Deep Moat Grange

by S. R. Crockett

But after all, between Thursday and Saturday there is always Friday. And all sorts of superstitious people call that an unlucky day. Now, I never could see any difference myself. A day on which I lost money through a hole in my pocket, or got a cut finger, or got caught at the cupboard, or had a headache, was "an unlucky day, whether it happened to be Monday or Friday. And Sunday was Sunday, and the worst of all, mostly; for if mother caught me in a secluded crib reading what she called a "novelle," she marched me straight up to my father, who whaled me proper—not that he cared himself, but just to satisfy mother's conscience and for disturbing him in his after-dinner nap.

But, at all events, there was this Friday, which proved to be unlucky or not—just as you look at it. At any rate, it was with that day that there began the solving of the real mystery of Deep Moat Grange, which had puzzled Breckonside in general, and me in particular, for so long.

Somehow I made sure that Elsie would be looking out for me at the same corner of the road on Friday morning, just where I had met her the day before. At any rate, I did not doubt but that she would have it in her head. And I was such a fool that it pleased me, like a cat stroked on the back, to think that Elsie was thinking about me.

It was all right having Harriet and Constantia in the house, though. And not at all like what Elsie had feared. They were really very good to mother. And Harriet being always merry, and Constantia all the time wanting things done for her, it was good for mother, and took her mind more off her trouble.

Besides, you can't really keep on being angry with a pair of pretty girls about a house. They brighten things wonderfully. The very sight of them does, and you can't help it. And though both of them together were not worth an Elsie, nor half so pretty, yet they laughed more, and being town girls, of course they had any amount of nice dresses, pretty blouses, belts for the waist, and lace for their necks; while Elsie had just a white turn-over collar like a boy, and a broad brown leather belt for her blue serge dress. I gave her that belt, and she always wore blue serge, because she said that, with good brushing, she could make a not Sunday dress look almost like a Sunday one.

Well, as I say, of course all the Caws that ever were could never be like Elsie. But still it is a wonder and a marvel to me to think how much I liked having them in the house. Harriet was as merry as a grig whatever that may be; they don't live in our parts—and pretty, too, with a piquant expression that was never twice the same. She always looked as if she were going to cheek you. And that interested you, because, not being a boy, it put you in a fret to know how she was going to set about it this time. If she had been a boy, she would have got pounded—sound and frequent.

And then Constantia! She was more "keepsake" girl than ever, and slopped about all over our plain furniture like the "window-sill" girl, and the "Romney" girl, and the "chin-on-elbows" girl—that was Cinderella. But Constantia was always dressed to the nines—no holes in her dress, and not a very big one even where her waist came through. Oh, she was a Miss Flop from Floptown if you like! But lovely, I tell you! How everybody stared, as if they had never seen a girl with curls and big eyes that looked as if they were going to cry! They called them "dewy"—dewy, indeed! She kept an onion in her handkerchief on purpose. Once it fell out, and rolled right under the sofa. I nailed it, and in a minute had "dewy" eyes, too—right before her nose. There were gentlemen calling, too—your lawyer fellows with cuffs and dickeys! She said I was a horrid beast, but Harriet was quite jolly about it. She never "dewied" any, but kept laughing all the time. And if it had not been for thinking about Elsie and my father, she would have got a fellow to like her in time. She was the right sort. But the funny thing was, that of the two Elsie rather took to Constantia. She never could abide Harriet. Now, I was quite different.

Now, I know all this about girls' likes and dislikes is as tangled as can be. I asked Mr. Ablethorpe about it once. And he let on that he understood all about it; but when I asked him to explain, he said that he was bound by the "professional secret."

Which was all right, as a way of getting out of it. But as for understanding about girls, and what they like and don't, that was more than a bit of a stretcher, if one may say such a thing of a parson.

Well, on Friday morning, as I was coming down from my room, ready to go out and meet Elsie, just at the corner where stood the clock—which, as the books say, has been previously referred to in these memoirs—I came on Harriet rigged out in the smartest little dusting dress—the kind of thing that costs three shillings to buy and three pounds to make. She had her sleeves rolled up, because her arms were dimply, and she was sweeping crumbs into a dustpan. There had not been a crumb in that spot to my knowledge for ten years, but that made no matter. She was just tatteringly pretty—yes, and smart. I like that sort of girl, nearly as much as I dislike a loll-about, siesta-with-ten-cushions-and-a-spaniel girl—I mean Constantia.