Bealby was wonderful with the firelighting, and except that he cracked a plate in warming it, quite admirable as a cook. He burnt his fingers twice—and liked doing it; he ate his portion with instinctive modesty on the other side of the caravan and he washed up—as Mr. Mergleson had always instructed him to do. Mrs. Bowles showed him how to clean knives and forks by sticking them into the turf. A little to his surprise these ladies lit and smoked cigarettes. They sat about and talked perplexingly. Clever stuff. Then he had to get water from the neighbouring brook and boil the kettle for an early tea. Madeleine produced a charmingly bound little book and read in it, the other two professed themselves anxious for the view from a neighbouring hill. They produced their sensible spiked walking sticks such as one does not see in England; they seemed full of energy. “You go,” Madeleine had said, “while I and Dick stay here and make tea. I’ve walked enough to-day....”
So Bealby, happy to the pitch of ecstacy, first explored the wonderful interior of the caravan,—there was a dresser, a stove, let-down chairs and tables and all manner of things,—and then nursed the kettle to the singing stage on the patent cooker while the beautiful lady reclined close at hand on a rug.
“Dick!” she said.
He had forgotten he was Dick.
“Dick!”
He remembered his personality with a start. “Yes, miss!” He knelt up, with a handful of twigs in his hand and regarded her.
“Well, Dick,” she said.
He remained in flushed adoration. There was a little pause and the lady smiled at him an unaffected smile.
“What are you going to be, Dick, when you grow up?”
“I don’t know, miss. I’ve wondered.”