Читать книгу The Girls of the Abbey School - Elsie Jeanette Dunkerley - Страница 7

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‘Well, children, will it do? Do you like it, Adela?’ and the lady of the motor, having finished her tour of the abbey buildings, turned to the children, who came racing to meet her after a thorough exploration conducted strictly on their own.

‘Simply topping, mummy, darling! There’s a hundred million different places to play in!’ Della’s approval was enthusiastic.

‘It’s just It, mum.’ Dick’s was no less emphatic.

‘It really is a very charming spot, and most quaint and interesting.’ Their mother turned to Mrs Watson, unconscious of how Joan would have shuddered if she had heard her. ‘It always makes Joan see red if any one calls the abbey pretty or quaint,’ Joy sometimes explained.

‘Ann, we had another reason in coming to see you to-day, besides curiosity as to your new home.’ The lady’s tone was full of condescension, as of a mistress to an old and trusted servant, and Ann Watson accepted it as her natural due, and waited deferentially for the explanation. ‘I have to go with my husband to South Africa for a few weeks. He has an important commission for the Government to carry out, and desires my company and help. We have to sail immediately, and we cannot possibly take these children with us. They would wreck the prospects of any political errand!’—and Dick and Della grinned at one another knowingly. ‘I had planned to leave them with my brother’s family, but they have illness in the house; and my sister simply declines to have the responsibility.’ The children looked at one another again. ‘My plan, therefore, is to leave them here in your care. You have had charge of them already for some years, and know them well.’

‘Too well!’ said Ann Watson’s dismayed face. Aloud she said hastily, ‘Indeed, my lady, it’s quite impossible. Miss Joan expressly said she would have no children living in the abbey. I could not possibly keep them here without her permission, and I know she would not grant it.’

‘Tut! Who is this Miss Joan?’

‘She owns the abbey, and lives at the Hall, my lady. If you cared to see her—but it is only wasting your time; she would never agree.’

‘I have no time to waste, and none to spend calling on cranky old maids,’ Lady Jessop began peremptorily.

Ann Watson spoke up quickly. ‘Miss Joan is a young lady!’ and as she said it she saw a vision of two red-haired schoolgirls dancing a morris jig on the sunny garth.

‘Young, is she? Then she should be more reasonable. You must talk to her, Ann. It will only be for three months at the most. There is nowhere else I care to leave the children, and a summer in the country will be good for them both.’ Dick and Della nodded solemn agreement to this proposition. ‘They have fallen in love with the abbey, and so have I. It is a safe and quiet retreat, where they can come to no harm, and they will be well cared for in your hands. I will send them down to you, with their baggage, in the car to-morrow.’

‘Indeed, my lady!’ gasped Ann, her breath quite taken away by this assault. ‘I daren’t do it, really, I daren’t. It’s as much as my place is worth, and I’ve been that happy here, I couldn’t bear to have anything go wrong now. Besides, it would put Miss Joan out so, and I couldn’t bear to worry her. She’s as pleasant a young lady as you’d find anywhere, and as kind as kind. No, I couldn’t do it, not even to please you, my lady—not unless Miss Joan gives leave for them to stop.’

‘Oh, bother Miss Joan!’ Dick burst out wrathfully. ‘Look here, Nanny, we’re just going to stop, and that’s all about it! I believe the old place is full of mysterious secret passages, and I’m going to explore ’em all; see?’

Ann Watson did see, and, knowing him of old, was more than ever resolved to stand to her position. ‘Not without Miss Joan’s leave, you aren’t, Master Dick,’ she said grimly.

‘Where is she? I’ll soon settle her! Let Dick and me go and have it out with her, mummy!’ Della pleaded. ‘If she’s young surely she’ll be sporty! I’ll talk to her!’

But their mother knew better, and did not consider Della a good ambassador. ‘Ann, this is all nonsense!’ she said haughtily. ‘I’ve planned to leave the children in your care, and, of course, I’ll make it well worth your while. What possible objection could this Miss Joan have?’

‘She objects to children in the abbey, my lady;’ Ann did not think it wise to go into details of possible damage. Dick’s imagination was quite equal to the task of suggesting them without help from any outsider.

