'Well, you aren't,' said my brother, 'so that's that, and I should think it would be better manners if you saw we had a good tea when we're up. Pass the cake. Here, you eat the little chaps, I'll have the plum.'
So Sam ate all the small cakes with sugar on top, and Fitzbattleaxe got the cream tin to lick out. He went right inside and stuck, and had to be lugged out by the tail. Then we shoved the table back and sat round the fire, and talked about the old days. At seven o'clock Nannie looked round the door. She was promptly hauled in and sat on Ross's knee.
'Sam,' she scolded, 'why do you keep them out so late? I really shall have to tell your father to wallop you. I've often threatened to, I really will to-night.'
'Let's run her down the passage, Sam, for cheek,' said Ross, and they were just about to do it when Brown suddenly got up and said,—
'Want a bath, sir?' and Nannie said, 'Will you wear your black again, ma'am?' and, of course, it was that wretched S.P. come to clear away the tea. The smell under her nose was rather worse than usual, and the picnic broke up hurriedly. I felt as if I had been having tea with my brother's man-servant, and Ross had been nursing one of the maids. Oh, I do loathe that woman!
It was a most unfortunate dinner to-night, like one of those you get at Aunt Amelia's. There didn't seem to be anything solid to eat. At the end Sam handed Ross sardines on toast. 'What a thundering lot of hors d'oeuvres we seem to be having to-night, when's the dinner coming?'
'Savoury, sir,' said Sam.
'You don't mean to tell me,' said Ross, pushing back his chair and glaring at Sam, 'that I've had my dinner?'
'You've had what there was of it, sir.'
'Well, I'm jiggered. Why on earth, Meg, don't you make them cook more food. Really——'