Penelope and the Others Part 8

"Oh, I don't know!" said Pennie. "I like both. But I think perhaps it looks nicer in summer, because you see the flowers are in bloom and the old people are sitting on the benches, and all that."

"I like winter best," said Nancy, "because of making the toast."

All the year round a visit to old Nurse was one of the children's greatest pleasures, but it was specially so to Pennie. She now felt quite cheerful and happy in the prospect, not only because she was very fond of her, but because she lived in such an extremely delightful and interesting place. For Mrs Margetts, who had been Mrs Hawthorne's nurse when she was a child, had now left service for many years and taken up her abode in the almshouse at Nearminster, or The College as it was called. Next to the cathedral Pennie thought it the nicest place she had ever seen, and there was something most attractive to her in its low-arched ma.s.sive doors, its lattice windows with their small leaded panes, and its little old chapel where the pensioners had a service and a chaplain all to themselves.

The College was built in the form of a quadrangle, one side of which faced the High Street, so that though they were snugly sheltered within from noise and turmoil, the inmates could still look out upon the busy life they had quitted. As you pa.s.sed the entrance you caught glimpses of bright green turf, of trim borders of flowers, of neat gravel paths and quaint old figures standing about, or sitting on stone benches against the walls. Over it all rested the air of peace and stillness.

It was a place where neither hope nor fear, labour nor struggle could come. These were left outside in the troublesome world, and all who entered here had nothing more to do with them. They might sit in the sun with folded hands, talk over their past hardships, grumble a little at their present aches and pains, gossip a great deal, and so get gently nearer and nearer to the deepest rest of all.

The bishop, who had founded the College long ago, still stood carved in stone over the doorway, crozier in hand, watching the many generations of weary old souls who crept in at his gate for refuge. Pennie thought he had an expression of calm severity, as if he knew how ungrateful many of them were for his bounty, how they grumbled at the smallness of the rooms, the darkness of the windows, and the few conveniences for cooking. It must be hard for him to hear all those murmurs after he had done so much for them; but he had at any rate no want of grat.i.tude to complain of in old Nurse, who was as proud of her two tiny rooms as though they had been a palace.

Mrs Margetts was in all matters disposed to think herself one of the most fortunate people upon earth. For instance, to be settled so near her dear "Miss Mary," as she still called Mrs Hawthorne, and to have the pleasure of visits from the little "ladies and gentlemen," was enough to fill anyone's heart with thankfulness. What could she want more? She was indeed highly favoured beyond all desert. Other people may have thought that a life of faithful service and unselfish devotion to the interests of her employers had well earned the reward of a few quiet years at its end. But old Nurse did not look upon her good fortune as due to any merits of her own, but to the extraordinary kindness and generosity of others, so that she was in a constant state of surprise at their thoughtfulness and affection.

Not less did she cherish and respect the memory of the days which came before Mrs Hawthorne's marriage, and this was what the children liked best to hear. Stories of Miss Mary, Master Charles, Miss Prissy, and the rest, who were now all grown-up people, never became wearisome, and certainly Nurse was never tired of telling them. Her listeners knew them almost by heart, and if by any chance she missed some small detail, it was at once demanded with a sense of injury.

Pennie, in particular, drank in her words eagerly, and would sit entranced gazing with an ever-new interest at the relics of the "family"

with which the little room was filled. Hanging by the fireplace was a very faded kettle-holder, worked in pink and green wool by Miss Mary, now Mrs Hawthorne; on the mantel-piece a photograph of a family group, in which Miss Mary appeared at the age of ten in a plaid poplin frock, low in the neck and short in the sleeves, with her hair in curls; on each side of her stood a brother with a grave face and a short jacket.

There was a great deal to be told about this picture. Nurse remembered, she said, as if it was yesterday, the day it was "took." Master Owen had a swollen cheek, and had cried and said he did not want his picture done, but he had been promised a pop-gun if he stood still, and had then submitted. And that was why he stood side-face in the photograph, while Master Charles faced you. It was almost past belief to Pennie and Nancy that Uncle Owen, who was now a tall man with a long beard, had ever been that same puffy-cheeked little boy, bribed to stand-still by a pop-gun.

There were also on the mantel-piece two white lions or "monsters," as Nurse called them, presented by Miss Prissy, and quite a number of small ornaments given from time to time by the Hawthorne children themselves.

But perhaps the crowning glory of Nurse's room was a sampler worked by herself when a girl. Pennie looked at this with an almost fearful admiration, for the number of tiny st.i.tches in it were terrible to think of. "I'm glad people don't have to work samplers now," she often said.

This was indeed a most wonderful sampler, and it hung against the wall framed and glazed as it well deserved, a lasting example of industry and eyesight. At the top sat the prophet Elijah under a small green bush receiving the ravens, who carried in their beaks neat white bundles of food. Next came the alphabet, all the big letters first, and then a row of small ones. Then the Roman numerals up to a hundred, then a verse of poetry:--

"Time like an ever-rolling stream Bears all its sons away, They fly forgotten as a dream Dies at the break of day."

And then Nurse's name, "Kezia Margetts," and the date when this great work was completed.

d.i.c.kie's favourite amongst all Nurse's curious possessions was what she called her "weather-house," a building of cardboard covered with some gritty substance which sparkled. The weather-house had two little doors, out of one of which appeared an old woman when it was fine, and out of the other an old man when it was going to be wet. They had become rather uncertain, however, in their actions, because d.i.c.kie had so often banged the naughty old man to make him go in, supposing him to have a bad influence on the weather. Nurse spoiled d.i.c.kie dreadfully, the other children considered, and they were pleased when she did not make one of the party.

