Chapter Two.
Haughton Park.
Before the clock had finished striking six the next morning, Dennis and Maisie were in the stable-yard. Tom was there, pumping water into a pail, and Jacko the raven was there, stalking about with gravity, and uttering a deep croak now and then. Jacko was not a nice character, and more feared than liked by most people. He was a thief and a bully, and so cunning that it was impossible to be up to all his tricks. In mischief he delighted, and nothing pleased him more than to frighten and tease helpless things, yet, with all these bad qualities, he had been allowed to march about for many years, unreproved, in Aunt Katharine’s stable-yard. Maisie had been very much afraid of him in the days when she wore socks, for he had a way of digging at her little bare legs with his cruel beak whenever he could get near her. She was not frightened of him now that she was older, especially when Dennis was with her, but still she did not trust him, and took care this morning not to cross his path on her way to speak to Tom.
“If Jacko knew about the kittens,” remarked Dennis as they passed, “he’d go and peck out their eyes.”
“Oh!” shuddered Maisie; “but,” she added in a whisper, for she always fancied Jacko understood, “their eyes aren’t open yet, and besides Madam would claw and scratch at him.”
“He can claw and scratch too,” said Dennis. “I expect he could kill Madam and her kittens easily. And then he’d bury them, just as he does his food, you know, and then.”
Fortunately for Maisie, who was listening with horror to this picture of cruelty and crime, Dennis stopped at this point, for they were now close to Tom, who with his back towards them was making a dreadful noise with a creaking pump handle.
“I say, Tom,” he called out. Tom slowly turned his freckled face over his shoulder, but did not leave off his work. “Madam’s kittens are not to be drowned,” shouted Dennis at the top of his voice.
“They’re all to be saved,” added Maisie in a shriller key.—“Oh Dennis, I don’t believe he has taken it in. Do tell him to leave off pumping.”
But just then, Tom’s pails being full, he left off of his own accord, and proceeded to carry them into the stable.
“You do understand, Tom,” said Maisie anxiously, for she had an idea that Tom rather liked drowning kittens. “Not to be drowned.”
Tom’s voice having answered indistinctly from one of the stalls, she turned to follow Dennis, who was already half-way up the steep ladder which led to the loft. After all, Madam could not be told the good news, for she had gone out for a stroll, leaving her family in a little warm furry heap in their bed.
“Just fancy how dreadful it would be for her if she came back and found only one left,” said Maisie, touching the little round heads softly with her finger. “I am so glad they’re not to be drowned.”
“I’m tremendously glad we’re going to keep the black one ourselves,” said Dennis. “What do you think of the name of Smut?”
“I don’t like it a bit,” said Maisie.
They had got no further towards a name by breakfast time. All those which Maisie liked, Dennis thought silly, and those which Dennis proposed, Maisie thought ugly, so it promised to be a difficult matter to settle. As soon as they were seated at breakfast, however, Aunt Katharine made a suggestion which put the black kitten out of their heads for the present.
“Children,” she said, “I am going to drive over to Haughton Park to lunch this morning. If you like, you may both go with me and see Philippa.”
There was a moment’s pause, and then Dennis asked seriously:
“Shall you go anywhere besides, Aunt Katharine, or just straight there?”
“I shall only stop at Mrs Broadbent’s on my way,” she replied, “to ask about so some fowls.”
The children looked at each other, but made no answer.
“Well,” said their aunt, smiling, “I dare say you’d like to talk it over together. I shall start at twelve o’clock, and if you decide to go, you must be ready to the minute, for I shall not wait for you. Do just as you like about it.”
To go or not to go to Haughton was always a matter which required thought. There were things against it, and things for it. In Maisie’s opinion, there was a great deal to be liked in the visit. There was a large, beautiful house, much larger than Fieldside, and a park with deer in it: there were all sorts of dolls and toys and pretty things which she enjoyed playing with, and—there was Philippa. Philippa was perhaps a doubtful pleasure, for if she was in a cross mood she was not agreeable, but there was always the chance that she would be pleasant, and then she and Maisie got on very well together with their dolls. Dennis was disposed to be rather scornful about going to Haughton, but in his case there was the attraction of the drive, when Aunt Katharine sometimes let him hold the reins, and there was the chance of her stopping at somewhere interesting on the way. Mrs Broadbent’s would be better than nothing to-day, though it was not his favourite farmhouse.
“I don’t think I want to go much,” he said, as soon as he and Maisie had reached the play-room. “Aunt Trevor’s sure to have a headache, and then we shall have to be as quiet as mice.”
