Dimbie and I—and Amelia

by Mabel Barnes-Grundy

I was foolish enough to say this to Peter just before I was married, and he sniffed in the objectionable way which mother and I have always so specially disliked. It sounds undutiful to speak of father thus, but he does sniff. And I might as well remark in passing that I am very far from being attached to Peter, as I always call him behind his back, being less like a father than anyone I have ever met. I am sorry that this should be so, but I didn't choose him for a parent. Parents have a say in their children's existence, but you can't select your own progenitors. Were this within your power, General Peter Macintosh and I would only be on distant bowing terms at the moment, certainly not parent and child. And yet mother would be lonely without me, although I have left her. Poor, darling mother! That is my one trouble, the fly in the ointment; her loneliness, her defencelessness.

I do not mean that Peter kicks her with clogs, or throws lamps at her head. But he worries her, nags at her.

Now Dimbie never nags. I think it was his utter unlikeness to Peter that first attracted me. Peter is small and narrow in his views; Dimbie is large in every sense of the word. Peter has green eyes; Dimbie has blue. Peter has a straight, chiselled nose—the Macintosh nose he calls it: Dimbie has a dear crooked one—an accident at football. Peter has—— But I think I'll just keep to Dimbie's "points" without referring to General Macintosh any further—well, because Dimbie is incomparable.

I met him first in an oil-shop in Dorking. I was ordering some varnish for one of Peter's canoes. Since Peter "retired," which, unfortunately for mother and me, was many years ago—he having married late in life—he has spent his spare time in a workshop at the bottom of the garden building canoes which, up to the present, he has never succeeded in getting to float. But that is a mere detail. No one has ever expressed a wish to float in them, so what matters? The point is that this arduous work kept him shut up in his workshop for many hours away from mother and me. It was then we breathed and played and laughed, and Miss Fairbrother, my governess, read us entrancing stories and taught me how to slide down the staircase on a tea-tray and do other delightful things, while mother kept a sharp look-out for the advance of the enemy.

PETER HAS SPENT HIS SPARE TIME BUILDING CANOES

Well, Dimbie and I got to know each other in this little oil-shop. I, or my muslin frock, became entangled in some wire-netting, which really had no business to be anywhere but at an ironmonger's, and Dimbie disentangled me, there being no one else present to perform this kindly act, the shopman being up aloft searching for his best copal varnish.

We were not engaged till quite six weeks had elapsed after this, because Peter would not sanction such a proceeding. He said I must behave as a general's daughter, and not as a tradesman's; and when I pointed out that royalties frequently became engaged after seeing each other about half a dozen times, and that publicly, he just shouted at me. For years mother and I have been trying to persuade Peter that we are not soldiers, but he doesn't appear to believe us. He only gave his consent in the end to our engagement because he was tired and gouty and wanted to be let alone.

Dimbie was like the importunate widow, and he importuned in season and out of season, from break of day till set of sun. He neglected his business, took rooms in Dorking, would fly up to the city for a couple of hours each day, and spent the rest of his time on our doorstep when he wasn't allowed inside the house. Peter tried threats, bribery, shouting, drill language of the most fearful description; but Dimbie stuck manfully to his guns, and at last Peter was bound to admit that Dimbie must have come of some good fighting stock. Dimbie admitted most cheerfully that he had, that his great-great-grandfather had stormed the heights of Abraham and Wolfe. At which Peter laid down his arms and briefly said, "Take her!" And Dimbie did so at the very earliest opportunity, which was during the Christmas holidays. And so I am his greatly-loving and much-loved wife.