Penny Plain Part 17

Pamela, who had not a notion what a gazogene was, gasped the required surprise and horror and said, "But how did she do it?" which was the safest remark she could think of.

"Banged it in the sink," said Miss Watson, with a dramatic gesture, "and the bottom came out. I never thought it was possible to break a gazogene with all that wire-netting about it."

"Robina," said Miss Teenie gloomily, "could break a steam-roller let alone a gazogene."

"It'll be an awful miss," said her sister. "We've had it so long, and it always stood on the sideboard with a bottle of lemon-syrup beside it."

Pamela was puzzling to think what this could be that stood on a sideboard companioned by lemon-syrup and compa.s.sed with wire-netting when Mawson showed in Mrs. Jowett, and with her Miss Mary Dawson, and the party was complete.

The Miss Watsons greeted the newcomers brightly, having met them on bazaar committees and at Red Cross work parties, and having always been treated courteously by both ladies. They were quite willing to sink at once into a lower place now that two denizens of the Hill had come, but Pamela would have none of it.

They were the reason of the party; she made that evident at once.

Miss Teenie did not attempt the impossible and "toy" with her tea. There was no need to. The tea was delicious, and she drank three cups. She tried everything on the table and p.r.o.nounced everything excellent. Never had she felt herself so entertaining such a capital talker as now, with Pamela smiling and applauding every effort. Mrs. Jowett too, gentle lady, listened with most gratifying interest, and Miss Mary Dawson threw in kind, sensible remarks at intervals. There was no arguing, no disagreeing, everybody "clinked" with everybody else--a most pleasant party.

"And isn't it awful," said Miss Watson in a pause, "about our minister marrying?"

Pamela waited for further information before she spoke, while Mrs.

Jowett said, "Don't you consider it a suitable match?"

"Oh, well," said Miss Watson, "I just meant that it was awful unexpected. He's been a bachelor so long, and then to marry a girl twenty years younger than himself and a 'Pisc.i.p.alian into the bargain."

"But how sporting of him," Pamela said.

"Sporting?" said Miss Watson doubtfully, vague thoughts of guns and rabbits floating through her mind. "Of course you're a 'Pisc.i.p.alian too, Miss Reston, so is Mrs. Jowett: I shouldn't have mentioned it."

"I'm afraid I'm not much of anything," Pamela confessed, "but Jean Jardine has great hopes of making me a Presbyterian. I have been going with her to hear her own most delightful parson--Mr. Macdonald."

"A dear old man," said Mrs. Jowett; "he does preach so beautifully."

"Mr. Macdonald's church is the old Free Kirk, now U.F., you know," said Miss Watson in an instructive tone. "The Jardines are great Free Kirk people, like the Hopes of Hopetoun--but the Parish is far more cla.s.s, you know what I mean? You've more society there."

"What a delightful reason for worshipping in a church!" Pamela said.

"But please tell me more about your minister's bride--does she belong to Priorsford?"

"English," said Miss Teenie, "and smokes, and plays golf, and wears skirts near to her knees. What in the world she'll look like at the missionary work party or attending the prayer meeting--I cannot think.

Poor Mr. Morrison must be demented, and he is such a good preacher."

"She will settle down," said Miss Dawson in her slow, sensible way.

"She's really a very likeable girl; and if she puts all the energy she uses to play games into church-work she will be a great success. And it will be an interest having a young wife at the manse."

"I don't know," said Miss Watson doubtfully. "I always think a minister's wife should have a little money and a strong const.i.tution and be able to play the harmonium."

Miss Watson had not intended to be funny, and was rather surprised at the laughter of her hostess.

"It seems to me," she said, "that the poor woman _would_ need a strong const.i.tution."

"Well, anyway," said Miss Teenie, "she would need the money; ministers have so many claims on them. And they've a position to keep up. Here, of course, they have manses, but in Glasgow they sometimes live in flats. I don't think that's right. ... A minister should always live in a villa, or at least in a 'front door.'"

"Is your minister's bride pretty?" Pamela asked.

Miss Watson got in her word first. "Pretty," she said, "but not in a ministerial way, if you know what I mean. I wouldn't call her ladylike."

"What would you call 'ladylike'?" Pamela asked.

"Well, a good height, you know, and a nice figure and a pleasant face and tidy hair. The sort of person that looks well in a grey coat and skirt and a feather boa."

"I know exactly. What a splendid description!"

"Now," continued Miss Watson, much elated by the praise, "Mrs. Morrison is very conspicuous looking. She's got yellow hair and a bright colour, and a kind of bold way of looking."

"She's a complex character," sighed Mrs. Jowett; "she wears snakeskin shoes. But you must be kind to her, Miss Watson. I think she would appreciate kindness."

"Oh, so we are kind to her. The congregation subscribed and gave a grand piano for a wedding-present. Wasn't that good? She is very musical, you know, and plays the violin beautifully. That'll be very useful at church meetings."

"I can't imagine," said Miss Dawson, "why we should consider a minister's wife and her talents as the property of the congregation. A doctor's wife isn't at the beck and call of her husband's patients, a lawyer's wife isn't briefed along with her husband. It doesn't seem to me fair."

"How odd," said Pamela; "only yesterday I was talking to Mrs.

Macdonald--Jean's minister's wife--and I said just what you say, that it seems hard that the time of a minister's wife should be at the mercy of everyone, and she said, 'My dear, it's our privilege, and if I had my life to live again I would ask nothing better than to be a hard-working minister's hard-working wife.' I stand hat in hand before that couple.

When you think what they have given all these years to this little town--what qualities of heart and head. The tact of an amba.s.sador (Mrs.

Macdonald has that), the eloquence of a Wesley, a largesse of sympathy and help and encouragement, not to speak of more material things to everyone in need, and all at the rate of 250 per annum. Prodigious!"

"Yes," said Miss Dawson, "they have been a blessing to Priorsford for more than forty years. Mr. Macdonald is a saint, but a saint is a great deal the better of a practical wife. Mrs. Macdonald is an example of what can be accomplished by a woman both in a church and at home. I sit rebuked before her."

"Oh, my dear," said Mrs. Jowett, "no one could possibly be more helpful than you and your sisters. It's I who am the drone.... Now I must go."

The Miss Watsons outstayed the other guests, and Pamela, remembering Jean's advice, produced a few stray photographs of relations which were regarded with much interest and some awe. The photograph of her brother, Lord Bidborough, they could hardly lay down. Finally, Pamela presented them with flowers and a basket of apples newly arrived from Bidborough Manor, and they returned to Balmoral walking on air.

"Such _pleasant_ company and _such_ a tea," said Miss Watson. "She had out all her best things."

"And Mrs. Jowett and Miss Dawson were asked to meet _us_," exulted Miss Teenie.

"And very affable they were," added her sister. But when the sisters had removed their best clothes and were seated in the dining-room with the cloth laid for supper, Miss Teenie said, "All the same, it's fine to be back in our own house and not to have to heed about manners." She pulled a low chair close to the fire as she spoke and spread her skirt back over her knee and, thoroughly comfortable and at peace with the world, beamed on her sister, who replied:

"What do you say to having some toasted cheese to our supper?"

CHAPTER XII

"I hear the whaups on windy days Cry up among the peat Whaur, on the road that spiels the braes, I've heard ma ain sheep's feet.

An' the bonnie lambs wi' their canny ways And the silly yowes that bleat."

_Songs of Angus_.

Mhor, having but lately acquired the art of writing, was fond of exercising his still very shaky pen where and when he could.