“P’raps she’ll let us go out with Philippa,” said Maisie.
“Not without Miss Mervyn comes too,” said Dennis. “I don’t care about that—it’s no fun. She’s always saying, ‘You mustn’t do this, or you mustn’t do that.’”
“Well,” said Maisie, “should I go with Aunt Katharine then, and you stay at home?”
But this did not suit Dennis at all. It would never do for Maisie to come back and describe all manner of enjoyments which he had not shared. It would be better to go and grumble than to be left at home alone.
“Oh, I’ll go,” he said, condescendingly. And so it came to pass that when the ponies, Jack and Jill, came round, the children were both waiting in the hall, fully prepared for the drive. As she drew on her driving gloves, Aunt Katharine gave a glance at them to see that they were warmly wrapped up, for it was a fresh day in early spring.
“Jump in, children, and let Mary tuck you well up; it’s rather cold,” she said.—“Give me the reins, Tom. All right.”
Then came a dash down the short avenue, with Tom running before to open the gate, and then they were in the village street, where Jack and Jill always thought it right to plunge and shy a little. From their seat at the back Dennis and Maisie nodded at their various acquaintances as they passed, for they knew nearly every one. There was Mrs Gill at the post-office, standing at her open door; there was Mr Couples, who kept the shop; and there was Dr Price just mounting his horse, with his two terriers, Snip and Snap, eager to follow. Above this little cluster of houses stood the church and the vicarage close together, on a gently rising hill; and the rest of the village, including two or three large farms, was scattered about here and there, with wide spaces between.
“Why are you going to Mrs Broadbent’s, Aunt Katharine?” asked Dennis, as they turned sharply to the right.
“Because I want to ask her to let me have a setting of Minorcas,” replied his aunt, “and no one else keeps them.”
“And we might ask her, you know,” said Maisie, “whether she’d like one of the kittens. I should think that would be a good home, shouldn’t you?”
“P’raps she doesn’t like cats,” said Dennis carelessly. “We’ve got three weeks, so it really doesn’t matter much yet.”
The Broadbents’ square white house now came in sight. It had a trim garden, a tennis ground, and a summer-house, and was completely screened from the farm-buildings by a gloomy row of fir-trees. The children did not as a rule care to pay visits to Mrs Broadbent, for there were no animals or interesting things about; but to-day Maisie asked leave to go in, for she had the kittens on her mind, and felt she must not lose a chance.
Mrs Broadbent was a thin little widow, who wore smart caps, and had a general air of fashion about her person. She was sharp and clever, well up to the business of managing her large farm, and familiar with every detail of it. Unfortunately she considered this a thing to be ashamed of, and, much to Miss Chester’s annoyance, always pretended ignorance which did not exist. What she was proud of, and thrust foremost in her conversation, were the accomplishments of two highly-educated daughters, who painted on china, and played the violin, and on this subject she received no encouragement from Aunt Katharine.
“I shouldn’t have thought of disturbing you so early, Mrs Broadbent,” she said briskly, when they were seated in the smart little drawing-room, “but I’ve come on business. I want to know if you’ve a setting of Minorca fowls to dispose of. I’ve a fancy to rear some.”
Mrs Broadbent simpered a little and put her head on one side.
“I’ve no doubt we can oblige you, Miss Chester,” she said. “I’ll speak to my poultry-man about it, and let you know.”
“How many Minorcas have you?” asked Miss Chester.
“Oh, I really couldn’t tell you, Miss Chester,” replied Mrs Broadbent with a little laugh. “I never thought of inquiring.”
“Not know how many of each sort of fowls you have!” exclaimed Aunt Katharine. “Why, if I had a farm, I’d know every one of them by sight, and how many eggs they each laid. I suppose, though,” she added, “you leave that to your daughters. They must be a great help to you.”
Mrs Broadbent bridled:
“Emmeline and Lilian are far too much engaged,” she said, “with their studies and their artistic work. Emmeline’s quite devoted herself to art. I’ve given her a large room at the top of the house for a studio.”
“Indeed,” said Miss Chester coldly. “And what does she do in it?”
“Just now she’s painting some lovely plaques,” said Mrs Broadbent, “and Lilian’s quite taken to the new poker-work.”
“What is that?” asked her visitor.
“You haven’t seen it, Miss Chester? Well, it is quite new, and as I was saying the other day, in these remote parts we don’t see anything, do we? But Lilian’s been staying in London, and she learned it there. She did that frame.”
It seemed that poker-work was intended to have the effect of carving, which was produced by burning patterns on wood with a red-hot instrument.
