The Boys And I Part 11

"Audrey, _will_ the new nurse be like that?"

I turned to Tom.

"Tom," I said, "why do you say such unkind things to Racey?"

Tom nodded his head mysteriously.

"It's not unkinder to Racey than it is to us," he replied. "I'm sure the new nurse will be cross, because I heard Mrs. Partridge say something to Uncle Geoff on the stair to-day about that we should have somebody 'vrezy strict.' And I know that means cross."

"When did you hear that?" I asked.

"'Twas this afternoon. Uncle Geoff hadn't time to come up. He just called out to Mrs. Partridge to ask how we were getting on. And she said in that horrid smiley way she speaks sometimes--'Oh, _vrezy_ well, sir.

Much better since their nurse is gone. They need somebody much stricter.' Isn't she horrid, Audrey?"

"Never mind," I said. But that was all I would say. I would not tell the boys all I was feeling or thinking; they could hardly have understood the depth of my anger and wounded pride, though I really don't think it was a very bad kind of pride. I had always been trusted at home. When I was cross or ill-tempered, mother spoke seriously to me, sometimes even sternly, but she seemed to believe that I wanted to be good, and that I had sense to understand things. And now to be spoken of behind my back, and before my face too, as if I was a regularly naughty child who didn't want to be good, and who had to be kept down by strictness, and who wanted to make the boys naughty too--it was more than I could bear or than I would bear.

"Mother told me to make the boys happy," I said to myself, "and I _will_. I'll write to Pierson--to-night, when n.o.body can see, I'll write to her."

Tom and Racey saw that I was unhappy, though I only said "never mind,"

and when they saw that, it made them leave off quarrelling, and they both came to me to kiss me and ask me not to look "so sorry."

Just then Sarah came up with our tea-tray. She spoke very kindly to us, and told us she had begged Mrs. Partridge to send us some strawberry jam for our tea. And to the boys' great delight, there it was. As for me, I was too angry with Mrs. Partridge to like even her jam, but I did think it kind of Sarah.

"I'm sure you deserve it, you poor little things," she said. "And I don't see what any one has to find fault with in any of you. You've been as quiet as any three little mice to-day."

"Sarah," I said, encouraged by her way of speaking, "have you heard anything about the new nurse that is coming?"

Sarah shook her head.

"I don't think there's any one decided on," she said. "Mrs. Partridge has written to somewhere in the country, and I think she's expecting a letter. She said to-day that if to-morrow's fine, I must take you all out a walk."

Then she arranged our tea on the table and we drew in our chairs.

"I wish we had a tea-pot," I said. "I know quite well how to pour it out. It's horrid this way."

"This way," was an idea of Mrs. Partridge's. Since we had had no nurse, she had been unwilling to trust me with the tea-making, so she made it down-stairs and poured the whole--tea, milk, and sugar--into a jug, out of which I poured it into our cups. It wasn't nearly so nice, it had not the hot freshness of tea straight out of a tea-pot, and besides it did not suit our tastes, which were all a little different, to be treated precisely alike. Racey liked his tea so weak that it was hardly tea at all, Tom liked his sweet, and I liked hardly any sugar, so the jug arrangement suited none of us; Racey the best, perhaps, for it was certainly not strong, and sweeter than _I_ liked, any way. But this evening the unexpected treat of the strawberry jam made the boys less difficult to please about the tea.

"It was rather kind of Mrs. Partridge to send us the jam," said Tom. He spoke timidly; he didn't quite like to say she was kind till he had, as it were, got my leave to do so.

"It isn't _her_ jam," I said. "It's Uncle Geoff's, and indeed I shouldn't wonder if the strawberries were from our garden. I remember mother always used to say 'We must send some fruit to Geoff.'"

"Yes," said Tom, "I remember that too." He was just about biting into a large slice of bread and b.u.t.ter _without_ jam--I had kept to old rules and told the boys they must eat one big piece "plain," first--when a new idea struck him.

"Audrey," he said, "do you know what would be lovely? Supposing we made toast. I don't think there's _anything_ so nice as toast with strawberry jam."

Tom looked at me with so touching an expression in his dark eyes--he might have been making some most pathetic request--that I really could not resist him. Besides which, to confess the truth, the proposal found great favour in my own eyes. I looked consideringly at the ready-cut slices of bread and b.u.t.ter.

"They're very thick for toast," I said, "and the worst of it is they're all b.u.t.tered already."

"_That_ wouldn't matter," said Tom, "it'd be b.u.t.tered toast. That's the nicest of all."

"It _wouldn't_, you stupid boy," I said, forgetting my dignity; "the b.u.t.ter would all melt before the bread was toasted, and there'd be no b.u.t.ter at all when it was done. But I'll tell you what we might do; let's sc.r.a.pe off all the b.u.t.ter we can, and then spread it on the toast again when it's ready, before the fire. That's how I've seen Pierson do.

I mean that she spread it on before the fire--of course she didn't have to sc.r.a.pe it off first."

"I should think not," said Tom; "it's only that horrid Mrs. Partridge makes us have to do such things."

We set to work eagerly enough however, notwithstanding our indignation.

With the help of our tea-spoons we sc.r.a.ped off a good deal of b.u.t.ter and put it carefully aside ready to be spread on again.

