Читать книгу Auntie Robbo - Ann Scott-Moncrieff - Страница 5

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"But why does she call herself Benck—Miss Benck?" asked Hector through a mouthful of bread and marmalade. "Why isn't she a Mrs., and if she was married to my father, why isn't she Mrs. Murdoch?"

Auntie Robbo poured herself out some more coffee. She and Hector were alone at breakfast. Merlissa Benck had not come down yet. "Does it matter?" she asked abstractedly, gazing out of the window at the grey soaking morning.

"Yes," said Hector, frowning. "It doesn't make sense."

"Oh, well, perhaps she wants to marry again, or she's been left money under a Benck's will, or something like that." Auntie Robbo plainly did not want to discuss their guest; Hector wondered what had happened in the drawing-room after he had gone to bed last night; he hoped Auntie Robbo had behaved herself. As a matter of fact, Auntie Robbo had behaved; that was what was making her feel a little old and depressed.

"Good morning, all," said a bright voice, and there was Merlissa Benck smiling her china smile and looking even whiter than usual in the raw early air.

Auntie Robbo helped her to porridge, which she didn't eat, inquired how she had slept, and then suggested that Hector should take her for a walk during the morning and show her the neighbourhood.

"That would be lovely," said the guest, looking unenthusiastically out of the window. "But wouldn't it be better to wait till it clears up?"

"It will never clear up," said Auntie Robbo firmly. "Never. Not this day."

Hector thought perhaps that it would be better to take Merlissa out of Auntie Robbo's way, so he said kindly: "I've got heaps to show you. Do come. It's very nice outside once you're wet."

Merlissa Benck brightened, gushing: "Oh, you little darling. I'm just dying to see your domain."

Hector looked a little puzzled. He had meant to take her simply a mile down the road to buy some black-striped balls at Nethermuir post-office, but now a somewhat more intricate walk seemed to be called for.

As soon as they left the house, Merlissa Benck began to chat confidentially to him.

"Now, Hector, you must tell me all about yourself. I'm longing to know everything. Do you go into Edinburgh often?"

"Oh, no, hardly ever," said Hector.

"Do you mean to say your aunt doesn't keep a car at Nethermuir?"

"We sometimes go in the bus."

"You must come with me one day soon. You'd like that, wouldn't you?"

Hector smiled brightly.

"Doesn't your aunt go about at all? Doesn't she take you anywhere? Oh, I suppose she's getting too old for that sort of thing."

"Well, yes, I suppose so. We have the ponies though. Sometimes we ride quite a long way. Easily as far as Edinburgh—only in the other direction. 'Way down that way." Hector waved his hand southward over the hills.

"You ride? Your aunt rides?" Merlissa Benck's mouth gaped so that Hector feared her teeth might fall out; he distinctly heard them click into position as she recovered herself. "It's quite preposterous in a woman of her age. Riding at eighty—or ninety— or whatever it is! Suppose anything was to happen when you were out alone with her. Suppose she had an accident—or heart failure."

Hector looked puzzled. "Well, I could save her," he said at last. "I could gallop for help. It would be better than if she was quite, quite alone."

"Oh, how noble," burst out Merlissa Benck. She put an arm round Hector's neck. "But these are your most impressionable years. The shock might mar you for life. I do think your aunt is a most reckless woman. Selfish in some ways. Not at all the sort of person to be looking after young people."

Hector broke away from her uncomfortably.

"Mind your step here. We cross this burn and climb up it along that little path on the other side."

The burn was in spate, plunging downwards in a brown yeasty mass; but it was a little shallow burn, really, and there was no need for Merlissa Benck to yell so loud when she slipped off one of the stepping-stones; nor to splash about wildly while she groped for the bank.

"It's all right," shouted Hector. "Only three inches."

But he was all compunction when he had helped her ashore and saw how wet she was.

"Oh, I am sorry," he said. "But it was your own fault. Never mind. The heather will be wet higher up and now you'll never feel it."

Merlissa Benck, recovering from her panic, gave her china smile and said shortly that it didn't matter. They began to climb up along the burn by a slippery mud sheep-track.

"Shouldn't you be doing lessons at this time, Hector?" panted Merlissa Benck after a while. "I suppose your aunt gave you a holiday for me."

"Oh, I suppose so," Hector replied gaily. "But we only do them on and off anyway."

"What do you mean, on and off?" Her voice was sharp. She stopped in the path. Hector turned round.

"When we feel like it," he said mildly.

Merlissa Benck's expression had become hard and eager; she was like a hound picking up an interesting scent; she panted for breath on the steep, windy hillside.