“Well, if you ask my candid opinion,” said Aunt Katharine, rising to look at the frame, “I should like it much better plain; but it’s a harmless amusement, if wasting time is ever harmless.—Come Maisie, Dennis will be quite tired of waiting.—You’ll let me know about the eggs, Mrs Broadbent, and their price. I shall be much obliged if you can spare me a setting.”
In another moment Aunt Katharine would have swept out of the room, with her usual activity, but after waiting so long for a pause in the conversation, Maisie could not give up her purpose.
“Do you want a cat, please?” she said, standing in front of Mrs Broadbent—“that is, a nice little kitten. One of our cat Madam’s.”
But Mrs Broadbent was quite certain that she did not want a cat, and said so with some sharpness, for she was never pleased at Miss Chester’s outspoken opinions, though she was used to them. She had too many cats about the place now. She supposed as long as there were mice there must be cats, but to her mind there was not much to choose between them.
“I don’t really suppose it would have been a good home,” said Maisie, when she was tucked in again beside Dennis; “Mrs Broadbent doesn’t like cats, and she looked quite cross when I asked her, but I think that was because Aunt Katharine didn’t like Lilian’s poker-work frame.”
Haughton Park, towards which Jack and Jill were now quickly making their way, was about four miles from Fieldside, and just outside the little town of Upwell. It was a large house, standing in a park of some extent, and was built in what was called the Italian style, with terraces in front of it, and stone balustrades, and urns and vases wherever they could be put. Inside, the rooms were very large and lofty, and there was a great hall with marble pillars, and a huge staircase with statues in niches all the way up. Perhaps from some association with the sound of the name, Maisie always thought it was a proud cold house, which could not stoop to notice any one who came in and out of its doors, and did not mind whether they went or stayed. Yet, from its very unlikeness to Fieldside, it had a certain fascination for her, and she could not help admiring it.
Here, in lonely grandeur, lived Aunt Katharine’s widowed sister, Mrs Trevor, with her daughter Philippa, who was just ten years old. Mrs Trevor had always wondered why her brother, Captain Chester, had not sent Dennis and Maisie to Haughton to be educated with Philippa. Surely nothing could have been more suitable or better for the children!
But by some extraordinary blindness, he had passed over his elder sister and all her possessions, and chosen Katharine as their guardian until his return from India. When he did return, thought Mrs Trevor, he would see what a mistake he had made; even now, if he knew what odd ideas Katharine had, and how she allowed the children to run wild, and associate with the villagers, he would regret his choice—but it was no affair of hers. Nevertheless, it always gave her a sense of injury to see Dennis and Maisie with their Aunt Katharine. It was not that she envied her the charge of them, for she was, or fancied she was, somewhat of an invalid, and would have disliked the trouble. But she felt she had been slighted when the children were sent to Fieldside, and a slight was a thing she could not forget.
Mrs Trevor received her visitors this morning in her boudoir, and rose to greet them languidly from her low chair—a tall elegant figure, in soft clinging robes. The room was full of the heavy scent of hyacinths, and warm with the spring sunshine and a bright fire. As Aunt Katharine entered with her usual alert step, she seemed to bring a great deal of cold air and life into it from the outside world. The children followed her rather shyly.
“Here we are, you see,” she said, in her loud, cheerful voice. “How are you, Helen? You look rather white.”
“I am suffering from my old enemy to-day,” replied Mrs Trevor, with a forced smile; “my head is very painful.”
“Ah,” said Aunt Katharine, pulling off her gloves briskly, “a little fresh air is the best cure for that. To be shut up in this warm room with all those flowers is enough to poison you. Wouldn’t you like a window open?”
“Pray, Katharine!” exclaimed Mrs Trevor, putting up her hand with a shudder; “the very idea destroys me. It is an east wind. Warmth and rest are the only cure.” She put up her double eye-glasses, and looked at Dennis and Maisie. “Did you drive over? How are the children?”
“As jolly as possible,” said Aunt Katharine. She stood on the hearthrug, flapping her gloves against one hand. Maisie always thought that her aunt wore shorter skirts, rougher tweed dresses, and stouter boots when she came to Haughton, than at any other time. Also, she seemed to speak louder, and to look rosier and broader altogether. Perhaps this only seemed to be so, because Aunt Trevor’s skin was so fair, and her voice so gentle, and because she wore such graceful soft gowns, and such tiny satin slippers. Maisie was very fond of Aunt Katharine, but she admired Aunt Trevor’s appearance immensely, and always gazed at her as though she were a picture hanging on the wall. Dennis did not share in this. He fidgeted about in his chair, fingered the things in his pockets, hoped it would soon be time for luncheon, and wondered whether he and Maisie would be allowed to go out first.
