Fated to Be Free Part 8

"And what's the good of being rough with 'em, ma'am? I can no more make 'em sober and sensible than I could straighten out their bushes of curly hair. No, not though I was to take my best rake to it. They're powerful plagues, bless 'em! but so far as I can see, we're in this world mainly to bring them forrard in it. I remember when my Joey was a very little chap, he was playing by me with a tin sword that he was proud of. I was sticking peas in my own garden, and a great hulking sergeant came by, and stopped a minute to ask his road. 'Don't you be afraid of me,' says Joey, very kind. 'I won't hurt 'e.' That man laughed, but the water stood in his eyes. He'd lost such a one, he said. Children air expensive, but it's very cutting to lose 'em. I've never seen any of the Mortimers in that trouble yet, though."

"And you've been many a long year with them too," observed Miss Christie.

"Ay, ma'am. Some folks air allers for change, but I've known when I was well off and they've known when they were well off." Mr. Swan said this in a somewhat pragmatical tone, and continued, "There's nothing but a long course of just dealing and respect o' both sides as can buy such digging as this here family gets out of my spade."

"Very true," said Miss Christie, who did not appear to see anything peculiar in this self-eulogy.

"But some folks forget," continued Mr. Swan, "that transplanted trees won't grow the first year, and others want too much for their money, and too good of its kind; but fair and softly, thinks I; you can't buy five shillings with threepence-halfpenny in any shop that I ever heerd of; and when you've earned half-a-crown you can't be paid it in gold."

The next morning, while Peter sat at breakfast revolving in his mind the delights he had lost, and wondering what Janie and Bertie and Hugh and Nancy were about, these staunch little friends of his were unconsciously doing the greatest damage to his future prospects--to their most important part, as he understood them, namely, his chance of coming to see the Mortimers again.

Miss Christie Grant always presided over the school-room breakfast, and John Mortimer, unless he had other visitors, breakfasted alone, generally coming down just after his children's meal was over, and having a selection of them with him morning by morning.

On this occasion, just as he came down, his children darted out of the window, exclaiming, "Oh, there's Mr. Brandon down the garden--Mr.

Brandon's come."

John walked to the window, and looked out with a certain scrutinising interest; for it was but a few weeks since a somewhat important visitor had left old Daniel Mortimer's house--one concerning whom the neighbourhood had decided that she certainly ought to become Mrs. Giles Brandon, and that it would be an odd thing if Mr. Brandon did not think so. If he did, there was every appearance that she did not, for she had gone away all but engaged to his young brother Valentine.

"He looks dull, decidedly dull, since Miss Graham left them,"

soliloquised John Mortimer. "I thought so the last time I saw him, and now I am sure of it. Poor fellow," he continued with a half smile. "I can hardly fancy him a lover, but, if he does care for that graceful little sea-nymph, it is hard on him that such a shallow-pated boy as Valentine should stand in his light;" and he stepped out to meet his guest, who was advancing in the midst of the children, while at the same time they shouted up at the open schoolroom window that Nancy must come down directly and see her G.o.dfather.

The grand lady-governess looked out in a becoming morning costume.

"A fine young man," she remarked to Miss Christie Grant.

"Yes, that's my oldest nephew, St. George they call him. Giles Brandon is his name, but his mother aye disliked the name of Giles, thought it was only fit for a ploughman. So she called him St. George, and that's what he is now, and will be."

Miss Christie Grant said this with a certain severity of manner, but she hardly knew how to combine a snubbing to the lady for her betrayal of interest in all the bachelors round, with her desire to boast of this relative. So she presently went on in a more agreeable tone. "His mother married Mr. Daniel Mortimer; he is an excellent young man. Has no debts and has been a great traveller. In short a year and a half ago he was shipwrecked, and as nearly lost his life as possible. He was picked up by Captain Graham, whose grand-daughter (no, I think Miss Graham is the old gentleman's niece) has been staying this summer with Mr. Daniel Mortimer. Mr. Brandon, ye'll understand, is only half-brother to Valentine Mortimer, whom ye frequently see."

Valentine was too young to interest the grand lady, but when by a combined carelessness of manner with judicious questioning she had discovered that the so-called St. George had a moderate independence, and prospects besides, she felt a longing wish to carry down little Anastasia herself to see her G.o.dfather, and was hardly restrained from doing so by that sense of propriety which never forsook her. In the mean time Brandon pa.s.sed out of view into the room where breakfast was spread and the little Anastasia, so named because her birth had taken place on Easter day, was brought down smiling in her sister Barbara's arms.

