Читать книгу The Girls of the Hamlet Club - Elsie Jeanette Dunkerley - Страница 7

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Cicely sat nursing the boarder with much content, and Mose purred his delight at this unusual attention. ‘Does he like being here?’ she asked.

Mrs Ramage smiled. ‘He’s very happy with me. He always comes to see me again after he’s gone home.’

‘No—really? Does he come to call? How sweet of him! Do you know Miriam Honor well, Mrs Ramage?’ Cicely asked presently.

‘Oh yes. She often looks in on her way to school.’

‘She goes to Miss Macey’s school in Wycombe, doesn’t she?’

‘It’s not right in Wycombe. Wycombe Moor, they call it. Yes; she goes by train every day.’

‘And you had told her I was stopping at the inn?’

‘That’s it. She had heard there was a lady and gentleman expected there. Then she met you yesterday morning, and called in at night to ask me if you belonged to them.’

‘And you told her there was no other lady, except me?’

‘Nay, I told her you were the lady,’ smiled Mrs Ramage.

‘I like her. I shall go up to Green Hailey to-morrow on the chance of meeting her or the kiddies. Are there any others?’

‘One brother, a year younger than Miss Miriam. He’s away at a boarding-school. I’ve heard tell she wanted to go too, but ‘twasn’t possible for them both. Their father died five years since, and they’ve had a hard time. They came from Missenden way; but Mrs Honor’s home was in Risborough, so she took that cottage and brought the children here.’

‘I mean to know them. I shall start to-morrow.’

But Mrs Ramage had another suggestion to offer next day. ‘Mr Stevens, from the farm, is driving to Wycombe to-day, and he’ll take you with him, if you like, Miss Cicely. It’s a pleasant drive, and a fine day for it.’

The chance seemed too good to lose, and Cicely reflected that probably Saturday morning would not be the best time to hope for a meeting with Miriam. There was sure to be work to do in the cottage, and her help would be needed. In the afternoon she might be free, and out in the woods, perhaps. So she accepted Mr Stevens’s kindness gratefully, and enjoyed the drive round the foot of the hills to the old market-town. Out of sheer kindness of heart, he brought her home by Hughenden, Speen, and Hampden, across the hills; and she reached home full of delight in the golden woods, bare open ‘bottoms,’ with their stony fields, and quaint little villages.

A note from her father awaited her, written in London as he waited for the Liverpool train to start. Its concluding words gave her a shock:

‘I shall be with you on Tuesday or Wednesday, and hope to find your answer ready for me, for my time at home is short now, and I must see you definitely settled before I go.’

In her interest in Miriam, Mose, and her new surroundings, she had quite forgotten the choice which had to be made—had forgotten she was not here simply for a holiday. She took her dinner, looking very sober, her keen appetite gone, and then set out for a walk, her mind tackling its problem in earnest.

She liked the country very well. She saw prospect of a friend of about her own age, so that she would not be entirely lonely if she went to the new school. Mrs Ramage’s cottage was cosy, and she could be very comfortable there. But—but——

There were the grandparents in the background. At any time she might have to leave the cottage and go to Broadway End. The thought did not attract her. The house, as described by Mrs Ramage, sounded gloomy and dull. She had no particular pity for the old people, who had shown themselves unsympathetic towards her in the past, in letting her, a lonely child, be left in the care of strangers. The strangers had been kind, but Mr and Mrs Broadway had never troubled to inquire if it were so. They only wanted her now for their own sake, and she was aware of the fact, and resented it. She was hardly old enough to put their feelings before her own, or feel any very deep pity for their loneliness and grief.

And she was asked, for their sake, to give up so much. She had been very happy in her old life, and strongly objected to any change. Mrs Gaynor was more than kind, and petted her far more than she did her own girls, trying to make up to Cicely for her loss of her mother. And the girls were very jolly. She had been good friends with Margery, Elsie, and Doris; while Nancy, two years her senior, had played elder sister very successfully. They had made her one of themselves till she had almost forgotten she did not belong to them. It was home, and a very merry one. She had her place there—her own beloved little bedroom—her niche in the family arrangements. To leave it all really felt like tearing up roots, and she shrank from it intensely.

