The Girls and I Part 12

'We must see what father says,' she answered. 'Of course there's the railway fare.'

'But you couldn't go alone, mums,' I reminded her; 'and you know I'm only half, still. Father would never have time to go, and if you took Rowley she'd cost full fare.'

'Oh, you old-fashioned child!' said Cousin Dorothea, laughing. 'Dear, you _must_ take him.'

I felt sure mums would, after that.

'I know I could help you about the rooms and everything better than anybody,' I said.

And I knew I could.

I did go. Father laughed and said I was the proper person to take his place, as he couldn't possibly go. So it was settled, and one fine morning off we set.

It was really a fine morning,--I don't mean it only as an expression. It was really a lovely morning. Let me see, it must have been May by then.

I'll look it up in my diary of that year, and fill in the exact date afterwards. It was sunny and mild, though there was a little nice wind too. Mums and I felt like two children out of school, or two captives out of prison, when we found ourselves in a jolly comfortable railway carriage all alone, flying along through the bright green fields with the trees in their new spring dresses and the sky as blue as blue,--all so jolly, you know, after the long winter in our London square and all the troubles we'd had.

Everything seemed at last to be going to begin to come right.

'I feel in such much better spirits,' said mums. 'Hebe does seem to be improving so fast now, and the weather is so nice.'

Dear little mums, she was looking so pretty. She had a brown dress with very soft, fussy tr.i.m.m.i.n.g, and a brown bonnet, with something pink--just a tiny bit of pink. She generally wears bonnets, except when we're regularly in the country. They suit her, and I like them better than hats for her. I hate those mothers who are always trying to look young.

And I think mums looks all the younger because she dresses like a mother and not like a girl. I've got ideas about dressing though I am a boy. I can't help having them.

'I do hope Mossmoor Farm will be nice,' she went on again. 'The only thing is I wish we were going to be all together there.'

'So do I,' I said. I hate being away from mums, and then I've a feeling she may be wanting me always.

'Perhaps, if Hebe gets much stronger at Ventnor, after two or three weeks there, the doctor may let us join you all at this place,' said mother.

That was a nice idea.

'It would be awfully jolly,' I said. 'We'd have nothing left to wish for then, would we, mums, except--if only the diamond thing could be found!'

I don't know what put it in my head just then; we hadn't spoken of it for ever so long. I was almost sorry I had said it, for mums' face clouded over a little.

'Yes, indeed,' she said. 'But I fear there's no chance of that now. And really gran has been _so_ good about it. He might have been very, very angry; for, after all, it _was_ a sort of carelessness of mine. I should have made sure it was firm the very last moment before I put it on.'

But I began to talk of other things to put it out of her head. And before long--at least it didn't seem long, railway journeys do so depend on how you're feeling--we pulled up at a pretty little station, and we saw that the name of it was Fewforest.

We got out, feeling rather important, and perhaps mums was a tiny bit nervous. You see she's very seldom had to do things like looking for houses, by herself. She's always nearly had father or gran. She was rather proud of it, too, and so was I. I was determined she shouldn't feel lonely or bothered if I could help it.

And everything went wonderfully right. It is like that sometimes.

To begin with, I never saw a jollier railway station. It seems in the middle of a wood, and the station-master's house is like a Swiss cottage. I've never been in Switzerland-- I've never been out of England--but mother has, lots, and of course I've seen pictures. And everybody says Fewforest is quite as pretty as heaps of places people travel miles and miles over the sea to visit.

There was a little kind of a phaeton standing outside, and a rather fat boy with red cheeks on the box.

He touched his cap as we came out, and, getting still redder, he mumbled something about 'Measter Parsley,' and 'Mossmoor.'

'Yes,' said mother, 'we are going to Mossmoor Farm. Are you to drive us?'

He touched his cap again, and tried to explain that his master was very sorry he couldn't come himself; something or other unexpected, we couldn't make out what, having happened to prevent him.

I wasn't sorry. If the farmer had come, we'd have had to talk to him, for civility's sake, and it would have been a great bore, when we wanted to talk to each other and to look about us. We certainly didn't need to talk to the fat boy. He looked most thankful when we were settled in our places behind, and he didn't have to see us at all, though his ears kept red all the way to Mossmoor, I could see, just from shyness. I got to know him quite well afterwards, and his ears weren't generally redder than other people's. He was a nice boy; his name was Simon Wanderer; it didn't suit him, for he'd never been farther away from his home at Mossmoor than six miles. I don't believe he has yet, though he must be seventeen by now.

It was a lovely drive. I have been it lots of times since of course, and I always like it; but that first time there was something extra about it. It was all new to us, and then we did so enjoy being in the country again, and there was a nice feeling as if we were having an adventure too.

Part of the way is all through woods; then after that comes a heathy bit, and then a clear bit of common, and then you go up for a while with trees thick at one side of the road and at the other a beautiful sort of stretching-to-the-sky view. _Then_ you turn sharp down a lane, and at a corner where another lane--quite a short one--leads on to a heath again, is the Farm.