“Ah, here is Philippa!” said Aunt Katharine.
A little girl of about Maisie’s age—but so much taller and slighter that she looked a great deal older—came into the room. She had rather long features, a pointed chin, and a very pure white complexion, with hardly a tinge of colour; and, as she ran forward to kiss her little brown-faced cousins, she was a great contrast to them in every way. Her dress, which was prettily made and fanciful, and her gleaming bronze shoes added to this; for Dennis and his sister seldom wore anything but serge or holland, and their boots were of strong country make, which made their feet look rather clumsy.
“If the children must wear such thick boots, Katharine,” Mrs Trevor often said, “you might at least have them made to fit. It gives them the air of little clodhoppers.”
But Miss Chester went her own way, and Aunt Trevor’s objections had no effect on her arrangements.
“Ask if we may go out!” said Dennis, in an urgent whisper to his cousin, who at once ran up to her mother, and repeated the request in the midst of her conversation with Aunt Katharine. Mrs Trevor cast an anxious glance out the window.
“Well, my darling, as you have a cold and the wind is in the east, I think you had better play indoors. You can take your cousins into the long gallery and have a nice game.”
Philippa frowned and pushed out her lower lip:
“I want to go out,” she murmured.
“But your cough, my dearest,” said her mother in a pleading tone.—“What do you say, Katharine? Would it not be more prudent for her to keep indoors?”
“I think it would be best for her to do as you wish,” said Aunt Katharine, with a half smile at Philippa’s pouting lips.
“I must go out with Dennis and Maisie,” said the little girl in a whining voice.
“Dennis and Maisie will be quite happy indoors,” said Mrs Trevor entreatingly; “you can show them your new violin, you know, and play them a tune.”
“I don’t want to,” said Philippa, with a rising sob.
Mrs Trevor looked alarmed.
“My darling, don’t excite yourself,” she said; “we will see—we will ask Miss Mervyn. Perhaps if you are very warmly wrapped up.”
Philippa’s brow cleared at once.
“Then we may go?” she said.
“Ask Miss Mervyn to come and speak to me a moment,” said her mother. “Such a difficult, delicate temperament to deal with,” she continued, as the door closed on her daughter. “Not like a commonplace nature,” with a glance at Dennis and Maisie; “so excitable, that it makes her ill to be thwarted in any way. Indeed the doctor forbids it.”
“How bad for her!” said Aunt Katharine bluntly. “Children are never happy until they learn to obey.”
“That sort of system may answer with some children,” said Mrs Trevor; “but my poor delicate Philippa requires infinite tact.”
“What do you think, Miss Mervyn,” as a thin, careworn-looking lady entered, “of Philippa going out to-day? She wants to take her cousins into the garden for a little while.”
Miss Mervyn looked anxiously from mother to daughter.
“She has been coughing this morning, and the wind is cold,” she began, when she was interrupted by an angry burst of tears from Philippa.
“I must go out,” she cried between her sobs. “You’re a cross thing to say it’s cold. I will go out.”
“There, there, my darling,” said Mrs Trevor; “do control yourself. You shall go.—Pray, Miss Mervyn, take care that she is warmly dressed, and has goloshes and a thick veil. You will, of course, go with the children, and keep to the sheltered places, and on no account allow Philippa to run on the grass or to get overheated.”
Philippa’s tears and sobs ceased at once, and soon muffled up to the eyes, she was ready to go out with her cousins, followed by the patient Miss Mervyn, and Mrs Trevor was left at liberty to bestow some attention on her guest. As soon as they were out of sight of the windows, Philippa’s first action was to tear off the white knitted shawl which was wrapped round her neck and mouth.
“If you don’t keep that on, we must go in again,” said Miss Mervyn.
“I won’t wear it, and I won’t go in,” said Philippa. “If you tease about it, I shall scream, and then I shall be ill; and then it will be your fault.”
Poor Miss Mervyn shook her head, but after a few mild persuasions gave in, and Philip had her way as usual, not only in this, but in everything that she wished to do throughout the walk. Dennis and Maisie were used to seeing this whenever they came to Haughton, but it never ceased to surprise them, because it was so very different from their unquestioning obedience to rules at Fieldside. It certainly did not seem to make Philippa happy or pleasant. Although she did what she liked, she never appeared to like what she did, and was always wanting something different, and complaining about everything.
“Let’s go back now,” she said at last, dragging her feet slowly through a puddle as she spoke; “my feet are wet.”