Then there was school. They all went to school together every day, and she had made herself of some importance there. Without any conceit, she knew that the hockey-team depended on her to keep goal, just as they depended on Margery as half-back and Nancy as forward. She knew that Miss Raynham was hoping she would win the scholarship, and bring honour to the school. She remembered ruefully her paper on ‘School Games,’ to be read before the Literary Society in November. And the Christmas play, in which she and Nancy always took part! The dancing class to which they went together! Her life had been so full, and she was asked to break away from it all for the sake of two old people for whom she really did not care.

Or was it not more for her father’s sake? He wished her to stay here, and he believed her mother would have wished it also. Poor Cicely found the choice very difficult. All her inclinations drew her one way, but her duty certainly seemed to point in the other. There were alleviations, of course, if she had to stay here, but so far they were no more. Her friendship with Miriam was too slight to be a definite attraction. There was nothing to make her wish to stay. All her wishes lay very much the other way. She wanted to go home. If she stayed here, she would be cut off from home, cut adrift entirely from all her friends. And her father would be on the other side of the world. The prospect seemed unspeakably dreary, and she longed intensely to put away all these troubling thoughts and hurry home to Mrs Gaynor’s motherly kindness and the warm welcome of the girls.

She did not cry easily, but she was very near it as she stumbled along, caring nothing where she went. It was pure instinct which had made her turn towards the Cross and climb the road through the wood towards Green Hailey. She had not given a thought to Miriam since she received her father’s letter; but as she passed through the scattered hamlet a clamour of voices made her look up. She remembered the Honors, and thrust away the haunting problem for a time as she looked to see if she had discovered their home.

A tiny cottage, with picturesque thatched roof and climbing roses, stood far back from the road, with a long front garden still gay with sunflowers and daisies. A tiled path led to the little porch; a low gate gave entrance through a wild-rose hedge.

Two girls, strangers to Cicely, stood in the tiled path. Both were about her age, and therefore younger than Miriam. One had loose black hair; the other dark brown, with brown eyes and face like a gipsy. Both were gazing up into an apple-tree, where Miriam sat enthroned on a bough. She held half a cocoa-nut hung from a string, and was tying it round another branch so that it should dangle about four feet from the ground.

‘Now, children, is that right?—Babs, you can’t reach it? That’s just as well!—Bobs, ask mother if she can see it from her window. All right?’

‘Yesh! Yesh! Kvite all right, Mirry darling. Now where’ll we put ve ovver one?’

‘I really don’t think it could be better, Miriam,’ Bobs answered sedately.

‘Do come down, Mirry!’ called the black-haired girl impatiently. ‘Georgie says it’s quite true. What do you think of it?’

‘If that girl comes back to school, I sha’n’t speak to her. And I don’t believe any of the others will either,’ said the gipsy-faced girl decidedly.

‘Oh—Georgie!’ and Miriam gazed down at her in dismay. ‘It was all a mistake. She didn’t understand. You do believe it, don’t you?’

‘Rot!’ said Georgie scornfully. ‘She couldn’t be such a soft. She knew well enough. I think she’s got jolly good cheek to come back, and I believe the girls will make it hot for her, that’s all.’

‘Well, I’ll tell you what I think,’ said Miriam with decision. ‘I think she’s jolly plucky to come back after what happened. I believe it was all a mistake, and you know Miss Macey thinks so too. Why, Georgie, she wouldn’t have come back if it hadn’t been; she simply couldn’t. The very fact that she’s coming back at half-term shows it was a mistake. She had the chance to have no more to do with us, and instead she’s coming back. I think she’s downright plucky.—Don’t you, Marguerite?’

The black-haired girl looked dubious. ‘Mirry, I don’t know. I don’t know what to think. It’s all very queer, and jolly awkward. I know it will be just beastly for Dorothy if she does turn up. I wouldn’t be in her shoes for anything. Of course’—with a touch of bitterness—‘it doesn’t much matter what we think. All that matters is how the others look at it. But I guess there’s no doubt about that. They’ve made up their minds already.’

‘Then, as you say, it will be pretty horrid for Dorothy’—— Miriam began.

‘I put it more strongly than that;’ and Marguerite’s black eyes gleamed.

‘Well, perhaps we could make it pleasanter for her, even though we are Outsiders,’ Miriam explained. ‘That’s what I think about it, Georgie.—Now, Babs, where’s that other nut? Shall we hang it from the cherry-tree?’ and she swung herself to the ground. ‘I say, won’t the tomtits have a feast? I wonder if too much cocoa-nut gives them a pain?—It was awfully decent of you to bring us nuts for them again, Marguerite.’

