It may be added, too, that beyond breaking one of his arms in a tumble downstairs through riding on the banisters in defiance of all commands to the contrary, he managed for the next few months to keep pretty free from scrapes—something surprising in such a long interval.
During all this time Jupp had been a very regular Sunday visitor at the vicarage, coming up to the house after morning-service and being entertained at dinner in the kitchen, after which meal he served as a playfellow for the children until the evening, when he always accompanied the vicar to church.
He had now come to be looked upon by all as a tried and valued friend, Mr Vernon being almost as fond of chatting with him about his old sea life as was Mary, the nurse; while Conny would consult him earnestly on geographical questions illustrative of those parts of the globe he had visited.
As for the younger ones, he was their general factotum, Teddy and Cissy regarding him as a sort of good-natured giant who was their own especial property and servant.
With all a sailor’s ingenuity, he could carve the most wonderful things out of the least promising and worthless materials that could be imagined; while, as for making fun out of nothing, or telling thrilling stories of fairies and pirates and the different folk amongst whom he had mixed in his travels—some of them, to be sure, rather queer, as Conny said—why, he hadn’t an equal, and could make the dreariest afternoon pass enjoyably to young and old alike, even Joe the gardener taking almost as great pleasure in his society as Molly and Mary.
This was while the snow lay on the ground and Jack Frost had bound the little river running through the village and the large pond in the water meadow beyond with chains of ice, and life out of doors seemed at a standstill; but, anon, when the breath of spring banished all the snow and ice, and cowslips and violets began to peep forth from the released hedgerows, and the sparrows chuckled instead of chirped, busying themselves nest-building in the ivy round the vicarage, and when the thrush sang to the accompaniment of the blackbird’s whistle, the children found that Jupp was even a better playfellow in the open than he had been indoors, being nearly as much a child in heart as themselves.
Whenever he had half a day given him in the week free from duty he would make a point of coming up to take “Master Teddy and the young ladies” out into the woods, fern-hunting and flower-gathering, the vicar frequently popping upon the little picnickers unawares, whilst they were watching the rabbits and rabbitikins combing out their whiskers under the fir-trees, and Jupp and Mary getting an al fresco tea ready for the party.
The little tabby kitten had long since been eclipsed in Teddy’s affections by a small Maltese terrier with a white curly coat of hair, which his fond grandmother had rather foolishly given him, the poor little animal being subjected to such rough treatment in the way of petting that it must have over and over again wished itself back in its Mediterranean home.
“Puck” was the little dog’s name, and he appeared in a fair way of “putting a girdle round the earth,” if not in forty minutes like his elfish namesake, at least in an appreciable limited space of time, Teddy never being content except he carried about the unfortunate brute with him everywhere he went, hugging it tightly in his arms and almost smothering its life out by way of showing his affection.
Having once had his hair cut, too, unluckily by Mary, Teddy seized an opportunity, when alone in the nursery, to treat poor Puck in similar fashion, the result of which was that the little animal, deprived of his long curly coat, not only shivered constantly with cold, but looked, in his closely-shorn condition, like one of those toy lambs sold in the shops in lieu of dolls for children, which emit a bleating sort of sound when pressed down on their bellows-like stands.