Sisters Three Part 2

"I think I'll stay and talk to you, if you don't mind," said Norah, seating herself on an oak stool by the fire, and holding out a thin, brown hand to shade her face from the blaze. "I'm very fond of talking when I get to know people a little bit. Raymond told us that you were reading at home to prepare for college, and that you didn't like it. I suppose that is why you are tired of books. I wish I were in your place! I'd give anything to go to a town, and get on with my studies, but I have to stay at home and learn from a governess. Wouldn't it be nice if we could change places? Then we should both be pleased, and get what we liked."

The young fellow gave a laugh of amus.e.m.e.nt. "I don't think I should care for the governess," he said, "though she seems awfully kind and jolly, if she is the lady who looked after me last night. I've had enough lessons to last me for the rest of my life, and I want to get to work, but my father is bent on having a clever son, and can't make up his mind to be disappointed."

"And aren't you clever? I don't think you look exactly stupid!" said Norah, so innocently, that Rex burst into a hearty laugh.

"Oh, I hope I'm not so bad as that. I am what is called 'intelligent,'

don't you know, but I shall never make a scholar, and it is waste of time and money to send me to college. It is not in me. I am not fond of staying in the house and poring over books and papers. I couldn't be a doctor and spend my life in sick-rooms; the law would drive me crazy, and I could as soon jump over a mountain as write two new sermons a week. I want to go abroad--to India or Ceylon, or one of those places-- and get into a berth where I can be all day walking about in the open air, and looking after the natives."

"Oh, I see. You don't like to work yourself, but you feel that it is 'in you' to make other people exert themselves! You would like to have a lot of poor coolies under you, and order them about from morning till night--that's what you mean. I think you must be very lazy to talk like that!" said Norah, nodding her head in such a meaning fashion that the young fellow flushed in embarra.s.sment.

"Indeed, I'm nothing of the kind. I am very energetic--in my own way.

There are all sorts of gifts, and everyone knows which one has fallen to his share. It's stupid to pretend that you don't, I know I am not intellectual, but I also know that I have a natural gift of management.

At school I had the arrangement of all the games and sports, and the fellows would obey me when no one else could do anything with them. I should like to have a crowd of workmen under me--and I'll tell you this!

they would do more work, and do it better, and be more contented over it, than any other workmen in the district!"

"Gracious!" cried Norah, "you are conceited! But I believe you are right. It's something in your eyes--I noticed it as soon as I saw you-- a sort of commanding look, and a flash every now and then when you aren't quite pleased. They flashed like anything just now, when I said you were lazy! The poor coolies would be frightened out of their senses. But you needn't go abroad unless you like. You could stay at home and keep a school."

"No, thank you. I know too much about it. I don't want the life worried out of me by a lot of boys. I could manage them quite well though, if I chose."

"You couldn't manage me!" Norah brought her black brows together in defiant fashion, but the challenge was not taken up, for Master Rex simply e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed, "Oh, girls! I wasn't talking about girls," and laid his head against the cushions in such an indifferent fashion that Norah felt snubbed; and the next question came in a very subdued little voice--"Don't you--er--_like_ girls?"

"Ye-es--pretty well--the ones I know. I like my sister, of course, but we have only seen each other in the holidays for the last six years.

She is sixteen now, and has to leave school because her chest is delicate, and she has come home to be coddled. She don't like it a bit--leaving school, I mean--so it seems that none of us are contented.

She's clever, in music especially; plays both violin and piano uncommonly well for a girl of her age."

"Oh, does she? That's my gift. I play the violin beautifully," cried Norah modestly, and when Rex laughed aloud she grew angry, and protested in snappish manner, "Well, you said yourself that we could not help knowing our own talents. It's quite true, I _do_ play well. Everyone says so. If you don't believe it, I'll get my violin and let you hear."

"I wish you would! Please forgive me for laughing, I didn't mean to be rude, but it sounded so curious that I forgot what I was doing. Do play! I should love to hear you."

Norah walked across the room and lifted the beloved violin from its case. Her cheeks were flushed, and she was tingling with the remembrance of that incredulous laugh, but her anger only made her the more resolved to prove the truth of her words. She stood before Rex in the firelight, her slim figure drawn up to its full height, and the first sweep of the bow brought forth a sound so sweet and full, that he started in amazement. The two sisters in the adjoining room stopped their work to listen, and whispered to one another that they had never heard Norah play so well; and when at last she dropped her arms, and stood waiting for Rex to give his verdict, he could only gasp in astonishment.

"I say, it's wonderful! You can play, and no mistake! What is the piece? I never heard it before. It's beautiful. I like it awfully."

"Oh, nothing. It isn't a piece. I made it up as I went along. It is too dark to see the music, and I love wandering along just as I like.

