Black, White and Gray Part 18

"It would be splendid," she said. "Do you think Aunt Katharine would let me help?"

"Why, of course," said Dennis; "it's _quite_ a different thing from using tools. _Any one_ can paint!"

"Only the splashes," said Maisie a little doubtfully. "Tuvvy said you got splashed all over. Aunt Katharine mightn't like me to spoil my frocks."

"As to that," said Dennis, "you could wear a big ap.r.o.n. Painters always do. Hulloa! it's raining!"

So it was. The bright sunshine had vanished, and the sky was downcast and grey. First it rained gently, then faster, then it made up its mind in good earnest, and a regular downpour of drops pattered on the hedges, and fell softly on the dusty roads.

"How pleased old Sally will be," said Maisie, "because of the greens!"

"P'r'aps we'd better go in somewhere," said Dennis, looking at his sister's frock; "you're getting awfully wet, and we haven't got an umbrella."

They were just pa.s.sing Dr Price's lodgings. Snip and Snap, who stood at the gate snuffing up the moist fresh air with their black noses, wagged their stumpy tails in a friendly manner to the children, and growled at Peter at the same time.

"You go in," continued Dennis, hurrying his sister up to the door, "and I'll run home and fetch umbrellas and cloaks for you. Aunt Katharine always says you're not to get wet."

Maisie would much rather have gone on with Dennis, and did not mind the rain a bit; but it was quite true that Aunt Katharine did not like her to get wet. So she yielded, and stood waiting in the little porch for the door to be opened, while Dennis sped up the road, and was soon out of sight.

"Come in, dearie, and welcome," said Mrs Budget, the doctor's landlady, when Maisie had asked for shelter, "and I'll just get a clean cloth and take off the worst of the damp."

She led the way to a very clean kitchen, talking all the while, and flapped vigorously at Maisie's skirt with a towel.

"The doctor's just in, and I says to him, 'Now I do hope, sir, you'll get your meal in comfort to-day, for it's as tidy a little bit of griskin as any one need wish to see, and done to a turn.' Owin' to his profession, he don't give his vittles no chance, the doctor don't. Most times he eats 'em standing, and then up in saddle and off again. It's a hard life, that it is, and he don't even get his nights reg'lar. Snug and warm in bed, and ring goes that bothering night-bell. If it was me, I should turn a deaf ear sometimes, pertickler in the winter.--Is your boots wet, my dear? No; then come in and see the doctor. He'll be pleased."

Maisie would have liked to stay in the kitchen with Mrs Budget, but she was too polite to refuse this invitation, and soon found herself at the door of the doctor's sitting-room.

"Little Miss Chester, sir," said Mrs Budget, "come to shelter from the rain;" and thereupon vanished to dish up the dinner.

Maisie looked curiously round the room. It was small, and smelt strongly of tobacco smoke; chairs, mantelpiece, and floor were untidily littered with old newspapers, books, pipes, and bills scattered about in confusion; a pair of boxing-gloves, which looked to her like the enormous hands of some dead giant, hung on the wall, and on each side of them a bright silver tankard on a bracket.

The doctor himself looming unnaturally large, sat sideways at the table on which a cloth was laid, reading a newspaper. He had his hat on, slightly tilted over one eye, and his booted legs were stretched out before him with an air of relief after fatigue. He jumped up when he saw the shy little figure on the threshold, and took off his hat.

"Come in, come in, Miss Maisie," he said. "Why, this _is_ an honour.

Where's your brother?"

"Dennis ran home for umbrellas," said Maisie, placing herself with some difficulty on the high horsehair-chair which he cleared with a sweep of his large hand; "it's raining fast."

"Why, so it is," said her host, glancing out of the window, "and ten minutes ago there was no sign of it. That's a good sight for the farmers. And where have you been? Far?"

"We've been to see Tuvvy," replied Maisie gravely; "he's helping Dennis, you know, with the jackdaws' house."