Peter's little love, a fair and dimpled creature, was forthwith accommodated with a chair close to her G.o.dfather, while the twins withdrew to practise their duets, and more viands were placed on the table.

The children then began to wait on their father and his guest, and during a short conversation which ensued concerning Mrs. Peter Melcombe and her boy, they were quite silent, till a pause took place and the little Anastasia lifted up her small voice and distinguished herself by saying--

"Fader, Peter's dot a dhost in his darden."

"Got a ghost!" exclaimed John Mortimer, with a look of dismay; for ghosts were the last things he wished his children to hear anything about.

"Yes," said the youngest boy Hugh, "he says he's going to be rather a grand gentleman when he's grown up, but he wishes he hadn't got a ghost."

"Then why doesn't he sell it, Huey?" asked the guest with perfect gravity.

The little fellow opened his blue eyes wider. "I don't think you know what ghosts are," he remarked.

"Oh yes, I do," answered Brandon. "I've often read about them. Some people think a good deal of them, but I never could see the fun of having them myself, and," he continued, "I never noticed any about your premises, John."

"No," answered John Mortimer, following his lead; "they would be no use for the children to play with."

"Do they scratch, then?" inquired the little Anastasia.

"No, my beauty bright, but I'm told they only wake up when it's too dark for children to play."

"Peter's ghost doesn't," observed Master Bertram. "He came in the morning."

"Did he steal anything?" inquired Brandon, still desirous, it seemed, to throw dirt at the great idea.

"Oh no, he didn't steal," said the other little boy, "that's not what they're for."

"What did he say then?"

"He gave a deep sigh, but he didn't say _nothink_."

"Ghosts," said Bertie, following up his brother's speech as one who had full information--"ghosts are not birds, they don't come to lay eggs for you, or to be of any use at all. They come for you to be afraid of.

Didn't you know that, father?"

John was too much vexed to answer, and Peter's chance from that moment of ever entering those doors again was not worth a rush.

"But you needn't mind, father dear," said Janie, the eldest child present, "Peter's ghost won't come here. It doesn't belong to 'grand,'

or to any of us. Its name was Melcombe, and it came from the sea, that they might know it was dead." John and Brandon looked at one another.

The information was far too circ.u.mstantial to be forgotten by the children, who continued their confidences now without any more irreverent interruptions. "Mrs. Melcombe gave Peter four half-crowns to give to nurse, and he had to say 'Thank you, nurse, for your kindness to me;' but nurse wasn't kind, she didn't like Peter, and she slapped him several times."

"And Mrs. Melcombe gave some more shillings to Maria," said Bertie.

"Like the garden slug," observed Brandon, "leaving a trail of silver behind her."

The said Maria, who was their little nursemaid, now came in to fetch away the children.

"Isn't this provoking," exclaimed John Mortimer, when they were gone. "I had no notion that child had been neglected and left to pick up these pernicious superst.i.tions, though I never liked his mother from the first moment I set my eyes on her."

"Why did you ask her to stay at your house then?" said Brandon, laughing.

"Giles, you know as well as I do."

Thereupon, having finished their breakfast, they set forth to walk to the town, arguing together on some subject that interested them till they reached the bank.

Behind it, in a comfortable room fitted up with library tables, leather chairs, and cases for books and papers, sat old Augustus Mortimer.

"Grand," as he was always called by his descendants, that being easier to say than his full t.i.tle of grandfather; and if John Mortimer had not taken Brandon into this room to see him, the talk about the ghost might have faded away altogether from the mind of the latter.

As it was, Grand asked after the little ones, and Brandon, standing on the rug and looking down on the fine stern features and white head, began to give him a graphic account of what little Peter Melcombe had been teaching them, John Mortimer, while he unlocked his desk and sorted out certain papers, now and then adding a touch or two in mimicry of his children's little voices.

Old Augustus said nothing, but Brandon, to his great surprise, noticed that as the narrative went on it produced a marked effect upon him; he listened with suppressed eagerness, and then with a cogitative air as if he was turning the thing over in his mind.

The conclusion of the story, how Janie had said the name of the ghost was Melcombe, John Mortimer related, for Brandon by that time was keenly alive to the certainty that they were disturbing the old man much.

A short silence followed. John was still arranging his papers, then his father said deliberately,--

"This is the first hint I ever received of any presence being supposed to haunt the place."