I'll play you some pieces later on when the lamps are lit."

"I say, you know, you are most awfully clever! If you play like that now, you could do as well as any of those professional fellows if you had a chance. And to be able to compose as well! You are a genius--it isn't talent--it's real, true, genuine genius!"

"Oh, do you think so? Do you really, truly think so?" cried Norah pitifully. "Oh, I wish you would say so to father! He won't let us go away to school, and I do so long and pine to have more lessons. I learnt in London ever since I was a tiny little girl, and from a very good master, but the last three years I have had to struggle on by myself. Father is not musical himself, and so he doesn't notice my playing, but if you would tell him what you think--"

"I'll tell him with pleasure; but if he won't allow you to leave home, I don't see what is to be done--unless--look here! I've got an idea. My sister may want to take lessons, and if there were two pupils it might be worth while getting a man down from Preston or Lancaster. Ella couldn't come here, because she can only go out on fine days, but you could come to us, you know. It would make it so much more difficult if the fellow had to drive six miles over the mountains, and we are nearer a station than you are here. I should think it could be managed easily enough. I'll write to the mater about it if you like."

"Will you, really? How lovely of you! Oh, it would be quite too delightful if it could be managed. I'd bless you for ever. Oh, isn't it a good thing you sprained your ankle?" cried Norah in a glow of enthusiasm, and the burst of laughter which followed startled the occupants of the next room by its ring of good fellowship.

"Really," said Hilary, "the strange boy must be nicer than we thought.

Norah and he seem to be getting quite good friends. Let us hurry up, and go and join them."

CHAPTER FOUR.

ROUND THE FIRE.

Mrs Freer wrote a grateful letter to Mr Bertrand, thanking him for his hospitality to her son, and arranging to drive over for Rex on the following Sat.u.r.day afternoon, so that Hilary's anxiety was at an end, and she could enjoy the strange boy's society with an easy mind. After Norah had broken the ice, there was no further feeling of shyness. When Rex hobbled downstairs at ten o'clock in the morning, he ensconced himself on the old-fashioned sofa in the sewing-room, and remained there until he adjourned into the drawing-room for the evening. The boys came in and out as they pleased, Miss Briggs coddled him and brought him cups of beef-tea, but it was upon the girls that he chiefly depended for amus.e.m.e.nt. In the morning they were busy with their household duties; but, as regular lessons had not begun, afternoon was a free time, and while Norah drew, Lettice carved, and Hilary occupied herself manufacturing fineries for the London visit, a brisk clatter of tongues was kept up, in which the invalid took his full part. The sound of five-finger exercises would come from the schoolroom overhead, but so soon as four o'clock struck, the Mouse would steal in, in her little white pinafore, and creep on to the corner of the sofa. She and the "strange boy" had made friends at once, and were on the best of terms.

"I wish you lived with us for ever!" she said one afternoon, looking lovingly in his face, as he stroked her wavy locks.

"And I wish you lived with me, Mouse," he answered. "I should like a little sister like you, with a tiny pointed chin, and a tiny little nose, and big dark eyes. You are a real little mouse. It is exactly the right name for you."

"No, it's my wrong name. My true name is Geraldine Audrey. It's written that way in the Bible."

"Dear me! that's a big name for a small person. And who gave you that name?" asked Rex, laughing. But the child's face did not relax from its characteristic gravity as she replied--

"My G.o.dfathers and my G.o.dmothers, and a silver mug, and a knife and fork in a case, with 'GAB' written on the handles. Only I mayn't use them till I'm seven, in case I cut my fingers."

Dear little Geraldine Audrey! Everyone loved her. She was always so desperately in earnest, so unsuspicious of fraud, that her little life was made a burden to her in the holidays by reason of the pranks of her big brothers. They sent her into village shops to demand "a halfpenny- worth of pennies," they kept her shivering in the drive staring at the lions on the top of the gate-posts, to see them wag their tails when they heard the clock strike twelve; they despatched her into the garden with neat little packets of salt to put on the birds' tails, and watched the poor mite's efforts in contortions of laughter from behind the window curtains. The Mouse was more sorrowful than angry when the nature of these tricks was explained to her. "I fought you told the trufh," she would say quietly, and then Raymond and Bob would pick her up in their arms, and try to make amends for their wickedness by petting her for the rest of the day.