"I understood from your aunt that you had a tutor, a Mr. Mathison, the minister here. Surely he insists on regular hours."

"Oh, yes, every Friday. He teaches us Latin."

"Us?" breathed his stepmother.

"Auntie Robbo and me. She never learned any Latin when she was young. I say, you mustn't stand still in your wet feet. We must keep walking."

Hector led the way up the path.

"But what about ... Hector, wait for me ... What about other subjects?"

"Oh, Auntie Robbo knows all about them. Sometimes we do sums. We keep account books, and history—lots of history; then afterwards we ride over the battlefields and go and look at the castles where the murders were done."

Seeing Merlissa Benck's shocked expression, Hector explained seriously. "Scottish history has a great many murders, you know."

"I dare say," said Merlissa Benck shortly. "But I should have thought British history would have been more suitable for a boy of your age, indispensable in my opinion. England's story is a very great and noble one."

"Yes," said Hector. "But then we couldn't ride to the battlefields, could we? I mean they were mostly fighting in places that didn't belong to them, weren't they?"

"Certainly not—at least unless it was for a very good cause."

"Auntie Robbo says the causes won't bear looking into."

"What other lessons have you?" asked Merlissa Benck in exasperation.

"Oh, Gaelic poetry. Auntie Robbo is frightfully good at that. She had a Gaelic nurse when she was young who had the second sight. Her name was Morag, and Morag's brother was a bard. Then let's see; we've done an awful lot of geography. Auntie Robbo has been three times to New Zealand and twice to South America and once to Italy, passing through France, and once to Norway. So we've done all these places very thoroughly. Oh, and French; we read French. This summer we're going to make a grand tour."

"Whatever for?" cried Merlissa Benck.

"To finish my education," replied Hector confidently.

"Nonsense!" but the wind flung the word back in her teeth. Merlissa Benck snapped her mouth tight on it.

Hector bounded ahead out of the gully through which the burn ran and onto a tableland of moor.

"Come on," he shouted, and Merlissa Benck struggled after him.

A neat little lochan lay on the tableland and it was its brown, peaty waters that fed the burn.

"This is the Splash," explained Hector. "And we own all the land up to it. In the summer time we bring a boat up; it's in the stable loft now. The two ponies pull it—they're immensely strong. Now watch this——"

Hector pulled a scone out of his pocket and began crumbling it, casting it on the water.

Merlissa Benck had regained her breath. "Then I suppose you'll be going to school in the autumn when you and your aunt come back from this ... this so-called grand tour."

"S-s-sh," said Hector. "You're a stranger, so you'd better keep low down behind me." He began to whistle.

From the far side of the lochan a pair of wild ducks began to scutter across the water towards them.

"Hold your breath," whispered Hector, strung up with excitement.

The wild ducks came closer, swimming carefully. Then the brown female dived right close in to gobble the bread, but the male one circled far out, cautious and aloof.

"Isn't he a beauty?" breathed Hector. "They're not so tame this time of the year. Let's go now so as he can get some food as well. What would you like to see next?"

"I'd like to get out of this bog before I sink to my knees," said Merlissa Benck with some asperity.

Hector stared at her.

"Oh," he said in a subdued voice. "There's a road over there.''

They plodded over to it in silence. It was a cart-track, a deep cutting between banks of heather. Water ran down the middle of it but there were comparatively dry patches on either side.

"This is better," said Merlissa Benck, putting good humour back into her voice. "Now do tell me about this school you're going to. You've no idea how interested I am."

"I'm not going to school," he said.

She gave a little cry of protest, and Hector, hurriedly so as not to hurt her feelings by explaining that he didn't want to go to school, added:

"You see, I haven't learned the proper things for the entrance examination."

"You poor lamb. Of course not. I quite understand. But wonderful things can be done with a tutor, a proper tutor, I mean. Now suppose we got one for you right away, you could——"

But Hector ceased to listen. He had heard it all so often before over the drawing-room tea-table. By and by he began to jump dexterously from side to side over the water which flowed down the middle of the cart-track. When he heard Merlissa Benck's voice trail up in a question, he would turn and smile serenely; and if she still looked for an answer from him, he would say: "Yes, that's right," or "Of course."

Thus they passed down the hill, through the village, and along the main road. When they reached the white gate of Nethermuir, Merlissa Benck fell silent. She had pointed out fully the advantages of a public school education, the dullness of living at Nethermuir, the queerness of Auntie Robbo, and the brilliant career that lay in front of Hector if only he followed her advice. She was satisfied she had made a considerable impression upon Hector. Her eyes gleamed with triumph, even as she limped, dripping and exhausted, up the last few yards of the drive.