They gathered round the cherry-tree, and Cicely realised two things—that she ought not to have been listening, and that Miriam had friends for the afternoon and would have no time to spare for strangers.

She did not feel very guilty in having overheard the school gossip, since it had been spoken so loudly; but it had roused her interest, and she would have liked to know more. What had the unfortunate Dorothy done? Why were these three ‘Outsiders,’ and who were the others whose opinion mattered so much? Was Dorothy plucky or cheeky in braving the opinion of the school, as she evidently intended to do?

‘It seems to me,’ said Cicely to herself as she turned into the wood, ‘that I’m getting interested in that school. Besides all this, why didn’t that girl in the train speak to Miriam Honor yesterday morning? Well, if I should go there, I shall get to know all about it, I suppose. But—am I going? To be, or not to be? Oh dear! That is the question, of course. And I’d better decide soon, for I’ll have no peace till it’s settled.’

She wandered up through the wood, her mind drearily working at its problem, the schoolgirls forgotten. She knew her way now, and followed the cart-track on and up till she found herself by a gate, looking out into a great field. She stood hesitating, wondering if the path which crossed it was a public footway.

Suddenly a voice called to her from among the trees close at hand. ‘It’s all right. It’s a public path—or have you lost your way?’

She looked round hastily for the owner of the friendly voice. A tall girl, of twenty-one or thereabouts, stood among the trees, a folded easel and sketching materials under her arm. She was fair-haired, and her blue eyes looked kindly and helpful.

‘I was wondering where the path led to,’ Cicely explained. ‘I don’t know my way about yet.’

‘This is Great Hampden Park. The path runs past the house.’

‘Oh, I didn’t know I was so near to Hampden! Thank you so much.’

‘These are the Hampden Woods. Are you quite a stranger?’

‘Quite. I’ve only been here two days. We drove to Hampden yesterday, but that was by the road.’

‘This is much shorter. Where are you stopping?’

‘At Whiteleaf, near the Cross.’

The girl nodded. ‘I wonder’—— she began, then went on quickly, ‘Would you like to see something interesting? If you’re a stranger, you’ll never have seen it, and it’s just a chance. Come down the wood with me, and I’ll show you.’

Cicely hesitated, and the girl laughed out.

‘What’s the matter? Do you think I’m the traditional “old woman in a red cloak” who runs away with girls? Are you afraid I’ll take you to the gipsies?’

‘Oh no, no! It wasn’t that at all,’ Cicely cried, reddening and laughing in confusion. ‘I was wondering whether I ought to. I came out on purpose to think over something, and—and make up my mind, and I’m afraid if I go with you I shall forget all about it and go home as undecided as ever. But I’d like to come. Is it far?’

‘No; just down the wood. It won’t take many minutes. Come along. Sometimes problems are all the more easily solved for being left to themselves for a while.’

The girl’s eyes had kindled in sudden interest, and were full of sympathy. She asked no questions, however, but led the way through the wood, following a faint track, till they came to a wide clearing where many trees lay on the ground.

‘Have they fallen or been cut down?’ Cicely asked curiously.

‘They’ve been cut. I hate to see them lying there, but the woods have to be thinned. But these are cut for use. By the way, my name is Margia Lane, and I come from Totteridge, near High Wycombe.’

‘I’m Cicely Hobart.’

‘You have a fine old name. You should be proud of it.’

‘Is it old? I didn’t know.’

‘John Hampden had a friend Miles Hobart.’

‘Oh! I’m glad. I always liked him.’

Margia nodded. ‘Now, this is what I brought you to see;’ and Cicely gazed with eager eyes.

The clearing held several little encampments, like the one she had found deserted the day before. Low huts, built of hurdles and sacking, their walls formed by heaps of creamy wood shavings, stood among the tree-stumps. Thin blue smoke rose from camp-fires, and a number of men and boys were working round the huts, their cycles propped against the trees.

‘What are they doing?’ Cicely asked curiously. ‘I saw a tent like those yesterday, but there was no one about. Are they gipsies? Do they live here?’

‘Oh no! The huts are only for working in. They live in the villages—Little Hampden, Green Hailey, and others.’

