The Children of Wilton Chase Part 16

"We might both of us jump on the bed at the same moment," said Eric.

"That ought to shake him a good bit, and perhaps he'd begin to yawn.

Oh, jolly, it's a spring mattress; we can give him a great bounce if we jump on together. Now then, Mag, be sure you jump when I do."

Marjorie, still looking rather terrified, but led on by Eric's indomitable spirit, did spring on the bed, and so heavily that she rolled on to Mr. Wilton's leg. He started, groaned, said "Down, Gyp!"

in a very angry voice, and once more pursued his way in dreamland, without any idea that two little imps were perched each on one side of his pillow.

"It's too bad," said Eric. "The whole morning will go at this rate; it will soon be five o'clock. Oh, I say--pater--father--gov! do wake!"

"You shouldn't say pater or gov," said Marjorie. "Father doesn't like it."

"Much he cares! He doesn't hear anything. He's stone deaf--he's no good at all!"

"Well, we shouldn't say words he doesn't like, even if he is asleep,"

said Marjorie in her properest tones.

"I like that," said Eric. "And why mayn't I say pater, I wonder? Pater is the Latin of father. It's a much nicer word than father, and all our fellows say it. You think it isn't respectful because you're an ignorant girl, Maggie, but Julius Caesar used to say pater when he was young, so I suppose I may."

"Father looks very handsome in his sleep," said Marjorie, turning her head on one side, and looking sentimentally at her parent.

"He doesn't," said Eric. "He looks much better with his eyes open. Oh, I say, I can't stand this! The morning will go, and we'll never get our water-lilies. Father, wake up! Father, it's your birthday! Don't you hear us? Here, Mag, let's begin to jump up and down again on the bed. Couldn't you manage to hop on his leg by accident? You're heavier than me."

Marjorie and Eric joined hands, the fun entered into their souls, and they certainly jumped with energy.

Mr. Wilton began to have a very bad dream. Gyp, his favorite spaniel, seemed suddenly to have changed into a fiend, and to have seized him by the leg. Finally the dream dissolved itself into a medley of laughter and childish cries. He opened his eyes: two little figures with very red faces and very disordered hair were tumbling about on his bed.

"Eh--what? Is the house on fire?" he gasped.

"Oh, father! At last!" exclaimed Marjorie. She flung herself upon him, and began to kiss him all over his face.

"My dear child--very affectionate of you, no doubt, but why this sudden rush of devotion in the middle of the night?"

"It isn't!" exclaimed Eric in a voice of awful emphasis. "It's nearly five o'clock!"

"And it's your birthday," said Marjorie, beginning to kiss him again.

"Yes," continued Eric, "it's your birthday, father. _Our_ day, you know."

The victim in the bed lay quite still for a moment. That much grace he felt he must allow himself to recover from the shock of the announcement. Then he said, as cheerfully as he could speak, "What did you say the hour was?"

"Close on five o'clock--awfully late," answered both children, shouting their words into his ears.

"All right; what do you want me to do?"

"To get up at once, and come with us to gather water-lilies."

"Oh!"

"Isn't it a delightful plan?"

"Very. Are you sure the morning isn't wet?"

"The morning wet, father! The sun is shining like anything. Run to the window, Mag, and pull the blind up. Now you can see, can't you, father?"

"I can, thanks, Eric."

"Well, aren't you getting up?"

"I will, if you will both favor me by retiring into the corridor for five minutes. And listen, even though it is my birthday, it isn't necessary to have any more vic----I mean, we need not wake the rest of the house."

"Oh, we'll be as quiet as mice," retorted Marjorie. "_Dear_ father, you'll promise to be very quick?"

"_Dear_ Maggie, I promise; I am your devoted and humble servant for the rest of the day."

"Isn't father delicious?" said Marjorie, as they waited in the pa.s.sage.

"Delicious!" retorted Eric; "what a girl's expression! One would think you were going to eat him. I tell you what it is, pater ought to be very much obliged to us for waking him. He was lazy, but he'll have a time of it for the rest of the day."

CHAPTER X.

THE REIGN OF CHAOS.

A cold bath and a rapid toilet afterward effectually removed all traces of sleep from Mr. Wilton's eyes.

"I feel like a sort of knight putting on my armor," he said to himself. "I am going on a crusade for the rest of the day. A crusade against all my established customs, against all my dearly loved order, against my newspaper, my books, my quiet pleasant meals. Well, it is for the sake of the children; and their mother, bless her"--here he glanced at the picture of the girl over the mantelpiece--"would smile at me if she could. Oh, yes, I buckle on my armor cheerfully enough.

Hey, for Chaos! Hey, for wild Mirth and childish Frivolity! Here I come, Eric and Maggie--poor patient little mice that you are! Here's father at last. Give me your hand, Mag: you may jump on my shoulder, if you like. Now for a race downstairs to the garden, and then you can tell me what you got me out of my bed in the middle of the night for."

Miss Wilton was quite right when she left the Chase the day before.

She certainly would not have enjoyed being awakened from her early morning slumbers by the wild raid which now took place through the old house. There was a scamper, a rush, some shouts, not only from childish throats, but from a manly and decidedly ba.s.s voice. The poor respectable old house would have looked shocked if it could, but who cared what anything looked or felt when Chaos was abroad?

About three hours later a somewhat draggled-looking party might have been seen approaching the Chase. They were all dead tired, and all very untidy, not to say disreputable in appearance. The little girl's brown Holland frock was not only torn, but smeared with mud and some sort of green mossy stuff which produces a deep stain very difficult for laundresses to remove. The little boy was also in a sorry plight, for he had a scratch across his cheek, and his knickers were cut through at the knees; while the big boy, in other words, the man, looked the most untidy, the most fatigued, the most travel-stained of all.

Ermengarde, in her neat white cool frock, with a green sash tied round her slim waist, and her long fair hair streaming down her back, came out to meet this party. She was accompanied by Lucy, who was also neat and fresh and trim. The two had stepped out of the house to gather a few flowers to put on the breakfast-table, and now they a.s.sumed all the virtuous airs of those good moral people who do _not_ get up to catch the early worm.

"_What_ a figure you are, Maggie! and what a disgraceful noise you and Eric made this morning," she began, in her most grown-up and icy tones.

"Oh, please don't scold us, Ermengarde," said Mr. Wilton. "Look at our water-lilies, gaze well at them, and be merciful."

Yes, the water-lilies were superb--each jaded conqueror was laden with them--buds and blossom and leaf, all were there--_such_ buds, such blossoms, heavy and fragrant with richness.

Ermie adored flowers. She uttered a little shriek of delight when her father held up a great ma.s.s of enormous waxen bells for her to bury her face in.

"Oh, delicious!" she exclaimed, "but how tired you all are!"

"Yes, yes, yes," exclaimed Victor No. 1, "tired and starving, absolutely starving. Get us some breakfast, good Ermie, and put the lilies in water as quickly as you can."