how strange it was; it seemed perfectly natural to me and I am sure it was equally natural for him. All the afternoons we spent together seemed to exist in a kind of sunny haze. Poor Nettie's image faded swiftly into the past as Mr Jameson absorbed my waking hours. When I was with him, it was as if I were living in a different world, a world I wanted to be in more than anything else.

My sense of dislocation from my family was heightened by the arrival of the new nursemaid, Mrs McQueen, and my subsequent move from the familiar attic to a small square room on the first floor. Instead of overlooking the garden, this room had a window facing the road, and the clatter of early carts and late carriages, the drudging step of the postman and the comings and goings of the milk cart, baker's cart and grocer's boy, all seemed to mirror the change from a protected and enclosed life, to the more worldly one I was about to embark upon. I spent hours alone for the first time ever, and it felt strange. There was no Benjy to distract me in the daytime, and no Nettie or Hannah sleeping across the room to make me feel safe at night. Mama, I recollect, thought I would be pleased to have a room of my own, as even Christiana and Sarah were obliged to share, and she said she hoped I would make the most of it, although in what way she did not say. She supervised the removal of my bed and chest of drawers down one flight of stairs, and got Matthews to bring up a new washstand with Delft tiles and a blue and white washing set, as well as a bookcase Papa said he could spare for my increasing collection of books. Hannah brought down my clothes from the nursery wardrobe and put them away for me with quite a good grace. (Ever since Mrs McQueen had arrived, Hannah had been in good spirits, and she even put a posy of flowers into the vase on the mantelpiece as a gesture of welcome.) All the time the removals were going on, however, we could hear Benjy howling upstairs and Mrs McQueen trying to placate him. 'She'll have her work cut out,' Hannah said to Matthews on the stairs, nodding her head to the source of the cacophony. I remember Matthews glancing up too, saying, 'Poor little sod. He doesn't know whether he's coming or going ' then stopping because Mama came out of the bedroom and said, 'That's enough, Matthews. Thank you for your help.'

I never knew whether she had heard or not, but it made me feel guiltier still that I was abandoning Benjy in his hour of need. He had only just got used to Hannah, and Mrs McQueen was a complete stranger. I asked Mama if I could go up and play with him for a while, but she said I would only upset him and it was better to let him settle with Mrs McQueen, as he had to learn.

Wednesday 25th June I am now in my own room on the first floor so I can write in this journal whenever I like. This is a great relief. But now I must find somewhere new to hide it as Hannah still comes in to do my hair and Christiana and Sarah are in the next room and I know they are very curious and would certainly laugh at what I have written if they found it. They came in to see me as soon as I moved in and went around picking everything up, reading the t.i.tles from my books and smiling to each other in a condersending way. As it is summer and there is no chance that we will have a fire, I am putting this journal under the grate inside the screen. There are no coals or ashes so it's quite clean, but when the worse weather comes, it will be no good, as I expect I will have a fire from time to time though not every day like in the nursery, and Mama always has the chimneys swept in the autumn.

I am to eat my evening meals with Papa and Mama now, and lunch with my sisters in the morning room when I am not at school. If Christiana and Sarah are out, I am to eat by myself in the breakfast room, served by Cook. It seems as though everything is changing very quickly and I hardly know who I am any more. DEB

5.

JOHN JAMESON.

Daisy really is the most delightful child. She tries so very hard to be good, but she is also very natural, as all children are, and says what she thinks at the moment she thinks it. We adults rarely say what we think indeed, I do not know how long it has been since I have said exactly what I think to another adult human being. But when I am with Daisy I feel at liberty to say whatever comes into my head and it makes her laugh. I can scarcely believe my good fortune. I feel I am walking on air. My head is full of ideas and thoughts and wild imaginings, and she is sharing them with me.

But I antic.i.p.ate myself. This state of bliss has not come about without effort, and I congratulate myself on the effectiveness of my strategy, beginning with the pleasant tea party I was able to arrange for the four little friends. The photographic experiment produced some interesting effects and the tea itself went well, although I was surprised at the amounts of bread-and-b.u.t.ter and cake such small children could consume. I don't recall my sisters ever falling upon the tea table with such enthusiasm, but my father was strict (stricter than I am, at any rate) and we all had to wait our turn in order to begin, which was only ever after grace had been said and the eldest among us had partaken first.

