Deep Moat Grange

by S. R. Crockett

Then she introduced the girls in due form. One, the tall tired-looking girl on the sofa, was Constantia, and the little merry one was named Harriet. To my great astonishment they were of the same age, being twins.

It seemed as if I were to be left out altogether, but Harriet looked across at me and asked demurely if I were going to be a minister, too.

She was making fun of me, of course, and that is what I do not allow any girl to do. Only Elsie, and she is really too serious to abuse the privilege—not like this Harriet. I could see in a minute that she was a regular magpie—a "clip," as they say in Breckonside.

Meanwhile, Constantia did not say very much. She gave Mr. Ablethorpe her hand as if she were doing him a valuable kindness. And at this I could hear her sister gurgle. The next minute, Harriet was on her feet, and, taking me by the shoulder, she said: "Come on, Joe—Joe is your name, isn't it? That's good, for it's just the name I like best of all boys' names. Come on and help Susan Fergusson to get tea." That was the way she spoke of her grandmother—off-hand and kindly, with a glint of fun more in the manner than in the words.

"What's your other name?" I asked, because I did not like to call her Harriet so suddenly. Besides, I did not know how Elsie might take to all this. I was sure they would like one another no end. Because they were both the same kind of girl—jolly, so that almost any boy could get on with them. At least, that was what I thought at the time, not knowing any better.

"Caw," she said; "that is my name; same as a crow says 'Caw—Caw—Caw!' You needn't be surprised, I couldn't help it being my father's name. But it's short, and if you should forget it, you have only to go out and stand beneath a rookery, and you'll remember it in a minute. That is, unless you are deaf."

Then I told Harriet Caw my name, Joseph Yarrow, which she thought funny. And she gave me bread to cut while she stood by me and buttered it—doing everything so quickly, and talking all the time, that indeed it was very nice. And I wished Elsie had been there to laugh at Harriet's jokes, which seemed very funny to me then. But, oh, how stupid and feeble they seemed when I came to tell them to Elsie after! And Elsie wasn't a bit amused, as I had hoped. Girls hardly ever seem to get on with other girls as a fellow thinks they will. It is different with men. Now I got on first-class with Mr. Ablethorpe, even when I thought—but it's no matter about that now.

Well, it was a tea! The table was loaded from one end to the other. There were soda scones, light and hove up so as to make your teeth water. There were farrels of oat-cake, crisp and curly, with just the proper amount of browning on the side where the red ashes of the fire had toasted it. Four or five kinds of jams there were, all better one than the other. Old Caleb came in and ate quickly, sermonizing Mr. Ablethorpe all the time, and as long as he was there we were all as quiet as mice. But I am sure everyone was glad when he rose, tumbled things about on the window seat in search of his blue bonnet (which only he of all the countryside still wore), and finally went out to the hill. Before going he warned us to behave and to remember that, such as he was, we had one who deemed himself a minister among us.

But as soon as we were alone, up jumped Harriet Caw, and catching me round the waist, she cried, "Dance, Joseph—dance, Joe! He's gone. Never mind Granny Susan. She does not count!"

That was actually the way she spoke of her grandmother—or step-grandmother, rather. And, indeed, that good lady only laughed, and, shaking her head at the minister, repeated, what I afterwards found to be her favourite maxim—that "young folk would be young folk." The philosophy of which was that they would get over it all too soon.