CHAPTER XIII
Camp Hospitality
The brief visit at the camp was vanishing with almost incredible rapidity; the week would finish on Saturday, but Miss Gibbs had decided to stay till Monday morning, so as to put in the full period of work on Saturday afternoon. Sunday was of course a holiday, and the pickers enjoyed a well-earned rest. Those who liked went to the little church in Shipley village, the clergyman of which also held an outdoor service in the stackyard at the farm for all whom he could persuade to come.
In the afternoon the members of the camp gave themselves up to hospitality. They had small and select private tea-parties, and invited each other, the hostesses generally being “at home” in some cosy spot beneath a tree, or under the shelter of a hedge, where the alfresco repast was spread forth, each guest bringing her own mug and plate. Raymonde, Morvyth, Katherine, and Aveline were the recipients of a very special invitation, and Miss Gibbs assenting, they accepted it with glee. Miss Lowe, the artist with whom they had struck up a friendship, had removed on Friday from the camp to lodgings at an old farm near the village, and she had asked her four school-girl acquaintances to 154 come for early dinner and tea, so that they might spend the afternoon with her.
Miss Lowe was an interesting personality. She sketched beautifully, and had shown the girls a few charming specimens of her work. She had been painting in the neighbourhood for some weeks before the strawberry picking began, and had many quaint accounts to give of her experiences. Her quarters in the village had been decidedly uncomfortable, and it seemed very uncertain whether the rooms she had engaged at the farm would turn out to be any improvement.
“You’ll have to take pot-luck if you come to dinner with me,” she announced to her guests. “I don’t believe my landlady has even the most elementary notions of cooking. The meal will probably be a surprise.”
“We shan’t mind that!” the girls assured her.
Miss Lowe had chosen her lodgings more for the sake of the picturesque than for creature comforts. The farm-house was an extremely ancient building, and its very dilapidation rendered it a more suitable subject for her brush. It consisted of a front later-date portion, and a much older part at the back, the two being really separate blocks, connected by a large central hall. This hall, which measured about twenty feet square and thirty feet in height, must at one time have belonged to a family of some pretensions. The walls to a height of fifteen feet were covered with splendid oak panelling, grey with neglect, and above that were ornamented with plaster designs in bas-relief—lions, unicorns, wild boars, stags, and other heraldic devices, a form of decoration which was also continued over the ceiling. 155 The back part of the house was evidently the older; the same beautiful plaster-work was to be seen, both in the bedrooms and kitchen, together with fine black oak beams. There was a winding stair to the upper story, with narrow windows that suggested a castle, and that dull, dim, soft yellow-brown light about everything which only seems reflected from ancient walls. The front portion consisted of two great sitting-rooms, one of which was empty, while the other had been arranged for the accommodation of visitors. Neither walls nor window-sills had been touched with paint for half a century, and they were sadly in need of attention. The house was the property of an old miser, who refused to spend a penny on repairs, and every year things went on from bad to worse. The woodwork of the wide old staircase was rotting away, most of the doors were off their hinges, and the rain came through several spots in the roof. Like many another fine mansion, it had descended from hall to farm-house, and showed now but faded relics of its former grandeur.
The farmer and his family lived entirely in the back premises, and the whole of the front was given up to their lodgers.