On the third day of Rex's visit, the weather was so tempestuous that even Raymond and Bob did not stir from the house. They spent the morning over chemical experiments in the schoolroom, but when afternoon came they wearied of the unusual confinement and were glad to join the cosy party downstairs. Norah had a brilliant inspiration, and suggested "Chestnuts," and Master Raymond sat in comfort, directing the efforts of poor red-faced Bob, as he bent over the fire and roasted his fingers as well as the nuts. When half a dozen young people are gathered round a fire, catching hot nuts in outstretched hands, and promptly dropping them with shrieks of dismay, the last remnants of shyness must needs disappear; and Rex was soon as uproarious as any other member of the family, complaining loudly when his "turn" was forgotten, and abusing the unfortunate Bob for presenting him with a cinder instead of the expected dainty. The clatter of tongues was kept up without a moment's intermission, and, as is usual under such circ.u.mstances, the conversation was chiefly concerned with the past exploits of the family.

"You can't have half as many jokes in the country as you can in town,"

Raymond declared. "When we were in London, two old ladies lived in the house opposite ours, who used to sit sewing in the window by the hour together. One day, when the sun was shining, Bob and I got hold of a mirror and flashed it at them from our window so that the light dazzled their eyes and made them jump. They couldn't see us, because we were hiding behind the curtains, but it was as good as a play to watch first one, then the other, drop her work and put up her hand to her eye? Then they began shaking their fists across the road, for they knew it was us, because we had played some fine tricks on them before. On wet days we used to make up a sham parcel, tie a thread to the end, and put it on the side of the pavement. Everyone who came along stooped down to pick it up, we gave a jerk to the string and moved it on a little further, then they gave another grab, and once or twice a man overbalanced himself and fell down, but it didn't always come off so well as that-- oh, it was capital sport!"

"You got into trouble yourselves sometimes. You didn't always get the best of it," Norah reminded him. "Do you remember the day when you found a ladder leaning against the area railings of a house in the white terrace? Father had forbidden you to climb ladders, but you were a naughty boy, as usual, and began to do it, and when you got to the top, the ladder overbalanced, and you fell head over heels into the area. It is a wonder you were not killed that time!"

Raymond chuckled softly, as if at a pleasant remembrance. "But I was not, you see, and the cook got a jolly fright. She was making pastry at a table by the window, and down we came, ladder and I, the finest smash in the world. There was more gla.s.s than flour in the pies that day!"

"But father had to pay for new windows, and you were all over bruises from head to foot--"

"That didn't matter. It was jolly. I could have exhibited myself in a show as a 'boy leopard,' and made no end of money. And I wasn't the only one who made father pay for new windows. When Bob was a little fellow, he broke the nursery window by mistake, and a glazier came to mend it. Bob sat on a stool watching him do it, and snored all the time--Bob always snores when he is interested--and as soon as the man had picked up his tools and left the room, what did he do but jump up and send a toy horse smashing through the pane again. He wanted to watch the glazier put in another, but he hadn't the pleasure of seeing it mended that time. He was whipped and sent to bed."

"We-w-w-well," cried Bob, who was afflicted with a stammer when he was excited, "I didn't c-c-ut off my eyelashes, anyway! Norah went up to her room one day and p-played barber's shop. She cut lumps off her hair wherever she could get at it, till she looked like an Indian squaw, and then she s-s-snipped off her eyelashes till there wasn't a hair left.

She was sent to bed as w-well as me."

"They have grown again since then," said Norah, shutting one eye, and s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g up her face in a vain effort to prove the truth of her words.

"I had been to see Lettice have her hair cut that day, and I was longing to try what it felt like. I knew it was naughty, but I couldn't stop, it was too fascinating. ... Oh, Lettice, _do_ you remember when you sucked your thumb?"

Lettice threw up her hands with a little shriek of laughter. "Oh, how funny it was! I used to suck my thumb, Rex, until I was quite a big girl, six years old, I think, and one day mother spoke to me seriously, and said I really must give it up. If I didn't I was to be punished; if I did, I was to get a prize. I said, 'Well, may I suck my thumb as long as ever I like to-day, for the very last time?' Mother said I might, so I sat on the stairs outside the nursery door and sucked my thumb all day long--hours, hours, and hours, and after that I was never seen to suck it again. I had had enough!"

"It must be awfully nice to belong to a large family," said Rex wistfully. "You can have such fun together. Edna and I were very quiet at home, but I had splendid times at school, and sometimes I used to bring some of the fellows down to stay with me in the holidays. One night I remember--hallo, here's the Mouse! I thought you were having a nice little sleep on the schoolroom sofa, Mouse. Come here and sit by me."

Geraldine advanced to the fireplace in her usual deliberate fashion.

She was quite calm and unruffled, and found time to smile at each member of the party before she spoke.

"So I was asleep, only they's a fire burning on the carpet of the schoolroom, and it waked me up."

"Wh-at?"

"They's a fire burning in the miggle of the carpet--a blue fire, jest like a plum pudding!"