"Ah, to be sure," said Dr Price readily, though this was the first time he had heard of such a thing. "Tuvvy's a clever fellow, isn't he? And so he's going to stay on at the farm, after all?"

"Dennis did that, you know," said Maisie, forgetting her shyness a little. "Dennis made a Round Robin, and all the men put their names, and so Mr Solace let Tuvvy stop."

The doctor nodded, with a little smile. He seemed to know all about it, and this did not surprise Maisie, who thought it quite natural that such a great event should be widely spread.

"And since then," she went on, encouraged the attentive expression on her listener's face, "he's been as steady as steady! He doesn't have to pa.s.s the Cross Keys now, you know, because he goes home over our field, and he thinks it's partly that. It was the red blind drew him in, you see, and then he couldn't come out again."

Dr Price nodded again, and his smile widened in spite of evident efforts to conceal it, as Maisie turned her serious gaze full upon him.

"Just so," he said.

At that very minute it struck Maisie that she had made a dreadful mistake. She ought not to have mentioned red blinds to Dr Price.

Dennis had told her he was sometimes "like Tuvvy." She hung her head, and her round cheeks flushed scarlet.

"I heard all about it the other day, Miss Maisie," said the doctor in a very kind voice, "and who do you think told me? Tuvvy's little girl.

She's got a brother about the age of yours, and they both think a lot of what you did for their father."

Maisie began to forget her confusion in the interest of Tuvvy's little girl. She stole a glance at the doctor, who did not look a bit vexed at her unlucky speech, but went on as good-naturedly as ever.

"She's a nice little maid, and it's hard lines for her just now. She has to lie quite still all day because she's hurt her back. But she's very good and patient."

"Can't you make her well?" asked Maisie, remembering the firm faith of the village people in Dr Price.

"Oh, I hope so," he replied cheerfully. "But it takes time, and it's dull and lonely for her, you see, while her people are out at work all day."

"Is she _all_ alone?" asked Maisie. "Hasn't she got _any one_ to be with her?"

"Well, she's got a kitten," answered Dr Price, "and that seems a comfort to her, but that's about all. By the way, Miss Maisie," he added, "how are all your cats? What became of the kitten you offered me some time back?"

"Oh," said Maisie sorrowfully, "didn't you hear about it? We gave it to old Sally's Eliza at Upwell, and it ran out through the front shop and got lost in the streets. Aunt Katharine doesn't think we shall hear of it again now. It _was_ such a dear little kitten; not pretty like Darkie, but very good and sweet, and purred more than any of them."

"That _was_ a bad job," said the doctor sympathetically.

"Is Tuvvy's little girl's kitten a pretty one?" asked Maisie.

"Well, as to that," he replied slowly, "it looked to me about like other cats, but then I didn't notice it much, you see, because I'm not so fond of 'em as you are. If it had been a dog now, I could have told you all its points at once. The little girl--Becky her name is--was very fond of it, that's quite certain."

Deeply interested, Maisie secretly wondered what the "points" of a dog were, and concluded that they must mean its paws and the tip of its tail. After a minute's silence she put another question, rather sternly.

"What colour was it? You _must_ have seen that."

Dr Price looked quite cast down by this severe examination.

"I'm afraid I didn't," he said humbly; "you see they always look alike to me."

"There's _quite_ as much difference in them as there is in dogs," said Maisie in an instructive voice; "Madam's three last kittens were not a bit alike. One was black--we kept that; one was quite white--we gave that to Philippa; and one was stripey grey, and that was the one that went to Upwell and got lost."

"It would be odd, wouldn't it?" suggested the doctor, "if it was the one I saw at Tuvvy's."

Maisie sat very upright, with a sparkle of excitement in her eyes.

"Could it be?" she exclaimed. "How did the little girl get it?"

Dr Price shook his head with a guilty air. "Didn't ask," he said.