CHAPTER XII
NANTY CHEERS ME UP
A day has come when it is gusty and wet.
Last night the sun, which has been so kind to us of late, disappeared red and angry, leaving behind it a sky of flaming glory.
I said to Dimbie that perhaps we had not been sufficiently grateful to his majesty, that we had begun to take him for granted, and that we should never make the sun feel cheap.
And so to-day the little forget-me-nots and velvety, sweet-faced pansies have laid their heads on mother earth, driven there by squalls of angry wind and rain, and the long branches of the beech tree in the frog-pond field are waving and bending and shaking out their wealth of still tender green leaves with fine abandon.
I am solicitous for the sweet-peas. Dimbie has been late in putting in the sticks for them to climb up, and their hold is slight and wavering. Two long hedges of Eckfords and Tennants and Burpees, and that loveliest of all sweet-peas, Countess Cadogan, flank the lawn on either side. In a few days they will all be out, and I shall lie in the midst of a many-hued, blossoming sweetness. So much have I to be thankful for. A cripple in town would stare at brick walls, yet to-day only discontent sits at my side.
I am cold—rain in summer makes the inside of a creeper-covered cottage very chilly. The water drips from the leaves of the clematis—drips, drips. I want to be up and doing. The rain on my cheek in the woods and lanes would be gracious and sweet-scented. The raindrops lying in the heart of the honeysuckle would be as nectar for the gods. But a rainy world when one is a prisoner within four walls is truly depressing, and there will be no Dimbie to-night.
Dimbie, dear, do you know how much I miss you? The heart of your Marguerite calls for you, calls for you.
You say you will be back soon, but you don't know. Little old ladies take a long time to die. The flame flickers and flares up and flickers and gutters, and is so long in going out. What am I saying? Dimbie, forgive me, dear. I don't want Aunt Letitia to die. I am praying for her to get better. Ill or well, she needs you, or she would not have sent for you, for her message was: "I know your wife wants you, but I want you more; and it will only be for a few days, and then you may return to her. I would much like to have seen Marguerite, but——"
What does that "but" mean I wonder? Does she know that the journey is nearly over? And Dimbie says that that journey has been one of great loneliness, borne with a great patience and cheerfulness. I think God will create a separate heaven for very lonely women. He will give them little children and a love that passeth all understanding. The love that has been withheld from them in this world will be given to them a thousandfold in the New Jerusalem.
I am always sorry for lonely women.
*****
Nanty came in breezy and fresh and wet, and my loneliness vanished.
"I have told John to put up in the village, and I can stay with you for a couple of hours," she announced, removing her cloak. "And you have been crying."
I shook my head.
"Well, there are two tears at the back of your eyes ready to fall."
"Not now," I said.
"What's been the matter?"
"Dimbie's away."
"Dear me!" she said with comical gravity. "Been away long?"
"He went this morning."
She laughed outright.
"What did you have for lunch?"
"Fish."
"What sort of fish?'
"A whiting."
She sniffed.
"A cold, thin whiting with its tail in its mouth, devoid of any taste and depressing in its appearance?"
"That exactly describes it," I said laughingly.
"Did you eat it?"
"No, Amelia is going to make it into a fish pie for to-morrow's lunch."
"Amelia seems to be of an economical turn of mind."
"Painfully so," I agreed.
Nanty rose and rang the bell.
"Bring tea at once, please," she said when Amelia appeared, "and a lightly-boiled egg for your mistress with some hot, buttered toast, and light the fire."
Amelia's eyes bulged.
"We've been doing some summer cleaning, the fire'll make dirt."
"Light the fire at once, please, your mistress is cold, the dirt is of no importance; her comfort should be considered before anything else."
"But it's summer——"
"Matches!" said Nanty sternly, and Amelia produced a box like lightning.
Nanty knelt down and removed the fire-screen. Amelia stood and watched her.
"That is not getting tea and toast," said Nanty, without looking round.
"I'm not dressed, mum——" began Amelia argumentatively.
"Tea and toast!" thundered Nanty, and Amelia fled.
"How brave you are," I said.
She laughed.
"I'm certainly not going to be bossed by a young person like Amelia Cockles. How does she suit you?"
"I've never thought of how she suits us, but I think we suit her, although we are not grand like the Tompkinses."
"Who are the Tompkinses?" asked Nanty, settling herself comfortably in an arm-chair.
"Don't you remember the people she lived with before she came to us? They knew a poet, and gave dinner parties and had entrées and hors-d'oeuvres—hoary doves she calls them."
"But does she look after you well?"
"Yes," I said, "so long as I don't interfere with her cleaning. She is a great cleaner, that is her weakest point. Economy is another; she is too careful. Because I told her we were not rich she seems to think we must live on potato parings. Then she wears squeaky, high-heeled shoes, a pearl necklace, and puts on to her print bodies—as she calls them—innumerable patches. Against these bad qualities we must set her honesty, early rising, and devotion to me. She has taken me in hand since the day she entered the house. She thinks, deep down in her heart, that I am one of the poorest creatures she has met. She has compared me on different occasions to a love-lies-bleeding and a black prize Minorca hen. Yet I know she would go through fire and water for me. She dresses me in the morning with a gentleness and patience unsurpassed by any nurse, and the tenderness with which she lifts me from the bed to the couch has caused me to marvel. You ask me how she suits us. Now I come to think about it, I wouldn't be without Amelia Cockles for the world."
