The crossness of the two younger girls grew in intensity when, the ferry safely crossed, Luke dragged them at remorseless speed through the crowded town. Pitiful longing eyes were cast back at the glittering shops and the magical picture-shows. Why had he taken them to those horrid rocks? Why hadn’t he given them time to look at the shop-windows? They’d promised faithfully to bring back something for Dad and Betty and Queenie and Dick.
Phyllis had ostentatiously flung into the harbour her elaborately selected bunch of sea-flora, and the poor ill-used plants, hot from the girl’s hand, were now tossing up and down amid the tarry keels and swaying hawsers. The girl regretted this action now,—regretted it more and more vividly as the station drew near. Mummy always loved a bunch o’ flowers, and they were so pretty! She was sure it was Luke who had made her lose them. He had pushed her so roughly up those nasty steps.
Tears were in Polly’s eyes as, bedraggled and panting, they emerged on the open square where the gentle monarch looks down from his stone horse. There were sailors now, mixed with the crowd on the esplanade,—such handsome boys! It was cruel, it was wicked, that they had to go, just when the real sport began.
The wretched Jubilee Clock—how they all hated its trim appearance!—had a merciless finger pointing at the very minute their train was due to start, as Luke hurried them round the street-corner. Polly fairly began to cry, as they dragged her from the alluring scene. She was certain that the Funny Men were just going to begin. She was sure that that distant drum meant Punch and Judy!
Breathlessly they rushed upon the platform. Wildly, with anxious eyes and gasping tones, they enquired of the first official they encountered, whether the Yeoborough train had gone.
Observing the beauty of the three troubled girls, this placid authority proceeded to tantalize them, asking “what the hurry was,” and whether they wanted a “special,” and other maddening questions. It was only when Luke, who had rushed furiously to the platform’s remote end, was observed to be cheerfully and serenely returning, that Phyllis recovered herself sufficiently to give their disconcerted insulter what she afterwards referred to as “a bit of lip in return for his blarsted sauce.”
No,—the train would not be starting for another ten minutes. Fortunate indeed was this accident of a chance delay on the Great Western Railroad,—the most punctual of all railroads in the world,—for it landed Luke with three happy, completely recovered damsels, and in a compartment all to themselves, when the train did move at last. Abundantly fortified with ginger-pop and sponge-cake,—how closely Luke associated the savour of both these refreshments with such an excursion as this!—and further cheered by the secure possession of chocolates, bananas, “Ally Sloper’s Half Holiday,” and the “Illustrated London News,”—the girls romped, and sang, and teased each other and Luke, and whispered endearing mockeries out of the window to sedately unconscious gentlemen, at every station where they stopped until the aged guard’s paternal benevolence changed to irritable crossness, and Luke himself was not altogether sorry when the familiar landscape of Yeoborough, dusky and shadowy in the twilight, hove in sight.
Little Polly left them at the second of the two Yeoborough stations, and the others, crowding at the window to wave their good-byes, were carried on in the same train to Nevilton.
During this final five minutes, Annie slipped softly down upon her lover’s knees and seemed to wish to indicate to Phyllis, without the use of words, that her relations with their common friend were now on a new plane,—at once more innocent and less reserved.