Nancy Part 19

"I think I like 'Why was Balaam like a Life-Guardsman?' better, _on the whole_," I say, presently, peeping through my fingers, and speaking with a suspicious tremble in my voice.

"I have no doubt it is far superior," he answers, in a fierce and sulky tone, that he in vain tries to make sound playful. "'_Balaam like a Life-Guardsman?_' and why was he, may I ask? Something humorous about his donkey, I suppose."

"Because he had a queer a.s.s (cuira.s.s)," reply I, again exploding, and hiding my face in the back of the chair.

"A _queer a.s.s_!" (in a tone of the profoundest contempt); "you have no more sentiment in you than _this table_!" smiting it with his bare hand.

"I know I have not," say I, sitting up, and holding my hand to my side to ease the pain my excessive mirth has caused; "they always said so at home. Oh, here is the general! we will make _him_ umpire, which is funniest, yours or mine!"

Sir Roger enters, and glances in some surprise from Frank's crimson face to my convulsed one.

"Oh, general, do we not look as if we had been having an affecting parting?" cry I, jumping up and running to him. "Do not I look as if I had been crying? Quite the contrary, I a.s.sure you. But Musgrave and I have been asking each other such amusing riddles--would you like to hear them? _Mine_ is good, plain, vulgar English, but his is French, so we will begin with _it_--'_Mon premier_--'"

I stop suddenly, for Mr. Musgrave is looking at me with an expression simply _murderous_.

"Well, what are you stopping for? I am on the horns of expectation--'_Mon premier_--'"

"After all, it is not so funny as I thought," I answer, brusquely. "I think we will keep it for some wet Sunday afternoon, when we are short of something to do."

CHAPTER XIV.

The day of departure has really come. We have eaten our last bif-teck _aux pommes frites_, and drank our last cup of coffee in the Saxe. I have had my last look at the familiar square, at the great dome of the Frauen Kirchen, at the high houses with their dormer-windows, at the ugly big statue standing with its stiff black back rudely turned to the hotel, at the piled hay-carts. We are really and truly off. Our faces are set Barbara-ward, Bobby-ward, jackdaw-ward. I am in such rampaging spirits, that I literally do not know what to do with myself. I feel that I should like to tuck my tail, if I had one, between my legs, like Vick, and race round and round in an insane and unmeaning circle, as she does on the lawn at home, when oppressed by the overflow of her own gayety.

It seems to me as if there never had been such a day. I look at the sky as we drive along to the station. Call it sapphire, turquoise--indeed!

What dull stone that ever lived darkling in a mine is fit to be named even in metaphor with this pale yet brilliant arch that so softly leans above us? It seems to me as if all the people we meet were handsome and well-featured--as if the Elbe were the n.o.blest river that ever ran, carrying the sunlight in flakes of gold and diamond on its breast--as if all life were one long and kindly jest.

As we reach the station I see Mr. Musgrave standing on the pavement awaiting us, with a sort of mixed and compound look on his face.

"Here is Mr. Musgrave come to see us off!" I cry, jocundly. "Come to say '_Adieu!_' ha! ha! I must not forget to ask him whether he has any more riddles."

"For Heaven's sake do not!" cries Sir Roger, smiling in spite of himself, yet seriously and earnestly desirous of checking my wit. "Let the poor boy have a little peace! He no more understands chaff than I understand Pa.r.s.ee."

I hop out of the carriage like a parched pea, scorning equally the step and Frank's hand extended to help me. I feel to-day as if I need only stand on tiptoe, and stretch out my arms in order to be able to fly.

"So you have come to see the last of us," I say, trying to pull a long face, and walking with him into the waiting-room.

"Yes; rather a mistake, is not it?" he says, somewhat gloomily, but loading himself at once, with ostentatious haste (in memory of my former reproof), with my bag, parasol, and novel.

"The day after--the day after--the day after to-morrow," say I, smiling cheerfully up in his dismal face. "You may fancy us just turning in at the park-gates--by-the-by, have you any message to send to the boys, to Barbara?"

"None to the boys," he answers, half smiling, too. "I hate boys: you may give my love to Barbara if you like, and if you are quite sure that she is like the St. Catherine."

"Wait till you see her," say I, oracularly.

