The Unbidden Guest

by E. W. Hornung

“I'm very glad it was nothing worse,” said Mr. Teesdale heartily. “I made that sure it was you.”

“You never mentioned it, father?” said John William.

“No, because I was also quite sure that she would write if we only gave her time. You ought to have written, Missy, and then I'd have gone in and fetched you——”

“But that's just what I didn't want. All this way! No, the 'bus was quite good enough for me.”

“But what about your trunk?” Arabella inquired.

Missy made answer in the fewest words that her trunk was following by carrier; and because Mrs. Teesdale entered to them now, with a pot of fresh tea, Missy said little more just then, except in specific apology for her remissness in not writing. This apology was made directly to Mrs. Teesdale, whose manner of receiving it may or may not have discouraged the visitor from further conversation at the moment. But so it seemed to one or two, who heard and saw and felt that such discouragement would exist eternally between that old woman and that young girl.

Milking-time was at hand, however, and Missy was left to finish her tea with only Mr. Teesdale to look after her. John William and his mother were the two best milkers on the farm, and Arabella was a fair second to them when she liked, but that was not this evening. Her heart was with Missy in the parlour. But Missy herself was far better suited in having the old farmer all to herself. With him she was entirely at her ease. The moment they were alone she was thanking David for the twenty pounds duly received at the post-office, and his immediate stipulation that the matter of the loan must be a secret made it also an additional bond of sympathy between these two. They sat chatting about England and Miriam's parents, but not more than Missy could help. She referred but lightly to a home-letter newly received, as though there was no news in it; she was much more ready to hear how Mr. Teesdale had had the coat torn off his back in rescuing his first home-letters from the tiny post-office of the early days, which had been swept away by the first wave of the gold-rush. Again he spoke of that golden age, and of his own lost chances, without a perceptible shade of regret, and again Missy marvelled; as did Mr. Teesdale yet again, and in his turn, at her tone about money who had been brought up in the midst of it. It only showed the good sense of his old friend in keeping his children simple and careful amid all their rich surroundings; but Mr. Oliver had been ever the most sensible, as well as the kindest of men. The farmer said this as he was walking slowly in the paddock, with a pipe in his mouth and Missy on his arm, and his downcast eyes upon the long, broken shadow of his own bent figure. Missy's trunk came about this time, but she let it alone. And these two were feeding the chickens together—old David's own department—when Arabella came seeking Missy, having escaped from the milking-stool a good hour before her time.

“Oh, here you are! Come, and I'll help you unpack. Mother said I was to,” said she hurriedly. She was only in a hurry for Missy's society. So Missy went with her, getting a good-humoured nod from the old man, whose side she was sorry to leave.

And David watched her out of sight, smiling his calm, kind smile. “She's her father's daughter,” said he to the chickens. “Her ways are a bit new to me—but that's where I like 'em. Mannerisms she may have—I wouldn't have her otherwise. She's one of the rising generation—but she has her father's heart, and that's the best kind that ever beat time.”

In Missy's bedroom much talking was being done by Arabella. Her curiosity was insatiable, but she herself never gave it a chance. She wanted to know this, but before there was time for an answer she must know that. One thing, when the trunk was unpacked and its contents put away in drawers, she was left entirely unable to understand; and that was, how Missy came to have everything brand-new.