Captain Jim Part 4

"I suppose so," said Norah meekly. "But I can be useful, Daddy."

He patted her shoulder.

"Of course you can, mate. I'm only afraid you'll have too much to do.

I must say I wish Brownie were here instead of in Australia."

"Dear old Brownie, wouldn't she love it all!" said Norah, her eyes tender at the thought of the old woman who had been nurse and mother, and mainspring of the Billabong house, since Norah's own mother had laid her baby in her kind arms and closed tired eyes so many years ago. "Wouldn't she love fixing the house! And how she'd hate cooking with coal instead of wood! Only nothing would make Brownie bad-tempered."

"Not even Wal and I," said Jim. "And I'll bet we were trying enough to damage a saint's patience. However, as we can't have Brownie, I suppose you'll advertise for some one else, Dad?"

"Oh, I suppose so--but sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof,"

returned Mr. Linton. "I've thought of nothing but this inheritance of Norah's all day, and I'm arriving at the conclusion that it's going to be an inheritance of something very like hard work!"

"Well, that's all right, 'cause there shouldn't be any loafers in war-time," Norah said. She looked out of the window. "The rain is stopping; come along, everybody, and we'll go down Regent Street on a 'bus." To do which Norah always maintained was the finest thing in London.

They went down to see Norah's inheritance two days later. A quick train from London dropped them at a tiny station, where the stationmaster, a grizzled man apparently given over to the care of nasturtiums, directed them to Homewood. A walk of a mile along a wide white road brought them to big iron gates, standing open, beside a tiny lodge with diamond-paned windows set in lattice-work, under overhanging eaves; and all smothered with ivy out of which sparrows fluttered busily. The lodgekeeper, a neat woman, looked at the party curiously: no doubt the news of their coming had spread.

From the lodge the drive to the house wound through the park--a wide stretch of green, with n.o.ble trees, oak, beech and elm; not towering like Norah's native gum-trees, but flinging wide arms as though to embrace as much as possible of the beauty of the landscape. Bracken, beginning to turn gold, fringed the edge of the gravelled track. A few sheep and cows were to be seen, across the gra.s.s.

"Nice-looking sheep," said Mr. Linton.

"Yes, but you wouldn't call it over-stocked," was Jim's comment. Jim was not used to English parks. He was apt to think of any gra.s.s as "feed," in terms of so many head per acre.

The drive, well-gravelled and smoothly rolled, took them on, sauntering slowly, until it turned in a great sweep round a lawn, ending under a stone porch flung out from the front of the house. A wide porch, almost a verandah; to the delighted eyes of the Australians, who considered verandah-less houses a curious English custom, verging on lunacy. Near the house it was shut in with gla.s.s, and furnished with a few lounge chairs and a table or two.

"That's a jolly place!" Jim said quickly.

The house itself was long and rambling, and covered with ivy. There were big windows--it seemed planned to catch all the sunlight that could possibly be tempted into it. The lawn ended in a terrace with a stone bal.u.s.trade, where one could sit and look across the park and to woods beyond it--now turning a little yellow in the sunlight, and soon to glow with orange and flame-colour and bronze, when the early frosts should have painted the dying leaves. From the lawn, to right and left, ran shrubberies and flower-beds, with winding gra.s.s walks.

"Why, it's lovely!" Norah breathed. She slipped a hand into her father's arm.

Jim rang the bell. A severe butler appeared, and explained that General and Mrs. Somers had gone out for the day, and had begged that Mr. Linton and his party would make themselves at home and explore the house and grounds thoroughly: an arrangement which considerably relieved the minds of the Australians, who had rather dreaded the prospect of "poking about" the house under the eyes of its tenants.

The butler stiffened respectfully at the sight of the boys' uniforms.

It appeared presently that he had been a mess-sergeant in days gone by, and now regarded himself as the personal property of the General.

"Very sorry they are to leave the 'ouse, too, sir," said the butler.

"A nice place, but too big for them."

"Haven't they any children?" Norah asked.

"Only the Captain, miss, and he's in Mesopotamia, which is an 'orrible 'ole for any gentleman to be stuck in," said the butler with a fine contempt for Mesopotamia and all its works. "And the mistress is tired of 'ousekeeping, so they're going to live in one of them there family 'otels, as they call them." The butler sighed, and then, as if conscious of having lapsed from correct behaviour, stiffened to rigidity and became merely butler once more. "Will you see the 'ouse now, sir?"

They entered a wide hall in which was a fireplace that drew an exclamation from Norah, since she had not seen so large a one since she left Billabong. This was built to take logs four feet long, to hold which ma.s.sive iron dogs stood in readiness. Big leather armchairs and couches and tables strewn with magazines and papers, together with a faint fragrance of tobacco in the air, gave to the hall a comforting sense of use. The drawing-room, on the other hand, was chillingly splendid and formal, and looked as though no one had ever sat in the brocaded chairs: and the great dining room was almost as forbidding. The butler intimated that the General and his wife preferred the morning-room, which proved to be a cheery place, facing south and west, with a great window-recess filled with flowering plants.

"This is jolly," Jim said. "But so would the other rooms be, if they weren't so awfully empty. They only want people in them."

"Tired people," Norah said.

"Yes," Wally put in. "I'm blessed if I think they would stay tired for long, here."