“I should think they were,” sighed Miss Mervyn. “Come, let us make haste home, so that you may have your boots and stockings changed.”
But the perverse Philippa would not hurry. She now lingered behind the others, and even stood still now and then, causing Miss Mervyn great misery. “She will certainly take cold,” she murmured. “Cannot you persuade her, my dears, to come on.”
“Let’s have a race, Philippa, as far as the house,” called out Dennis.
Running fast had been forbidden, so it was perhaps on that account attractive to Philippa, who at once consented to the proposal, and Miss Mervyn, thinking it the less of two evils, made no objection.
“Maisie must have a start because she’s the smallest,” said Dennis, placing his sister a little in front; “now, one, two, three, off!”
The little flying figures sped away towards the house, and Miss Mervyn following, was pleased to see that Dennis allowed Philippa to win the race; that would perhaps make her more good-tempered.
“Ha, ha!” exclaimed Philippa, pointing a scornful finger at Maisie as she came panting up last, with her round cheeks very red. “What a slow coach! Maisie’s too fat to run.”
“She’s younger than we are,” said Dennis, who did not allow any one but himself to tease his sister.
“There’s not much difference,” said Philippa, as the children walked up to the house; “in three weeks it will be my birthday, and I shall be nine.”
“Mine isn’t for three more months,” said Maisie.
“Any one would think me quite twelve years old,” said Philippa, with her chin in the air, “because I’m tall and slight. Maisie has such a baby look.—I’m going to have a party on my birthday.”
“Are you?” said Maisie with sudden interest.
She gave Dennis’s arm a squeeze, to make him understand she had just got a good idea; but he only stared round at her, and said, “Don’t pinch so,” and Philippa continued:
“Yes, I shall have a party, and a birthday cake, and magnificent presents.”
“Can you guess what they will be?” asked Maisie.
“Mother says she won’t tell me what hers is,” said Philippa; “but I shall make her.”
“How?”
“Oh,” said Philippa carelessly, “if I want to know very much, I shall cry, and then I always get what I want.”
Philippa was not in a nice mood to-day, and did not improve at luncheon, for her wants and whims seemed to engross every one’s attention. If Aunt Katharine tried to turn the conversation to something more interesting, Philippa’s whining voice broke in, and Mrs Trevor at once ceased to listen to anything else.
It was a relief to the whole party, when, early in the afternoon, Aunt Katharine and her charges were settled once more in the pony-cart, and on their way home to Fieldside.
“Don’t you know why I poked you just after the race?” said Maisie to her brother, as they drove out of the lodge gates.
“Because Philippa said such stupid things, I suppose,” said Dennis.
“It wasn’t that at all,” she replied earnestly; “it was because I’d just thought of a good home for one of the kittens. Wouldn’t it be splendid to give it to Philippa for a birthday present? It will be just three weeks old.”
“H’m,” said Dennis doubtfully. He really thought it a capital idea, but he never liked to encourage Maisie too much.
She looked round at him, her brown eyes bright with excitement.
“It would be a magnificent home,” she continued, “more than a good one. It would have nice things to eat, and soft things to lie on, and a collar round its neck, and all those beautiful rooms to run about in!”
“I suppose they’d be kind to it,” said Dennis. “I don’t think I should like to live at Haughton Park.”
“Of course not, without Aunt Katharine agreed,” said Maisie; “but supposing Haughton Park was hers, wouldn’t you like it better than Fieldside?”
“No,” said Dennis promptly; “not half so well. At Fieldside you’ve only to run down the avenue, and there you are in the middle of the village, and only a short way off the Manor Farm. And at Haughton you have to go through the Park, where no one lives, and through three gates, and then you’re only in the Upwell road. It’s much duller.”
“There are the deer,” said Maisie.
“But you can’t talk to the deer,” replied Dennis; “and though they’re tame, they’re rather stupid, I think.”
“Well,” said Maisie, “I like some things at Haughton very much, and I daresay the kitten will. A cat’s quite different from a boy, isn’t it?”
“Which shall we give?” asked Dennis, warming a little to the idea.
“The white, of course,” said Maisie at once.
She spoke so decidedly, that Dennis felt she must have some good reason, though he could not see why the white should be preferred to the grey.
Maisie could not explain herself, however. She only repeated that of course the white kitten was the right one to go to Haughton, and though she generally yielded to Dennis, she remained firm in this, and by the time they reached home the matter was quite settled. The white kitten was thus provided with a good home; and though, on thinking it over, Maisie doubted whether Philippa would consider it a “magnificent present,” she had no misgivings as to its future happiness.