PEACE WITH HONOUR.
This is the story of Mr. Holmes, the Curate, and of how he brought peace to our troubled house. The principal characters are John, my brother-in-law, and Margery, my unmarried sister, and, at the bottom of the programme, in large letters, Mr. Holmes, the Curate. I have a small walking-on part. The story will now commence.
John and Margery went out for a walk in the beautiful Spring sunshine as friendly as friendly. They came back three hours later—well, Cecilia (his wife) and I heard them at least two villages away.
They both rushed into the room covered with mud and shouting at the tops of their voices.
"Cecilia," roared John, "order this girl out of my house. She shan't stay under my roof another hour."
"Cecilia," shrieked Margery, "he's an obstinate ignorant wretch, and thank Heaven he isn't my husband."
I put a cushion over my head.
Cecilia kept hers.
"If you will both go out of the room," she said, "take off your filthy boots and come back in your right minds and decent clothing I'll try to understand what you are both talking about."
They crawled out of the room abjectly and I came out into the open once more.
"Good Lord! What a family to be in!" I said.
"Cecilia," said John at tea, "harking back to the question of Hairy Bittercress——"
"Hazel Catkin," said Margery.
"What on earth——?" began Cecilia.
"I'll tell her," said Margery quickly. "Cecilia, we had a competition this afternoon, seeing who could find most signs of Spring. Well, I found a bit of Hazel Catkin——"
"Hairy Bittercress," said John.
"I tell you——" went on Margery.
"If you will calm yourself," interrupted John with dignity, "we will discuss the point."
"There's nothing to discuss. What do you know about botany, I'd like to know?"
"My dear child," said John, "when you were an infant-in-arms, nay, before you existed at all, it was my custom to ramble o'er the dewy meads, plucking the nimble Nipplewort and the shy Speedwell. I breakfasted on botany."
"Talking of botany," I broke in "there was a chap in my platoon——"
John groaned loudly.
"Do you suggest," I asked, "that he was not in my platoon?"
"I suggest nothing," he answered; "I only know that they can't all have been in your platoon."
"All who, John?" asked Cecilia.
"All the chaps he tells us about. Haven't you noticed, since he came home, it's impossible to mention any type or freak or extraordinary individual that wasn't like somebody in his platoon? It must have been about five thousand per cent. over strength."
"I treat your insults with contempt," I said, "and proceed with my story. This chap had the same affliction that has taken Margery and yourself. He spent his life searching for specimens of the Bingle-weed and the five-leaved Funglebid. At bayonet-drill he would stop in the middle of a 'long-point, short-point, jab' to pluck a sudden Oojah-berry that caught his eye. In the end his passion got him to Blighty."
"How?" asked Margery.
"Well," I continued, "it was the morning of the great German attack. My friend—er—I will call him X—and myself were retiring on the village of—er—Y, followed by about six million Germans. Shots were falling all round us, when suddenly X saw a small wild flower at his feet. He bent down to pick it up and—er——"
"That is quite enough, Alan," said Cecilia.
"That is all, Cecilia," I said; "that is how he got to Blighty."
"We will now proceed with the subject in hand," said John after a moment's silence. He produced a small crushed piece of green-stuff from his pocket.
"The question before the house is, as we used to say in the Great War, 'Qu'est-ce-que c'est que ceci?' Any suggestions that it is of the Lemon species will be returned unanswered. For my part I say it is Hairy Bittercress."
"And I say it's Hazel Catkin," said Margery.
"And what says Hubert the herbalist?" asked John, handing the weed to me.
I examined it carefully through the ring of my napkin.
"Well," I said, "speaking largely, I should say it is either Mustard or Cress, or both as the case may be."
I was howled down and retired.
We heard lots of the weed during the next few days. Each morning at breakfast it sprouted forth as it were.
"And how is the Great Unknown?" I would ask.
"The Hairy Bittercress is thriving, we thank you," John would answer.
"Hazel Catkin," Margery would throw out.
"Catkin yourself," from John, and so on ad lib.
They kept it carefully in a small pot in the window, and if one looked at it the other watched jealously for foul play.
"On Saturday," said John, "the Curate is coming to tea. He is a man of wisdom and a botanist to boot—or do I mean withal? On Saturday the Hairy Bittercress shall be publicly proclaimed by its rightful name."
"Which is Hazel Catkin," said Margery.
Saturday came and Saturday afternoon, and, about three o'clock, the Curate. I saw him coming and met him at the door.
"Good afternoon, Mr. Holmes," I said. "You come to a house of bitterness and strife. Walk right in."
"Indeed I trust not," he said.
"Come with me," I replied; "I will tell you all about it." And I led him on tip-toe to a quiet spot.
"Mr. Holmes," I said, "you know the family well. We have always been a happy loving crowd, have we not?"
"Indeed you have," he said politely.
"Well," I continued, "a weed has split us asunder. My brother-in-law and my younger sister are on the point of committing mutual murder."
I explained the whole situation and drew a harrowing picture of its effect on our family life. "Unless you help us," I said, "this Hazel Catkin or Hairy Bittercress will ruin at least four promising young lives."
"But I hardly see how I am to——" began Mr. Holmes.
I told him what to do.
"But surely," he said, "they will know better than that."
"No, they won't," I said. "Neither of them knows anything about it, really. Come, Mr. Holmes, it is for a good cause."
"Very well," he said. "Perhaps the end justifies the means. We will see what we can do."
"Good man," I said. "Children unborn will bless your name for this day's work."
I took him to the dining-room, where Margery and John were sitting.
"Here is Mr. Holmes," I said.
They both made a dash at him.
"Mr. Holmes," said John, "we seek your aid. You have a wide and deep knowledge of geography—that is botany, and you shall settle a problem that is ruining my home."
"Certainly I will do my best," said Mr. Holmes. And then without a blush: "What is the problem, may I ask?"
"We have found a piece of——" began John.
"Don't tell him," shrieked Margery. "Let him see for himself."
They fetched the weed and handed it reverently to the Curate.
Mr. Holmes looked at it carefully. He breathed on it and moistened it with his finger. At last he looked up.
"This is a very rare specimen indeed," he said; "I never remember to have seen one quite like it. It is in fact a hybrid." He stopped and beamed at us.
"What's it called?" shrieked Margery and John together.
Mr. Holmes chose his words carefully.
"It is called," he said, "Hairy Catkin."
There was a pause while Margery and John gazed at each other.
"'Hairy Catkin,'" said John solemnly.
"Then—then we're both right!" said Margery.
They looked at each other again and then did the only thing possible in the circumstances. Each fell on the other's neck.
Mr. Holmes and I shook hands silently.
"Get up, dear, and give your seat to this lady. Remember you lose nothing by being polite."
"Oh, don't I? I lose my seat."