Short Cruises Part 29

Mr. Jobling shook his head over lost opportunities. "I'm too old," he remarked.

"He's forty-seven," said his wife.

"Best age for a man, in my opinion," said the girl; "just entering his prime. And a man is as old as he feels, you know."

Mr. Jobling nodded acquiescence and observed that he always felt about twenty-two; a state of affairs which he ascribed to regular habits, and a great partiality for the company of young people.

"I was just twenty-two when I married," he mused, "and my missis was just six months-"

"You leave my age alone," interrupted his wife, trembling with pa.s.sion.

"I'm not so fond of telling my age to strangers."

"You told mine," retorted Mr. Jobling, "and n.o.body asked you to do that.

Very free you was in coming out with mine."

"I ain't the only one that's free," breathed the quivering Mrs. Jobling.

"I 'ope your ankle is better?" she added, turning to the visitor.

"Much better, thank you," was the reply.

"Got far to go?" queried Mrs. Jobling.

The girl nodded. "But I shall take a tram at the end of the street," she said, rising.

Mr. Jobling rose too, and all that he had ever heard or read about etiquette came crowding into his mind. A weekly journal patronized by his wife had three columns regularly, but he taxed his memory in vain for any instructions concerning brown-eyed strangers with sprained ankles. He felt that the path of duty led to the tram-lines. In a somewhat blundering fashion he proffered his services; the girl accepted them as a matter of course.

Mrs. Jobling, with lips tightly compressed, watched them from the door.

The girl, limping slightly, walked along with the utmost composure, but the bearing of her escort betokened a mind fully conscious of the scrutiny of the street.

He returned in about half an hour, and having this time to run the gauntlet of the street alone, entered with a mien which caused his wife's complaints to remain unspoken. The cough of Mr. Brown, a particularly contagious one, still rang in his ears, and he sat for some time in fierce silence.

"I see her on the tram," he said, at last. "Her name's Robinson-Miss Robinson."

"Indeed!" said his wife.

"Seems a nice sort o' girl," said Mr. Jobling, carelessly. "She's took quite a fancy to you."

"I'm sure I'm much obliged to her," retorted his wife.

"So I-so I asked her to give you a look in now and then," continued Mr.

Jobling, filling his pipe with great care, "and she said she would.

It'll cheer you up a bit."

Mrs. Jobling bit her lip and, although she had never felt more fluent in her life, said nothing. Her husband lit his pipe, and after a rapid glance in her direction took up an old newspaper and began to read.

He astonished Mrs. Jobling next day by the gift of a geranium in full bloom. Surprise impeded her utterance, but she thanked him at last with some warmth, and after a little deliberation decided to put it in the bedroom.

Mr. Jobling looked like a man who has suddenly discovered a flaw in his calculations. "I was thinking of the front parlor winder," he said, at last.

"It'll get more sun upstairs," said his wife.

She took the pot in her arms, and disappeared. Her surprise when she came down again and found Mr. Jobling rearranging the furniture, and even adding a choice ornament or two from the kitchen, was too elaborate to escape his notice.

"Been going to do it for some time," he remarked.

Mrs. Jobling left the room and strove with herself in the scullery. She came back pale of face and with a gleam in her eye which her husband was too busy to notice.

"It'll never look much till we get a new hearthrug," she said, shaking her head. "They've got one at Jackson's that would be just the thing; and they've got a couple of tall pink vases that would brighten up the fireplace wonderful. They're going for next to nothing, too."

Mr. Jobling's reply took the form of uncouth and disagreeable growlings.

After that phase had pa.s.sed he sat for some time with his hand placed protectingly in his trouser-pocket. Finally, in a fierce voice, he inquired the cost.

Ten minutes later, in a state fairly evenly divided between pleasure and fury, Mrs. Jobling departed with the money. Wild yearnings for courage that would enable her to spend the money differently, and confront the dismayed Mr. Jobling in a new hat and jacket, possessed her on the way; but they were only yearnings, twenty-five years' experience of her husband's temper being a sufficient safeguard.

Miss Robinson came in the day after as they were sitting down to tea.

Mr. Jobling, who was in his shirt-sleeves, just had time to disappear as the girl pa.s.sed the window. His wife let her in, and after five remarks about the weather sat listening in grim pleasure to the efforts of Mr.

Jobling to find his coat. He found it at last, under a chair cushion, and, somewhat red of face, entered the room and greeted the visitor.

Conversation was at first rather awkward. The girl's eyes wandered round the room and paused in astonishment on the pink vases; the beauty of the rug also called for notice.

"Yes, they're pretty good," said Mr. Jobling, much gratified by her approval.

"Beautiful," murmured the girl. "What a thing it is to have money!" she said, wistfully.

"I could do with some," said Mr. Jobling, with jocularity. He helped himself to bread and b.u.t.ter and began to discuss money and how to spend it. His ideas favored retirement and a nice little place in the country.

"I wonder you don't do it," said the girl, softly.

Mr. Jobling laughed. "Gingell and Watson don't pay on those lines," he said. "We do the work and they take the money."

"It's always the way," said the girl, indignantly; "they have all the luxuries, and the men who make the money for them all the hardships. I seem to know the name Gingell and Watson. I wonder where I've seen it?"

"In the paper, p'r'aps," said Mr. Jobling.

"Advertising?" asked the girl.

Mr. Jobling shook his head. "Robbery," he replied, seriously. "It was in last week's paper. Somebody got to the safe and got away with nine hundred pounds in gold and bank-notes."

"I remember now," said the girl, nodding, "Did they catch them?"

"No, and not likely to," was the reply.

Miss Robinson opened her big eyes and looked round with an air of pretty defiance. "I am glad of it," she said.

"Glad?" said Mrs. Jobling, involuntarily breaking a self-imposed vow of silence. "Glad?"

The girl nodded. "I like pluck," she said, with a glance in the direction of Mr. Jobling; "and, besides, whoever took it had as much right to it as Gingell and Watson; they didn't earn it."