After tea and games (of which the limericks proved a decided hit), I took all four children home and begged that on the next occasion I should limit myself to two young visitors on account of Dinah's nervousness with company. This was agreed and Daisy elected to bring Annie with her. Annie is a very forward child with a wide face and a bold expression. She is as ignorant as an eleven-year-old should be, but she is always ready with her opinions, which can be amusing. However, she does not in any way compare with Daisy, around whose natural charm there is now an air of sadness that I am making it my daily work to dispel.

I managed to arrange it so that it was not long before their second visit, and Hannah brought them as before, marching them across the quad in their neat cotton dresses, white stockings and jaunty straw hats, where they rightly drew the admiring attention of all who had eyes in their heads. But this time the servant did not stay. I explained that I planned to take the two girls for a walk in the meadow before tea and there would have been nothing for her to do except walk along behind us. She was not anxious to remain in any case, saying she had some errands to do at the haberdasher's in the High, but hoping I would not let the girls walk too far in the afternoon warmth. I promised I would take the greatest care of them and she took herself off. Hardly had she gone when Annie piped up asking if we were going to play games later on, as she found walks extremely uninteresting.

'And do you find walks uninteresting too, Daisy?' I enquired.

'It depends,' she said, wrinkling her forehead in a delightful way. 'On whom I'm walking with, and where we're walking. Sometimes it can be dull. I mean it's very dull when Miss Prentiss makes us walk in line for half an hour without speaking to one another.'

'And then makes us stand and look at some old bones in a gla.s.s case,' added Annie. 'In fact, I think museums are the most uninteresting places in the world.'

'Well, I promise there will be no museums today. And no old bones. Although I can't promise about young bones. There are inevitably a goodly number of them disporting themselves in the meadow, bowling hoops and playing at cricket. Unfortunately, they are mainly of a male variety.'

'But what will we do in the meadow?' moaned Annie. 'We can't play cricket because that's a boys' game. Could we play at shuttlec.o.c.k? We play that at home on the lawn but you'll need the battledores. Do you have battledores, Mr Jameson?'

'Sadly, no. Most of the games I know are in the mind. I think you can have even more fun with those, if you've a mind to play them. But there'll be a lot to do and talk about on the way, I a.s.sure you.'

Annie looked unconvinced, but I picked up my hat and said, 'Now, let's begin by walking in the opposite direction and see where we get to.'

'Opposite from where?' Annie said, pouting.

'Well, from here, of course.'

'But in which direction?'

'You ask a lot of questions for one who is only four and a half foot high,' I said. 'I've half a mind to make you sit down and answer an examination paper on all the questions you don't know the answer to, while Daisy and I go a-walking on our own.'

'But I won't know the answers!' She looked alarmed.

'Ah,' I said. 'Maybe there are no answers. I find there are far more questions in the world than answers, don't you think? Otherwise school wouldn't be the bother it is.'

They both laughed, and Annie being thus satisfied, we set off in good spirits as the clock in the tower chimed three.

'Do you teach all the young gentlemen in the college?' asked Daisy, eyeing a group of undergraduates who were reading on the gra.s.s and looked up as we trod by in our threesome.

'By no means. It is hard enough to teach the ones I do. They are so very deaf.'

'Oh, poor things!' cried Daisy, instantly sympathetic. 'But how can they learn when they are deaf?'

'With difficulty,' I said. 'When I ask a question, I often have to ask it twice. But that may be on account of the distance.'

She looked up. 'The distance?'

'Well, they will insist on taking their lessons on the kitchen staircase, and I have to call out my questions aloud from my room and Benson has to scurry down and pa.s.s them on, and due to his imperfect knowledge of mathematics and their imperfect hearing, equation becomes "evasion", and theorem becomes "peer at 'em" and we have to start all over again.'

'Is that really true?' asked Daisy with a sideways look.

'Well, not altogether,' I answered. 'I made up the bit about Benson. And the students are not actually deaf.'

She laughed. And my heart shivered into many delicious pieces.

We left the college buildings and set off across the Meadow. As we walked along the path I was able to point out various b.u.t.terflies and day-flying moths, and give them their proper Latin names, which the little girls attempted to learn by heart. Once by the river there was quite a congestion of rowing boats and punts and even the odd hopeful fisherman. 'We might see people catching crabs later,' I said.

'Oh, you don't get crabs in the Cherwell,' said Annie confidently. 'You only get them at the seaside.'

'That's what you think,' I said. 'I wouldn't be surprised if there weren't half a dozen people catching crabs at this very moment, down by Folly Bridge.'

'It means when you miss your stroke, doesn't it?' said Daisy. 'And wave your oar around in the air? That's what Papa says.'