"But when _shall_ I see her?" he asks, roused into an eagerness which I think promises admirably for Barbara; "when are you coming home, really?"

"Keep a good lookout at your lodge," I say, gayly, "and you will no doubt see us arrive some fine day, looking very foolish, most probably--crawling along like snails, dragged by our tenants."

"Were you _ever_ known to answer a plain question plainly since you were born?" he cries, petulantly. "When are you likely to come _really_?"

"'I know not! What avails to know?'" reply I, pompously spouting a line out of some forgotten poem that has lurked in my memory, and now struts out, to the anger and discomfiture of Mr. Musgrave.

"Ah! here are the doors opening."

Everybody pours out on to the platform, and into the empty and expectant train.

Sir Roger and I get into a carriage--_not_ a _coupe_ this time--and dispose our myriad parcels above our heads, under our feet. Trucks roll, and porters bawl past; luggage is violently shot into vans. The last belated, panting pa.s.senger has got in. The doors are slammed-to. Off we go! The train is already in motion when the young man jumps on the step and thrusts in his hand for one parting shake.

"_Mon tout_," say I, s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g up my face into a crying shape, and speaking in a squeaky, pseudo-tearful voice, "_je ne saurai vous le dire!_"

Then he is hustled off by an indignant guard and three porters, and we see him no more. I throw myself back into my corner laughing.

"General," say I, "I think your young friend is nearly as soft-hearted as the girl in Tennyson who was

'Tender over drowning flies.'

He looked as if he were going to _weep_, did not he? and what on earth about?"

CHAPTER XV.

"How mother, when we used to stun Her head wi' all our noisy fun, Did wish us all a-gone from home; But now that some be dead and some Be gone, and, oh, the place is dumb, How she do wish wi' useless tears To have again about her ears The voices that be gone!"

We have pa.s.sed Cologne; have pa.s.sed Brussels; have pa.s.sed Calais and Dover; have pa.s.sed London; we are drawing near home. How refreshing sounds the broad voice of the porters at Dover! Squeamish as I am, after an hour and three-quarters of a nice, short, chopping sea, the sight of the dear green-fustian jackets, instead of the slovenly blue blouses across-Channel, goes nigh to revive me. Adieu, O neatly aquiline, broad-shaved French faces! Welcome, O bearded Britons, with your rough-hewn noses!

To avoid the heat of the day, we go down from London by a late afternoon train. It is evening when, almost _before_ the train has stopped, I insist on jumping out at our station. Imagine if through some accident we were carried on to the next by mistake!

Such a thing has never happened in the annals of history, but still it _might_.

Sir Roger has some considerable difficulty in hindering me from shaking hands with the whole staff of officials. One veteran porter, who has been here ever since I was born, has a polite but improbable trick of addressing _every_ female pa.s.senger as "my lady." Well, with regard to _me_, at least, he is right now. I _am_ "my lady." Ha! ha! I have not nearly got over the ridiculousness of this fact yet, though I have been in possession of it now these _four_ whole weeks.

It has been a hot, parching summer day, and now that the night draws on all the flagging flowers in the cottage-borders are straightening themselves anew, and lifting their leaves to the dews. The pale bean-flowers, in the broad bean-fields, as we pa.s.s, send their delicate scent over the hedge to me, as if it were some fair and courteous speech. To me it seems as if they were saying, as plainly as may be, "Welcome home, Nancy!"

The sky that has been all of one hue during the live-long day--wherever you looked, nothing but pale, _pale_ azure--is now like the palette of some G.o.d-painter splashed and freaked with all manner of great and n.o.ble colors--a most regal blaze of gold--wide plains of crimson, as if all heaven were flashing at some high thought--little feathery cloud-islands of tenderest rose-pink. We are coming very near now. There, down below, set round its hips with tall rushes, is our pool, all blood-red in the sunset! Can _that_ be colorless water--that great carmine fire? There are our elms, with their heads in the sunset, too.

"General," say I, very softly, putting my hand through his arm, and speaking in a small tone of unutterable content, "I should like to kiss everybody in the world."

"Perhaps you would not mind beginning with _me_," returns he, gayly; then--for I look quite capable of it--glancing slightly over his shoulder at the vigilant couple in the d.i.c.key.

"No, I did not mean _really_."