“Yes, twice a year we spend a riotous fortnight in London. We stay at a Bayswater boarding-house that calls itself a private hotel, which the Puckles always patronise. Lizzie and I stare into windows and compare opinions, do a little shopping and go to concerts. Sep spends most of his time in theatres and worries managers with his plays.”
For some moments after this announcement Ronnie sat beside me in dead silence, then suddenly he sprang to his feet and began to walk to and fro along the professor’s well-beaten track; at last he came to a halt and said:
“Eva, I had no idea of all this! You always write such cheery letters—even that time in London you were mum. It is thundering bad luck that I’m obliged to be off so soon. However something has got to be done. Uncle Horace must find you a more suitable home. Look here, I have just hit on an idea! I shall suggest your going out to India as a P.G.—paying guest, you know—lots of girls do that, and Anglo-Indians are glad enough of the coin now that everything is so expensive. Of course the people you go to must be top hole—that is understood. Aunt Mina is a wonderful woman for references and position, and I believe you will get along famously; you can dance and sing and ride, and chatter nineteen to the dozen. You and I will be on the same continent, which will be a change. I shall offer to pay your passage, and I expect Aunt Mina will be so glad to be rid of you that she will give you a ripping outfit—what do you think of my idea?”
“Oh, Ronnie,” I exclaimed, “it is too splendid for words. How did it enter your head?”
“It came into my head just now as I walked up and down and saw you crouched here on the garden seat, and thought of you cooped up in that gloomy old house, with the sham professor, the clerical governess, and the great empty, ugly country that cuts you off from all the world—and you only nineteen! Before I go to sleep this very night I shall write Uncle Horace a letter that will make things move.”
“I doubt if your letter will move Aunt Mina or remove me! Ronnie, wouldn’t it be lovely if I could go out and keep house for you—I am such a clever manager?”
“My dear, crazy child, if the colonel were to hear you he would have fits. He bars married officers and——-”
“Is married himself,” I interrupted impatiently.
“Well, the fact is, she married him. Away from the regiment, he fell a prey, like Samson minus his hair. She was an old maid, a squiress, with a long pedigree and a large fortune. She was sick of her village and schools, and of unflinching determination to see the world; she met ‘James’ at a dinner party, and, so to speak, nailed him! She’s a rattling good sort I must confess, entertains a lot, mothers what she calls ‘her boys,’ and keeps us as well as she can under her own eye.”
“And he?”