There was a long billiard-room, with a ghostly table shrouded in dust-sheets; and upstairs, a range of bedrooms of all shapes and sizes, but all bright and cheerful, and looking out upon different aspects of park and woodland. Nothing was out of order; everything was plain, but care and taste were evident in each detail. Then, down a back staircase, they penetrated to outer regions where the corner of Norah's soul that Brownie had made housewifely rejoiced over a big, bright kitchen with pantries and larders and sculleries of the most modern type. The cook, who looked severe, was reading the _Daily Mail_ in the servants' hall; here and there they had glimpses of smart maids, irreproachably clad, who seemed of a race apart from either the cheery, friendly housemaids of Donegal, or Sarah and Mary of Billabong, who disliked caps, but had not the slightest objection to helping to put out a bush-fire or break in a young colt. Norah tried to picture the Homewood maids at either task, and failed signally.

From the house they wandered out to visit well-appointed stables with room for a dozen horses, and a garage where a big touring car stood--Norah found herself quite unable to realize that it belonged to her! But in the stables were living things that came and nuzzled softly in her hand with inquiring noses that were evidently accustomed to gifts of sugar and apples, and Norah felt suddenly, for the first time, at home. There were two good cobs, and a hunter with a beautiful lean head and splendid shoulders; a Welsh pony designed for a roomy tub-cart in the coach house; and a good old stager able for anything from carrying a nervous rider to drawing a light plough. The cobs, the groom explained, were equally good in saddle or harness; and there was another pony, temporarily on a visit to a vet., which Sir John had liked to ride. "But of course Killaloe was Sir John's favourite," he added, stroking the hunter's soft brown muzzle. "There wasn't no one could show them two the way in a big run."

They tore themselves with difficulty from the stables, and, still guided by the butler, who seemed to think he must not let them out of his sight, wandered through the grounds. Thatched cottage, orchard, and walled garden, rosery, with a pergola still covered with late blooms, lawns and shrubberies. There was nothing very grand, but all was exquisitely kept; and a kind of still peace brooded over the beauty of the whole, and made War and its shadows seem very far away.

The farms, well-tilled and prosperous-looking, were at the western side of the park: Mr. Linton and Jim talked with the tenant whose lease was expiring while Norah and Wally sat on an old oak log and chatted to the butler, who told them tales of India, and asked questions about Australia, being quite unable to realize any difference between the natives of the two countries. "All n.i.g.g.e.rs, I calls them," said the butler loftily.

"That seems a decent fellow," said Mr. Linton, as they walked back across the park. "Hawkins, the tenant-farmer, I mean. Has he made a success of his place, do you know?"

"'Awkins 'as an excellent name, sir," replied the butler. "A good, steady man, and a rare farmer. The General thinks 'ighly of 'im.

'E's sorry enough that 'is lease is up, 'Awkins is."

"I think of renewing it, under slightly different conditions," Mr.

Linton observed. "I don't wish to turn the man out, if he will grow what I want."

"Well, that's good news," said the butler heartily. "I'm sure 'Awkins'll do anything you may ask 'im to, sir." A sudden dull flush came into his cheeks, and he looked for a moment half-eagerly at Mr.

Linton, as if about to speak. He checked himself, however, and they returned to the house, where, by the General's orders, coffee and sandwiches awaited the visitors in the morning-room. The butler flitted about them, seeing to their comfort un.o.btrusively.

"If I may make so bold as to ask, sir," he said presently, "you'll be coming to live here shortly?"

"As soon as General Somers leaves," Mr. Linton answered.

The man dropped his voice, standing rigidly to attention.

"I suppose, sir," he said wistfully, "you would not be needing a butler?"

"A butler--why. I hadn't thought of such a thing," said Mr. Linton, laughing. "There are not very many of you in Australia, you know."

"But indeed, sir, you'll need one, in a place like this," said the ex-sergeant, growing bold. "Every one 'as them--and if you would be so kind as to consider if I'd do, sir? I know the place, and the General 'ud give me a good record. I've been under him these fifteen years, but he doesn't need me after he leaves here."

"Well----" said Mr. Linton thoughtfully. "But we shan't be a small family--we mean to fill this place up with officers needing rest.

We're coming here to work, not to play."

"Officers!" said the ex-sergeant joyfully. "But where'd you get any one to 'elp you better, sir? Lookin' after officers 'as been my job this many a year. And I'd serve you faithful, sir."

Norah slipped her hand into her father's arm.

"We really would need him, I believe, Daddy," she whispered.

"You would, indeed, miss," said the butler gratefully. "I could valet the young gentlemen, and if there's any special attention needed, I could give it. I'd do my very utmost, miss. I'm old to go out looking for a new place at my time of life. And if you've once been in the Army, you like to stay as near it as you can."

"Well, we'll see," Mr. Linton said guardedly. "I'll probably write to General Somers about you." At which the butler, forgetting his butlerhood, came smartly to attention--and then became covered with confusion and concealed himself as well as he could behind a coffee-pot.

"You might do much worse," Jim remarked, on their way to the station.

"He looks a smart man--and though this place is glorious, it's going to take a bit of running. Keep him for a bit, at any rate, Dad."

"I think it might be as well," Mr. Linton answered. He turned at a bend in the drive, to look back at Homewood, standing calm and peaceful in its cl.u.s.tering trees. "Well, Norah, what do you think of your property?"