"The worst of it is it'll be such awfully thick toast," I said, looking at the st.u.r.dy slices with regret. "I wish we could split them."

"But we can't," said Tom, "we've no knife. What a shame it is not to let us have a knife, not even _you_, Audrey, and I'm sure you are big enough."

"I've a great mind to keep one back from dinner to-morrow," I said, "I don't believe they'd notice. Tom, it's rather fun having to plan so, isn't it? It's something like being prisoners, and Mrs. Partridge being the--the-- I don't know what they call the man that shuts up the prisoners."

"Pleeceman?" said Racey.

"No, I don't mean that. The policeman only takes them to prison, he doesn't keep them when they are once there. But let's get on with the toast, or our tea'll be all cold before we're ready for it."

[Ill.u.s.tration: We made holes at the crusty side of the slices, and tied them with string.]

It was no good thinking of splitting the slices, we had to make the best of them, thick as they were. And it took all our planningness to do without a toasting-fork. The tea-spoons were so short that it burnt our hands to hold them so near the fire, and for a minute or two we were quite in despair. At last we managed it. We made holes at the crusty side of the slices, and _tied_ them with string--of which, of course, there were always plenty of bits in Tom's pockets; I believe if he'd been in a desert island for a year he still would have found bits of string to put in his pockets--to the end of the poker and to the two ends of the tongs. They dangled away beautifully; two succeeded admirably, the third unfortunately was hopelessly burnt. We repeated the operation for another set of slices, which all succeeded, then we spread them with the sc.r.a.ped b.u.t.ter in front of the fire by means of the flat ends of our tea-spoons, and at last, very hot, very b.u.t.tery, very hungry, but triumphant, we sat round the table again to regale ourselves with our tepid tea, but beautifully hot toast, whose perfection was completed by a good thick layer of strawberry jam.

We had eaten three slices, and were just about considering how we could quite fairly divide the remaining two among the three of us,--rather a puzzle, for Tom's proposal that he and I should each take a slice and give Racey half, didn't do.

"That would give Racey a half more than us--at least a quarter more. No, it wouldn't be a quarter either. Any way, that wouldn't do," I said.

"Let's cut each slice into three bits and each take two."

"And how can we cut without a knife?" said Tom.

"'How can he marry without a wife?'" I quoted out of the nursery rhyme, which set us all off laughing, so that we didn't hear a terrible sound steadily approaching the door. Stump, stump, it came, but we heard nothing till the door actually opened, and even then we didn't stop laughing all at once. We were excited by our toast-making; it was the first time since we were in London that our spirits had begun to recover themselves, and it wasn't easy to put them down again in a hurry. Even the sight of Mrs. Partridge's _very_ cross face at the door didn't do so all at once.

I dare say we looked very wild, we were very b.u.t.tery and jammy, and our faces were still broiling, our hair in confusion and our pinafores crumpled and smeared. Then the fender was pulled away from the fire, and the poker, tongs, and shovel strewed the ground, and somehow or other we had managed to burn a little hole in the rug. There was a decidedly burny smell in the room, which we ourselves had not noticed, but which, it appeared, had reached Mrs. Partridge's nose in Uncle Geoff's bedroom on the drawing-room floor, where, unfortunately, she had come to lay away some linen. And she had really been seriously frightened, poor old woman.

Being frightened makes some people cross, and finding out they have been frightened for no reason makes some people _very_ cross. Mrs. Partridge had arrived at being cross on her way up-stairs; when she opened the nursery door and saw the confusion we had made, and heard our shouts of laughter, she naturally became _very_ cross.

She came into the room and stood for a minute or two looking at us without speaking. And in our wonder--for myself I can't say "fear," I was too ready to be angry to be afraid, but poor Tom and Racey must have been afraid, for they got down from their chairs and stood close beside me, each holding me tightly--in our wonder as to what was going to happen next, our merriment quickly died away. We waited without speaking, looking up at the angry old woman with open-mouthed astonishment. And at last she broke out.

"Oh, you naughty children, you naughty, naughty children," she said. "To think of your daring to behave so after my kindness in sending you jam for your tea, and the whole house upset to take you in. How dare you behave so? Your poor uncle's nice furniture ruined, the carpet burnt to pieces as any one can smell, and the house all but set on fire. Oh, you naughty, _naughty_ children! Come away with me, sir," she said, making a dive at Tom, who happened to be the nearest to her, "come away with me that I may take you to your uncle and tell him what that naughty sister of yours has put into your head--for that it's all her, I'm certain sure."

Tom dodged behind me and avoided Mrs. Partridge's hand. When he found himself at what he considered a safe distance he faced round upon her.

"Audrey isn't naughty, and you sha'n't say she is. None of us is naughty--not just now any way. But if it was naughty to make toast, it was me, and not Audrey, that thought of it first."

"You _impertinent_ boy," was all Mrs. Partridge could find breath to say. But she did not try to catch Tom again, and indeed it would have been little use, for he began a sort of dancing jig from side to side, which would have made it very difficult for any one but a very quick, active person to get hold of him. "You rude, impertinent boy," she repeated, and then, without saying anything more, she turned and stumped out of the room.

Tom immediately stopped his jig.

"I wonder what she's going to do, Audrey," he said.