The Vagaries of Tod and Peter

by L. Allen Harker

“Oh, no; Miss Mercer doesn’t teach Latin, and he’s far too backward in other things to begin.”

“I began Greek when I was his age,” said Gaffer dreamily; “but there’s no reason why Addison should not begin Latin. He shall begin it with me.”

Addison flushed up to the roots of his hair; then he scrambled off his seat—a most unheard-of proceeding in the middle of lunch—and ran round to his grandfather. He threw himself upon him, exclaiming: “I love you; oh, how I love you!”

Kit regarded him with astonished eyes. That Addison, who never kissed anybody but mother, who was so undemonstrative, so slow to show feeling, should behave in this extraordinary manner, because he was told he might have Latin lessons, was to her incomprehensible; and Gaffer seemed to approve, for he lifted Addison on to his knee, and said in such a queer voice: “I think we’re rather of a kidney, you and I; we’re going to understand each other uncommonly well,” and Addison sat enthroned on Gaffer’s knee all the rest of lunch, and shared his cheese. Kit felt injured.

When Gaffer went back to his study he sat down before the fire, and he pondered for a long time over his queer little grandson. Then he gave his shoulders a shake and sighed: “I was a disappointment to my father, and he’ll be a disappointment—he is a disappointment—poor little chap, to his. He is unaccountably like me.”

A lonely child was Addison. The fact that he was always called Addison from the time he ceased to be baby was proof enough. A child who is understood gets a nickname. Kit had fifty. Addison was always called by his baptismal name. It was Gaffer’s name, and Gaffer’s grandfather had been called after a gentleman who wrote poetry and things. Little Addison knew that much, and he wondered if the writings of that far-away Mr. Addison were more interesting than “Step by Step.” Addison was called an “old-fashioned child”; he was not very sure precisely what that was, but that it was something a child ought not to be, he was convinced. Kit was pretty, very pretty; so the officers said, not infrequently to Kit herself. Kit was never afraid of anything by day or by night. Kit always spoke the truth; Addison had been known to prevaricate when he was frightened, and he was often frightened—at nothing at all, Kit said.

But the worst and most unforgivable thing about Addison was this: he had no wish to be a soldier—and said so. The sound of a pop-gun caused his heart to thump against his breast in an unpleasantly violent manner, and a review was to him a prolonged agony that made him ill for days.

His mother—whom he worshipped—and who loved him tenderly, was quite unconscious of his many sufferings. She was absolutely devoid of nerves herself, and thought that Addison would grow out of his “delicacy,” as she called it. She was proud of his remarkable resemblance to her father, whom she admired above all mortal men—but she was disappointed; and poor Addison, with the quick intuition of childhood, was perfectly aware of it—at his being what her husband called “such a Molly.”

So it came about that Kit was always brought forward, and Addison kept in the background—to his own satisfaction certainly, but very much to the detriment of Kit.

Edinburgh, where the regiment was stationed, was too cold for mother, and dad obtained leave to take her to the Riviera for the worst months; so Kit and Addison were sent to Gaffer, and for Addison it was the turning-point of his life.