‘Tut! A silly prejudice, merely! When she finds they are here——’

‘I couldn’t take them here without her leave, my lady. I’m real sorry, but I couldn’t do it.’

Lady Jessop knew her of old. She looked at her closely and saw that she could not move her. ‘But this is very annoying!’ she said angrily. ‘I have no time to make other arrangements. It seemed an ideal plan to leave them with you, their old nurse; my mind has been quite easy about them. I never dreamt that you would fail me, Ann.’

‘Could they not go to school for the short time, my lady?’ Ann was anxious to help, so long as Dick and Della did not have to come to the abbey.

‘My husband objects to boarding-school for children before they are fourteen, as you must know very well,’ Lady Jessop said coldly, while the victims looked daggers at Ann.

There was an uncomfortable silence. Ann Watson looked apologetic but firm; Lady Jessop anxious and wrathful. Dick’s eyes wandered hungrily towards the fascinating ruined buildings; Della, uninvited, was exploring the tiny kitchen and bedroom.

‘I don’t believe we could fit in, anyway,’ she announced. ‘There’s only one bed. If I slept in it with Nanny, Dicky’d have to lie on the floor in the kitchen, and it’s stone.’

‘Oh, I could do with a shake-down anywhere!’ her brother said airily, with masculine superiority.

‘Could you? Not for more than one night!’ she mocked. ‘You’ll have to get a bed in the village, and come up to see me sometimes. I’ll let you know when I’m at home. I guess I’ll have an At Home day, and you can come to call, and sit and balance your cup on your knee in the drawing-room.’

‘Do you know any one in the village, Ann?’ Lady Jessop’s troubled face lightened. ‘Is there any one you could recommend, with whom I could board them? You could keep an eye on them; I suppose you would not refuse to do that much for me? You must help me out of this difficulty, if you can; I really do not know what else to do with them. I simply cannot leave them in town with the servants and housekeeper. They’d just run wild, and it’s better they should do it in the country than in town.’

‘I’m fed up with town,’ said Dick.

Ann Watson would very much have preferred Dick and Della should not be in the neighbourhood at all. She had been their nurse till a couple of years ago, and the thought of having any responsibility for them was a nightmare to her. But her old mistress looked very troubled, and Ann was fond of her and anxious to help her if she could. ‘There are my old father and mother. They have a cottage in the village,’ she said doubtfully; and the mischief was done.

Lady Jessop’s face lit up. ‘Your parents, Ann? The very thing! Nothing could be better. You could answer for them, of course. Would they have room for the children?’

With a sinking heart but honest regard for the truth, Ann acknowledged that her parents would have room in their cottage. She gave the address, and promised dubiously to ‘keep an eye on Dick and Della,’ if her mother consented to take them in. ‘But they mustn’t come expecting to get into the abbey at all hours,’ she protested feebly, conscious already that she had made a mistake and broken her compact with Joan in the spirit, though not in the letter, and very anxious as to the future.

Della and Dick looked at one another seriously. Then he protested, ‘But I’m interested in old buildings, Nanny! You ought to be pleased! I always have been, don’t you know!’

‘Can’t we go and see the cottage?’ Della pleaded, hastily stifling him with a skilful change of thought. ‘There’s nothing more to stay here for, is there, mummy?—since Nanny won’t take us in! I’d never have believed she’d be such a beast—so unkind, I mean! I should have thought she’d be simply delighted to see us again! Perhaps her mother’s more sporting, though.’

‘Yes, we must not stay any longer,’ and Lady Jessop fastened her big coat. ‘Give me your mother’s address, Ann. How far off is the village? Half a mile? Good! Then you can very well keep an eye on the children, and I’ll be glad to know they’re in your charge.’

As the motor rolled away through the old gatehouse, with its sculptured saints and porter’s lodge, Dick and Della fell into one another’s arms in rapturous anticipation of good times to come, and paid no heed at all to their mother’s warnings. And Ann Watson, very nervous as to what would come of all this, watched them go with a sinking heart and many forebodings as to the future.