‘But what can they do out here? It’s so far from everywhere. Oh, are they making things out of wood, from the cut-down trees?’

‘Exactly. And here are the “things” they make;’ and Margia led Cicely towards the workers.

Near the huts stood stacks of rounded bars of white wood, placed neatly in piles, four laid crosswise as for ‘noughts and crosses,’ then others laid upon them till the erection was three feet high. The little white stacks stood dotted about among the huts; as they watched, a boy came out carrying an armful, which he proceeded to pile neatly in orthodox fashion.

‘But what are they for? What lots of bars of wood! But how are they used?’ asked Cicely, in much curiosity.

Margia laughed. ‘Don’t you recognise them? They’re chair-legs, waiting to be carted to Wycombe and put together and provided with seats.’

‘Chair-legs! Oh, but how funny! So they are!’ as closer inspection showed lines of beading round the bars, three rings near one end, two at the other. ‘Is that how chairs are made? Out here in the woods? I thought they came from factories and workshops.’

‘This is a chair factory. Those huts are the workshops. See, these are cross-bars quite plain; and those are for baby-chairs, evidently, by their size.’

‘And may we see how they’re made? Don’t they need machinery to smooth them like this? They look almost polished.’

‘They aren’t polished, except by friction. Yes, come and look into the huts. You’ll have to crawl.’

‘Won’t they mind?’

‘The men? No. They’ll only be rather amused.’

They crouched on the creamy shavings, and peered through a three-foot-high opening in the hut. A boy was hard at work with a kind of lathe, which he worked with his foot. A cord from this treadle joined a long arm above his head, which projected through the open end of the hut. The cord was then wound with a single turn round a fresh bar, roughly hewn from a block of beech. This was fixed at both ends into a frame, and as the treadle was worked the vibration of the cord set the bar spinning. The boy held a knife, with which he skilfully chipped at the whirling bar, and the shavings flew in all directions, lay in heaps on the floor, and added to the piles about the walls of the hut.

Cicely watched in fascination as the spinning bar grew smooth and round and polished under the quivering cord and clever knife. Now it looked finished but for the beading. The boy dropped his knife and caught up another, and touched the bar as it flew round. Just a touch, a momentary pressure, and the line appeared; another touch, and the second was finished.

Cicely turned to Margia in round-eyed amazement. ‘How awfully clever! Just a touch, and it’s done. Why, the whole thing only takes a minute,’ as the boy tossed aside the bar and caught up another.

‘One chair-leg a minute. Yes. Shall we watch for a while?’

Cicely nodded, and watched in fascinated wonder as bars were turned out at the rate of one a minute. ‘It’s like magic. Thank you so much for bringing me. Are they here all the time?’

‘Oh no; only at times. Perhaps I had better see you safely away, too, or you’ll be wandering among the pheasants, and the keeper will be after you.’

‘Pheasants? Where?’

‘Up there—all those wooden coops. They don’t like the birds disturbed. There’s a man with a gun about somewhere, keeping guard. Come this way.’

Margia led Cicely back to the park entrance, and paused by the gate. ‘I’m going on towards Green Hailey. This will lead you to the farm at Hampden, and the pretty cottage where the key of the church is kept. I suppose’—and Margia looked at Cicely doubtfully—‘I suppose I couldn’t help, Cicely? You’re in some trouble or perplexity; I can see that in your face. Could I help in any way?’

Cicely’s lips quivered. ‘I’m in an awful hole,’ she confessed. ‘I don’t know what to do. I don’t know that any one can help, but I’d be awfully glad to talk it over with somebody. I’m all alone for a day or two, and when daddy comes back I have to say yes or no, and I’ve nobody to help me. If I might tell you about it while you’re painting? Would you mind very much?’

‘I wish you would,’ Margia said simply. ‘The fact is, I’m in a bit of a hole myself—to use your expression. That’s why I was interested in what you said. I don’t know whether we can help one another, but, as you say, it’s a relief just to talk over things at times. Suppose you come with me, and we’ll have a chat. It can’t do any harm, and it might help one of us.’

‘I’d love to,’ Cicely said wistfully. ‘It’s awfully hard to make up your mind sometimes, isn’t it? Especially when people want you to do one thing, and you want to do another.’

Margia’s lips tightened, and she glanced at her quickly. ‘Yes!’ she said quietly, and led the way back into the wood towards Green Hailey.