"I suppose Nurse knows we're coming?" said Pennie, as they were driving from Miss Unity's house, where they had left their mother, to the College.

"Of course," replied Nancy; "you know we never take her by surprise, because she always likes to get something for tea."

"I don't think surprises are nice," said Pennie. "I like to have lots of time to look forward to a thing. That's the best part."

"I like to surprise other people though," said Nancy; "it's great fun, I think. Here we are!"

There were no old people standing about in the garden, and all the benches were empty, for it was a chilly autumn afternoon. As the children crossed the quadrangle they saw here and there, through the latticed panes, the cheerful glow of a fire.

"It must be very nice to be an old woman and live here," said Pennie.

"Well, I don't know," said Nancy. "How would you like to be Mrs Crump?"

Mrs Crump was a discontented old lady who lived in the room beneath Nurse. For some reason Nancy took a deep interest in her, and even in the middle of Nurse's best stories she was always on the alert for the least sound of the sharp complaining tones below.

"Oh, of course not!" said Pennie hastily; "I mean some contented, good-natured old woman."

"Mrs Crump says," continued Nancy, "that she never knew what it was to be quick in her temper till she felt the want of an oven. She thinks it's the baker's bread that makes her cross. She turns against it, and that makes her speak sharp."

"She's a tiresome old woman," said Pennie, "and I can't make out why you like to hear about her, or talk to her. Let's go up softly, else she'll come out."

"I should like her to," said Nancy as the little girls climbed the steep carpeted stairs which led up to Nurse's room. "She's just like an old witch woman."

The children were warmly received by Nurse, who was waiting for them with all her preparations made. A snug round tea-table, with a bunch of chrysanthemums in the middle, a kettle hissing hospitably on the hob, and something covered up hot in the fender. She herself was arrayed in her best cap, her black silk gown, and her most beaming smiles of welcome.

"It's my turn to make the toast," said Nancy, pulling off her gloves briskly. "You've got a lovely fire. You cut the bread, Pennie.

Thick."

"And how's Miss d.i.c.kie?" said Nurse, watching these preparations with a delighted face. "Bless her dear little heart, I haven't seen her this long while."

"She wanted to come," said Pennie, "but she's got a cold, so mother wouldn't let her."

"A little dear," repeated Nurse. She sat with her hands folded on her waist, turning her kind round face first on Pennie and then on Nancy, who, kneeling on the hearth, was making toast in a business-like serious manner.

"How's Mrs Crump?" inquired the latter.

"Well, she's rather contrairy in her temper just now, my dear," answered Nurse.

"She always is, isn't she?" returned Nancy.

"I can't altogether deny that, Miss Nancy," said Nurse, chuckling comfortably; "but you see it's a constant trouble with her that her room window don't look on the street. She's been used to a deal of life before she came here, and she finds it dull, and that makes her short.

When you've been used to stirring and bustling about, charing and so on, it do seem a bit quiet, I daresay."

"I should have thought," said Nancy, "that she'd have been glad to rest after all that; but I think I'd rather have a room looking on the street too. I should like watching people pa.s.s."

Pennie was sitting in her favourite place, the window-seat, where Nurse's flower-pots stood in a row--a cactus, a geranium, and some musk.

She looked out into the garden.

"I think this way's much the nicest," she said, "because of the flowers and the gra.s.s, and the quietness."

"Tea's ready!" exclaimed Nancy, springing up from the fire with one scarlet cheek, and waving the last piece of toast on the top of the toasting-fork.

The little party drew in their chairs, Pennie pouring out tea, as usual on these occasions, for to her own great delight Nurse was always treated rather as a guest than hostess. By the good luck which, she considered, always attended her, she had that very morning received a present of a pot of honey, and she was pressing this on her visitors when the sound of a footstep was heard on the stairs.

"Perhaps it's Mrs Crump!" exclaimed Nancy eagerly. "If it is, do ask her to tea."

"It isn't Mrs Crump," said Pennie, listening; "it's somebody whose boots are much too big."

The steps came slowly up the steep stairs, one at a time, with evident difficulty, and then there was a timid knock at the door.

"I know who it is. You may come in, Kettles," said Nurse, raising her voice.

The door opened and Kettles came in. She was a little girl of about Nancy's age, in a tattered frock, an old shawl, and a straw bonnet hanging back from her head by the strings. Her hair fell rough and tangled over her forehead, beneath which a pair of bright grey eyes looked out half suspiciously at the company, and yet with a sort of mouse-like shrewdness, which was increased by the whole expression of her sharp little pointed face. Pennie glanced at once at her feet. She had been right. Kettles' boots were many sizes too large for her, which accounted for her difficulty in getting upstairs, and indeed everything she wore seemed to belong to a bigger and older person.

The children both stared in surprise at this little dingy figure, and Kettles returned their gaze, shifting her furtive glance from one face to the other with wonderful swiftness as she stood just inside the door, clasping a cracked china jug to her chest.

"You've come for my tea-leaves, haven't you?" said Nurse as she opened her corner cupboard and took out a basin. "How's your mother to-day?"

"She's bad," said Kettles decidedly, shutting up her mouth very tight after she had spoken.