We got out at the gate. There's no drive to the front of the house, and this first time Mrs. Parsley wouldn't have thought it 'manners' to meet us in the stable-yard. She was standing at the gate. I saw in a minute she was nice. She had a pleasant face, not too smiley, and no make up about it.

'I _am_ pleased to see you, ma'am,' she said, 'and Master Warwick too, and I'm so glad it's a fine day. Real May weather, isn't it, ma'am?'

'Yes, indeed,' said mums. 'We couldn't see your pretty home to greater advantage, Mrs. Parsley.'

Then Mrs. Parsley smiled more than she had done yet.

'I can't deny, ma'am, that it's a sweet spot,' she said, '_and_ a healthy. It's coldish in winter, it's true, but then it's a cold that you don't feel in the same piercing way as when it's damp. The air's that bracing about here, ma'am.'

'So they tell me,' said mother. 'And that's just what we're looking for.' Then she went on to tell about the whooping-cough, and though Cousin Dorothea had written about it already, Mrs. Parsley seemed as interested as could be. People like that--I mean people you can't call gentlemen and ladies, though they're not poor, and regular poor people, too--do love talking about illnesses--other people's as well as their own. And she had a lot of questions to ask about 'Miss Dorothea' too.

She 'did hope as she'd come down to Mossmoor some day.'

All this time we were going towards the house. But it was rather a slow business, doing so much talking by the way, and I _was_ in a fidget to see the rooms and find out if they'd do. There was no hall or pa.s.sage; we went straight into a large kitchen, a very large one. You didn't see at first how big it was, because just round the door--to keep out the draught, I suppose--there was a fixed wooden screen, like what you see in lots of cottages. I was a little surprised that there was no hall, for, outside, the house looked really rather grand; it might have been called 'Mossmoor Grange,' for it was built of nice dull red old bricks and the windows were very pretty--out-jutting, you know, and with tiny panes. But once you were well inside the kitchen you couldn't have wished it any different. It was so jolly; not a bit messy, you know, as if plates and dishes were washed there, or potatoes peeled, or anything like that, for there was a good-sized back kitchen where all that was done. The floor was tiled, with good thick rugs here and there, and there was a regular old grandfather's clock and bright bra.s.s pans and things on the wall.

I wondered at first if this could be the kitchen we were to have as a sitting-room. But Mrs. Parsley soon explained.

'Won't you sit down and rest a bit, ma'am,' she said, 'before I show you the rooms?'

But mums and I both said we weren't at all tired.

'Well, then,' she said, 'if you'll be so good, we'll step through this way,' and she opened a door at quite the other side of the kitchen.

'You'll have a little lunch, I _hope_,' said the kind woman, 'after we've seen the rooms,' and she nodded towards a table, which was all spread with a white cloth and on it two or three dishes, one with a cold ham, and another with some kind of a pie or tart, and a big jug of milk.

I was getting hungry, but still I cared most of all to see the rooms.

Through the door there _was_ a tiny hall. It had a nice window, and a door stood open at the other end.

'This is the summer kitchen, as we always call it,' said Mrs. Parsley.

'I had a little fire lighted just for you to see, it's nice and comfortable,'--she called it 'com,' not _c.u.m_-fortable,'--'even if the weather's chilly.'

It was a dear room--beautiful deep windows with seats round them, and nice old cupboards, one with gla.s.s doors, and a queer kind of sofa with a straight-up back and a long red cushion. The chairs were plain wood and everything was plain, but not a bit common; ever so much nicer than lodgings, you know, like what there are sometimes at the seaside with horrid flowery carpets all staring, and mirrors with gilt frames, and shaky little chiffoniers that won't hold anything. Here it was all solid and comfortable; there was nothing we could break supposing we did 'rampage' about, as nurse calls it. Even the kitchen fireplace was nice; I thought to myself what jolly toffy we could make on a wet day.

'Oh, this _is_ a nice room,' said mums; 'nothing could be better.'

Mrs. Parsley did look pleased, and in a minute or two she opened a door we hadn't noticed. It looked like a part of the wooden panels, and there was a funny little stair.

'This leads to the small bedroom, ma'am,' she said. 'There's a door through it to the other two, but there's also doors to them on the landing over the big kitchen, which you get to up the regular staircase.

But if the young gentleman was to have this room it might be a convenience for him to get to it without having to go all the way round and pa.s.s through the other bedrooms.'

It was a funny little room--very jolly though,--just a bed and a chest of drawers, a toilet-table, and a shelf across a corner for a washhand-stand, and two chairs. But I liked it very much, and the two big bedrooms that we got into through it were really very nice--carpets in the middle, and in one a regular polished bedstead with curtains. _I_ wouldn't have liked it, but, as it turned out, Anne did. And it was very big; plenty of room for her and Maud too. In the other room there were two smaller beds; one would do for Serry, and the other for nurse.