"Thank you," said Geoff again, more heartily this time. But he overheard Eames grumbling at his wife as he left the room, telling her "he'd have none of that there coddling of the lad."
"And you'd have him laid up with rheumatics—dying of a chill? That'd be a nice finish up to it all. You know quite well——" But Geoff heard no more. And he was too worn-out and sleepy to think much of what he had heard.
He got out what he required for the night. He wondered shiveringly how it would be possible to wash with only a basin. Water he was evidently expected to fetch for himself. He tried to say his prayers, but fell asleep, the tears running down his face, in the middle, and woke up with a sob, and at last managed somehow to tumble into bed. It was very cold, but, as Mrs. Eames had said, quite dry. The chilly feeling woke him again, and he tried once more to say his prayers, and this time with better success. He was able to add a special petition that "mother" might soon be well again, and that dear Vicky might be happy. And then he fell asleep—so soundly, so heavily, that when a drumming at the door made itself heard, he fancied he had only just begun the night. He sat up. Where was he? At first, in the darkness, he thought he was in his own bed at home, and he wondered who was knocking so roughly—wondered still more at the rude voice which was shouting out—
"Up with you there, Jim, d'ye hear? I'm not a-going to stand here all day. It's past half-past four. Jim—you lazy lout. I'll call master if you don't speak—a-locking of his door like a fine gentleman!"
Gradually Geoff remembered all—the feeling of the things about him—the coarse bed-clothes, the slightly mildewy smell of the pillow, helped to recall him to the present, even before he could see.
"I'm coming, Matthew!" he shouted back. "I'll be ready in five minutes;" and out of bed he crept, sleepy and confused, into the chilly air of the little room. He had no matches, but there was a short curtain before the window, and when he pulled it back the moonlight came faintly in—enough for him to distinguish the few objects in the room. He dared not attempt to wash, he was so afraid of being late. He managed to get out his oldest pair of trousers, and hurried on his clothes as fast as he could, feeling miserably dirty and slovenly, and thinking to himself he would never again be hard on poor people for not being clean! "I must try to wash when I come back," he said to himself. Then he hurried out, and none too soon.
Matthew was in the yard, delighted to frighten him. "You'll have to look sharp," he said, as Geoff hurried to the stable. "Betsy's filling the cans, and rare and cross she is at having to do it. You should have been there to help her, and the missis'll be out in a minute."
The harnessing of Dapple was not easy in the faint light, and he could not find the stable lantern. But it got done at last, and Geoff led the cart round to the dairy door, where Betsy was filling the last of the cans. She was not so cross as she might have been, and Mrs. Eames had not yet appeared. They got the cans into the cart, and in a minute or two Geoff found himself jogging along the road, already becoming familiar, to the station.
It seemed to grow darker instead of lighter, for the moon had gone behind a cloud, and sunrise was still a good time off. Geoff wondered dreamily to himself why people need get up so early in the country, and then remembered that it would take two or three hours for the cans to get to London. How little he or Vicky had thought, when they drank at breakfast the nice milk which Mrs. Tudor had always taken care to have of the best, of the labour and trouble involved in getting it there in time! And though he had hurried so, he was only just at the station when the train whizzed in, and the one sleepy porter growled at him for not having "looked sharper," and banged the milk-cans about unnecessarily in his temper, so that Geoff was really afraid they would break or burst open, and all the milk come pouring out.