Magnum Bonum; Or, Mother Carey's Brood Part 21

"Dull and goody?" put in Carey. "No, no, my dear, that would be utterly futile. You can't catch my birds without salt. Can we, Polly?"

To which the popinjay responded, "We are all Mother Carey's chickens."

"I did mean salt--very real salt," said Mary, rather sadly.

"I have not got the recipe;" said Carey. "Indeed I do try to do what must be done. My boys can hold their own in Bible and Catechism questions! Ask your brother if they can't. And Army is a dear little fellow, with a bit of the angel, or of his father, in him; but when we've done our church, I see no good in decorous boredom; and if I did, what would become of the boys?"

"I don't agree to the necessity of boredom," said Mary; "but let that pa.s.s. There are things I wanted to say."

"I knew it was coming. The Colonel has been at me already, levelling his thunders at my devoted head. Won't that do?"

"Not if you heed him so little."

"My dear, if I heeded, I should be annihilated. When he says 'My good little sister,' I know he means 'You little idiot;' so if I did not think of something else, what might not be the consequence? Why, he said I was not behaving decently!"

"No more you are."

"And that I had no proper feeling," continued she, laughing almost hysterically.

"No one can wonder at his being pained. It ought never to have happened."

"Are you gone over to Mrs. Grundy? However, there's this comfort, you'll not mention Mrs. Coffinkey's sister-in-law."

"I'm sure the Colonel didn't!"

"Ellen does though, with tragic effect."

"You are not like yourself, Carey."

"No, indeed I'm not! I was a happy creature a little while ago; or was it a very long, long time ago? Then I had everybody to help me and make much of me! And now I've got into a great dull mist, and am always knocking my head against something or somebody; and when I try to keep up the old friendships and kindnesses--poor little fragments as they are--everybody falls upon me, even you, Mary."

"Pardon me, dearest. Some friendships and kindnesses that were once admirable, may be less suitable to your present circ.u.mstances."

"As if I didn't know that!" said Carey, with an angry, hurt little laugh; "and so I waited to be chaperoned up to the eyes between Clara Acton and the Duck in the very house with me. Now, Mary, I put it to you. Has one word pa.s.sed that could do harm? Isn't it much more innocent than all the Coffinkey gossip? I have no doubt Mrs. Coffinkey's sister-in-law looks up from her black-bordered pocket-handkerchief to hear how Mrs. Brownlow's sister-in-law went to the cricket-match. Do you know, Robert really thought I had been there? I only wonder how many I scored. I dare say Mrs. Coffinkey's sister-in-law knows."

"It just shows how careful you should be."

"And I wonder what would become of the children if I shut myself up with a pile of pocket-handkerchiefs bordered an inch deep. What right have they to meddle with my ways, and my friends, and my boys?"

"Not the Coffinkeys, certainly," said Mary; "but indeed, Carey, I myself was uncomfortable at that singing in the lanes at eleven at night."

"It wasn't eleven," said Carey, perversely.

"Only 10.50--eh?"

"But what was the possible harm in it?"

"None at all in itself, only remember the harm it may do to the children for you to be heedless of people's opinion, and to get a reputation for flightiness and doing odd things."

"I couldn't be like the Coffinkey pattern any more than I could be tied down to a rope walk."

"But you need not do things that your better sense must tell you may be misconstrued. Surely there was a wish that you should live near the Colonel and be guided by him."

"Little knowing that his guidance would consist in being set at me by Ellen and the Coffinkeys!"

"Nonsense," said Mary, vexed enough to resume their old school-girl manners. "You know I am not set on by anybody, and I tell you that if you do not pull up in time, and give no foundation for ill-natured comments, your children will never get over it in people's estimation.

And as for themselves, a little steadiness and regularity would be much better for their whole dispositions."

"It is holiday time," said Carey, in a tone of apology.

"If it is only in holiday time--"

"The country has always seemed like holiday. You see we used to go--all of us--to some seaside place, and be quite free there, keeping no particular hours, and being so intensely happy. I haven't yet got over the feeling that it is only for a time, and we shall go back into the dear old home and its regular ways." Then clasping her hands over her side as though to squeeze something back, she broke out, "O Mary, Mary, you mustn't scold me! You mustn't bid me tie myself to regular hours till this summer is over. If you knew the intolerable stab when I recollect that he is gone--gone--gone for ever, you would understand that there's nothing for it but jumping up and doing the first thing that comes to hand. Walking it down is best. Oh! what will become of me when the mornings get dark, and I can't get up and rush into those woods? Yes"--as Mary made some affectionate gesture--"I know I have gone on in a wild way, but who would not be wild who had lost _him_? And then they goad me, and think me incapable of proper feeling," and she laughed that horrid little laugh. "So I am, I suppose; but feeling won't go as other people think _proper_. Let me alone, Mary, I won't damage the children. They are Joe's children, and I know what he wanted and wished for them better than Robert or anybody else. But I must go my own way, and do what I can bear, and as I can, or--or I think my heart would break quite, and that would be worse for them than anything."

Mary had tears in her eyes, drawn forth by the vehement pa.s.sion of grief apparent in the whole tone of her poor little friend. She had no doubts of Carey's love, sorrow, or ability, but she did seriously doubt of her wisdom and judgment, and thought her undisciplined. However, she could say no more, for Nita Ray and Janet were advancing on them.

The next day Caroline was in bed with one of her worst headaches. Mary felt that she had been a cruel and prim old duenna, and meekly bore Clara's reproachful glances.

CHAPTER X. -- ELLEN'S MAGNUM BONUMS.

He put in his thumb And he pulled out a plum, And cried, "What a good boy am I!"

Jack Horner.

Whether it were from the effects of the warnings, or from that of native good sense, from that time forward Mrs. Joseph Brownlow sobered down, and became less distressing to her sister-in-law. Mary carried off her brother to Wales, and the Acton and Ray party dispersed, while Dr. and Mrs. Lucas came for a week, giving much relief to Mrs. Brownlow, who could discuss the family affairs with them in a manner she deemed unbecoming with Mrs. Acton or Miss Ogilvie. Had Caroline heard the consultation, she would have acquitted Ellen of malice; and indeed her Serene Highness was much too good to gossip about so near a connection, and had only confided her wonder and perplexity at the strange phenomenon to her favourite first cousin, who unfortunately was not equally discreet.

With the end of the holidays finished also the trying series of first anniversaries, and their first excitements of sorrow, so that it became possible to be more calm and quiet.

Moreover, two correctives came of themselves to Caroline. The first was Janet's inordinate correspondence with Nita Ray, and the discovery that the girl held herself engaged to stay with the sisters in November.

"Without asking me!" she exclaimed, aghast.

"I thought you heard us talking," said Janet, so carelessly, that her mother put on her dignity.

"I certainly had no conception of an invitation being given and accepted without reference to me."

"Come, now, Mother Carey," said this modern daughter; "don't be cross!

We really didn't know you weren't attending."

"If I had I should have said it was impossible, as I say now. You can never have thought over the matter!"

"Haven't I? When I am doing no good here, only wasting time?"