“Will you play with me, then?” said Jerry. “I really like that better than anything, only it isn’t much fun for you.”
For Jerry was doing his best to learn the violin. He really loved music, and had already mastered the first difficulties, though his teaching had been but some irregular lessons from a friend who had also lent him his fiddle. And Charlotte, who played the piano well, though with less natural taste for music than her brother, could not please him better than by accompanying him. It called for some patience, no doubt, but harder things would have seemed easy to the girl for Jerry’s sake. So the two spent the rest of the dull autumn afternoon happily and contentedly, though the old school-room piano had long ago seen its best days, and the sounds that Jerry extracted from his violin were not always those of the most harmonious sweetness.
At six o’clock Charlotte started up.
“There is the first dinner-bell,” she said. “We must get dressed at once, Jerry. There is to be no school-room tea to-night, for mamma said it wasn’t worth while, as Noble was out. You and I are to dine with her and papa, and dinner is to be half-an-hour earlier than usual.”
“Where are the boys?” asked Mr Waldron, putting his head in at the door at that moment.
“All out, papa, except me,” Jerry replied.
“And we two are to dine with you and mamma instead of Arthur and Ted,” added Charlotte.
“All right, my dear, but don’t keep us waiting. I have to go out immediately after dinner,” her father replied.
“How tiresome it must be for papa to be sent for like that!” said Charlotte. “I think a lawyer—at least a lawyer in a little town like Wortherham—is almost as badly off as a doctor. I suppose some old gentleman fancies he’s going to die, and has sent for papa to make his will.”
“Very likely nothing half so important,” Jerry replied.