She entered as I finished speaking, and placed the tea-tray in front of me, eyeing Nanty with undisguised hostility.
Nanty returned the look with placidity.
"I s'pose you think I have been starving her?"
"No," said Nanty cheerfully, "I am sure you would do nothing of the kind. Your mistress has just been telling me how good you are to her."
Amelia's face softened.
"No one could help being good to a lady like her—she is a lady," and she flounced out of the room.
Nanty smiled. "You cannot be very dull so long as that young person is in the house." She pushed my couch nearer the fire, broke the top off my egg, and ordered me to begin to eat.
"It is lovely having you here," I said, "I was just beginning to be dull. What made you come this wet day?"
"Your husband wired for me."
"So you knew he was away?"
"Yes," she returned, "and I went straight away to see if I could persuade Peter to let your mother come and stay with you during your husband's absence."
"And——" I cried.
"Your father had just succeeded in getting a canoe to float on the duck-pond—personally I think it was on the bottom, but I did not suggest that—and in the flush of victory he said she could come the day after to-morrow. Ah, that's better," she finished as the blood rushed into my cheeks. "You looked as white as a ghost when I came in."
"You are clever," I said.
"Yes," she agreed, "in some things."
A smile hovered round her mouth.
"I wonder if you had been Peter's wife——"
"God forbid!" she broke in.
I laughed.
"It will be delightful having mother."
"Do you find the days long?"
"When it's wet."
"Do you still find vent for your happiness in the pages of a manuscript book?"
I nodded.
She looked at me with incredulous eyes.
"You still find your year—what was it you called it—wonderful?"
"I have Dimbie."
"And an aching back."
"That would be worse if I hadn't Dimbie."
"No man is worth such love from a woman."
"Mine is," I said indignantly.
"Well, don't flash out at me like that. He must be an exception."
"Of course he is."
"And all women think the same when they are first married."
"Nanty, you are a pessimist."
"Optimists are tiresome and always boring."
"They add to the cheerfulness of the world."
"They depress me and always put me in a bad temper. You say it is horribly cold, and they remind you that frost keeps away disease. You say it is windy, and they reply that it is bracing. You have lost your pet dog, and they suggest that you might have lost your favourite horse. People who always say, 'Never mind, cheer up!' are aggravating in the extreme. I like people to weep when I weep and laugh when I laugh. I don't like my friends to make light of my troubles and practically suggest that I am a coward."
She poked the fire with vigour.
"So you would like me much better if I were to howl about my accident."'
"Exactly, it would be much more natural and human."
"But what about Dimbie?"
"Oh, of course if you bring Dimbie into everything it will be impossible for you to behave in a rational way."
I laughed gently, and Nanty frowned at the fire.
"If I were to howl Dimbie's year would be spoiled."
"I don't believe in wives being unselfish to their husbands; it spoils them. Men are quite selfish enough as it is."
"How down upon men you are, Nanty. Have you not met any nice ones?" I asked.
"Dimbie is not bad as men go. But give him a few years; he will be as disagreeable as the rest."
"I met a very nice man the other day," I said, refusing to be annoyed. "It was just before my accident—a Professor Leighrail."
"Professor Leighrail!" A great astonishment lay in Nanty's eyes. "A very thin man?"
"Yes, he invited us to look at his ribs. His wife, Amabella, is dead."
"Amabella dead?" she repeated.
I nodded.
"He took up ballooning, as he thought it would be the quickest way of ending himself."
Nanty started, and then poured herself out another cup of tea.
"Do you know him?"
"I knew him some years ago."
"He once asked you to be his wife."
Nanty dropped her spoon with a clatter.
"Did he tell you?"
"Of course not," I laughed, and hugged Jumbles who lay on the couch beside me. "I knew by your face, Nanty, dear. Why didn't you accept him?"
"Because I was a fool." She spoke bitterly. "I should have been happy with that man. As it was, he—grew fond of Amabella. Didn't he?" She turned on me with a pounce.
"I—I think so," I stammered; "but I don't suppose he ever loved her as much as he loved you. I should fancy from her name she was a bit—pussy-catty."
Nanty smiled a little grimly.
"Men like domestic, sit-by-the-hearth women. I feel sure Amabella mended his socks regularly and brushed his clothes."
"They wanted brushing the other day," I said reflectively, "and his boots were miles too big for him—they were like canoes." And I went on to relate where we had met him, what he had had for his dinner, and how he was coming to call upon us in his balloon.
"It is a dangerous game," said Nanty crossly as she rose to go.
"But he is lonely and unhappy," I protested.
"So are lots of people," she snapped. "I have been lonely for twenty years, and I get stouter every day."
"His ribs are like knife blades," I observed.
"He was always thin. I have not seen him since I was a girl, but I have followed his career. I knew he would make a name for himself. He was always dabbling in some mess—ruined his mother's bed-quilts—and wore badly-fitting clothes. It's strange you should meet him," she finished musingly.
"Would you like his address?" I asked quietly.
"No, I wouldn't, thanks, but—I shouldn't mind meeting him here some day. It would be pleasant to have a chat about old times."
"Rather dangerous, I should say."
"You always were an impertinent child," she said as she stooped to kiss me.
The love affairs of my friends are multiplying, I thought, when she had gone—Dr. Renton's and now Nanty's.