'And your papa knows everything about rowing that there is to know,' I said. 'So you are right, Daisy.' At which she blushed and looked pleased.

And I was pleased too, to be walking along with two such pretty children, as if I were their father or, even better, their uncle. We chattered away about this and that, and picked up the b.a.l.l.s that rowdy schoolboys let run towards us, and answered innumerable requests for the 'right time' from all manner of people who only have to see that you have a watch about your person to think that you are obliged to keep them informed about the progress of the planet. However, the little girls were only too delighted to take out my pocket watch and read the hour and minute hands on my behalf, and supply the questioners with their answers. There were a number of people I knew by sight to whom I tipped my hat, and who acknowledged me similarly before pa.s.sing on. However, one person hove into view whom I did not wish to encounter. It was Smith-Jephcott, strolling about in that purposeless way of his. I attempted to usher the girls off the path in an effort to evade him, but when he saw us, he came over. 'Ah,' he said, doffing his hat. 'Two of your little fairies, I believe? Won't you introduce me?'

And I was obliged to do so, even though I was very loath. When I said Daisy's full name, he raised his eyebrows and said, 'Any relation to Daniel Baxter, the renowned Christian Athlete of St Cyprian's?'

'Her father,' I said shortly.

'Indeed? And so the charming lady in the picture was her mother?'

'Mr Jameson photographed us all,' added Daisy, with a sweet eagerness to impart information that I could have dispensed with on that occasion.

He bent towards her. 'And I was privileged to have, as it were, an advance view of the pictures. They were very good. Very good. What a lovely family you all are.' Then he raised himself and addressed me sotto voce: 'I had no idea when you showed me the pictures that it was Baxter's family you were so intimate with.'

'I a.s.sume you don't know him, then?'

'Only by reputation. But that's enough.' He laughed unpleasantly. 'But look here, Jameson, why don't we all have tea together? I was just about to turn back, and could do with a little livening up.'

'No,' I said. 'I have other plans.'

'You? What plans?' He laughed again. 'Are you going to introduce them to Dinah and play slapjack around the table for half an hour?'

'What's that to you?' I replied, incensed.

'Nothing at all. I just thought these two young ladies might rather see the musical box I have just purchased. It has a singing bird.'

'Oh, may we, please?' said Annie, her wide face made even wider with pleasure.

Daisy looked at me, and I think she could see the consternation on my face. But at the same time she was eager to see the toy. 'May we?' she asked quietly. 'Just for five minutes?'

'There you are!' said Smith-Jephcott. 'And while you are looking at it, I'll get Benson to give us tea.'

'But I have tea arranged in my own room. I have already p-purchased walnut cake,' I faltered, my tongue tight in my mouth.

'Then bring it down! I have some Bourbon biscuits, and Benson can see to the teapot and the bread-and-b.u.t.ter. The girls can know what it's like to have proper college hospitality!'

I looked at their shining eyes: Annie's bright and bold, Daisy's softer but no less eager. I could not deny them. 'Very well,' I said. But I was terribly put out by this alteration to my plan.

Daisy must have sensed my disappointment because she reached out her little hand and touched me on the arm. It was as if her touch had melted right through the black worsted, and I could feel her fingers on my very flesh. 'Do you mind very much, Mr Jameson?' she said.

At that moment I loved her so much for her kindness and sympathy that I almost felt grat.i.tude to Smith-Jephcott for being the cause of it. 'Not if it makes you happy,' I replied, daring to squeeze her gloved fingers.

And so we repaired back to college and Benson was obliged to bring down to Smith-Jephcott's rooms the walnut cake and the bread-and-b.u.t.ter that he had already laid out upstairs. Smith-Jephcott, in spite of his boast, made no attempt to provide proper hospitality, or even a table, and put the plates down w.i.l.l.y-nilly all over his desk and sideboard, mingling the cake with his bottles of port wine and muddling the bread-and-b.u.t.ter with his books.

The girls, meanwhile, were enchanted by the musical box, and in between forays to the cake and tea, they wound the handle over and over again while the bird moved back and forth and opened and shut its beak in time to the fluting music. Smith-Jephcott told them he had bought it for one of his nieces, who was ten years old in a week's time. Annie said how lucky that little girl was and expressed the wish that she could have one like it. 'Did you buy it in the High?' she asked.

'I got it in the Burlington Arcade. Do you know it?'

They both shook their heads.

'Ah, maybe you are not acquainted with London?'