Читать книгу The Abbey Girls - Elsie Jeanette Dunkerley - Страница 6

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‘Mother, isn’t Joy queer?’ and Joan began to make preparations for tea, and chased the Curate into the kitchen.

Mrs Shirley sighed. ‘I don’t know how to manage the child! Didn’t she tell you where she was going?’

‘I don’t think she knew herself. She made sandwiches and said she’d get a drink of milk somewhere, and went off quite happy.’

‘Is she cycling?’

‘No, it’s too muddy. Too much trouble to clean her bike afterwards.’

‘I’m glad of that. I always fear some accident when she goes off for those long rides alone.’

‘Yes, I think she might be reckless. But she’s walking to-day, so she’ll come home all right, only in a frightful state of mud, mother dear.’

She laughed as she set the table for three. ‘I didn’t tell you how she went off, did I? It was while you were down at the village. I thought she was hurrying up with her dusting so that she could have plenty of time to practise, for you know she wasted all her time yesterday, although she was at the piano so long—“making up things,” as she says. I think by the sound it must have been a funeral march. So I thought she’d practise in earnest to-day. But I soon found she didn’t mean to do anything of the kind. The bright morning was affecting her as usual. You know how restless she gets! She came to me and said she’d done everything, and she was pining to be out, and she was sure you wouldn’t mind. I knew it was no use saying anything, so I let her make sandwiches and go. Then I went to see if she’d put the rice pudding in the oven, as you suggested. She’d done it, but—and wasn’t this just like Joy?—she hadn’t pulled out the oven damper, and the heat was all going up the chimney! Mother, I wish Joy could go to school!’

‘Joan, dear!’

‘I know it’s impossible. But if she could have a long walk to school every morning, it might satisfy her wish to be out all the time, and she might settle down to work when she got there. She won’t do a thing but music left to herself.’

‘I don’t control her sufficiently, but when I mean to scold her I remember that she has no parents, and then——’

‘Then we’re both too soft with her, I know, I give in to her too. That’s another reason why school would be good for her. I wish—well, never mind!’ and she went to warm the teapot.

Mrs Shirley, glancing after her, wished many things also. As Joan returned with the tea, the outer door was thrown open, and an exclamation of relief broke from them both.

‘She has come home early! That’s good of her, for she’s done it to please you, mother. She’d stop out till sunset if she pleased herself,’ and they looked up to greet the wanderer.

She stood in the doorway, a second Joan, so exact was the likeness. They might well have been twin sisters instead of cousins. But they were the children of twin fathers who had always been mistaken for one another in boyhood, and both girls resembled them and not their mothers in any degree. Joy had the same eyes of golden brown, the same bright bronze hair, tied back in the same loose fashion as Joan’s. They were of the same height, and there was only a month between their ages. The only difference was in expression, Joy’s eyes being merrier and her cheeks flushed with exercise, but she lacked the strength of resolution, the dogged persistence, which had taken Cicely Hobart’s fancy in Joan.

‘Well, mother dear, haven’t I been good? I remembered what you said last time I stopped out after dark, and here I am!’

‘I’m glad you came back, dear,’ said Mrs Shirley, well pleased with the ‘mother dear’ which was Joy’s usual name for her. Her own mother had died when she was a small child, and her home had been with her aunt ever since. ‘But where have you been all day?’

‘Oh, just walking!’ Joy said airily. ‘I met Mr Baker, and he gave me a lift as far as Thame, so I started from there, and explored. I simply love walking on and on, finding my way by the signposts, and speaking to people if they look interesting!’

She was making a very good tea as she talked. Joan remarked, ‘I don’t see how you can go off by yourself for the whole day! Don’t you want somebody to talk to?’

‘If I do I talk to somebody! I should have been a gipsy, I suppose. I love wandering.’

‘Where did you have your lunch?’ Mrs Shirley asked anxiously, and Joy laughed.

‘On a stile. I didn’t sit on the grass, mother dear. And I had some ginger-beer at a tiny shop, and an orange.’

‘We’ve had an interesting time here, too.’

‘Oh, tourists? Americans?’

‘No, schoolgirls from Wycombe. They had to shelter during the storm, so they danced a morris dance in the cloisters——’

Joy’s brown eyes widened. ‘How funny! I wish I’d seen the dance!’

‘It was very pretty. One girl stood on a wall and whistled the tune. Then we asked them in here and one of them sang to us. She had a beautiful voice.’

‘I say! You did get chummy! I wish I’d heard the singing. I met them going home. I was coming through the wood, but they didn’t see me. Which was the singing girl?’

‘The tallest, a fair-haired girl, very pretty, called Miriam.’

‘I saw her. She was walking with another big one, who was awfully well dressed—lovely furs she had!’

‘Yes, I noticed the furs. She’s Cicely. She looked at my books, and she’s going to lend me some more exam. papers to see how I get on with them—harder ones. Isn’t it jolly of her?’

Joy made a grimace. ‘Lessons again! I couldn’t swot as you do, Joan.’

Joan laughed. ‘Cicely approved of your piano.’

‘Of course she did, if she knew anything about it. It’s a darling. I’m going to practise all evening.’

‘Funeral marches?’

‘Don’t be rude! It was a dirge——’

‘I must say it sounded like it!’

‘It must have been good, since you guessed what it was,’ Joy said lightly. ‘No, I mean really practise. It’s awfully noble of me, for after a day out I always want to make up things. I’m sure I could make a country song to-night! But don’t look worried, mother dear! I really mean to practise to-night.’

An hour later Joan, reading history by the kitchen fire, looked across at her mother and shook her head. Joy’s scales had died away, and her fingers were wandering off into an unknown melody, born in her heart during the day’s lonely tramp. Once or twice she pulled herself up, trying sternly to banish the songs which would come. Then she gave herself up to dreams, which, though enjoyable, were unprofitable. Joan groaned.

‘Mother, Joy’s being ruined! She’d be a great composer some day, I do believe, if she studied now and was properly trained, but she ought to have lessons. Then she’d have to practise.’

‘She needs more than music lessons,’ Mrs Shirley said despondently. ‘She ought to have a good all-round education. If she would study as you do it would be better than nothing. But——’

‘But she says she can’t, and I really think it’s true. People are different. I really think she does her best. She did try just now, you know. But she can’t keep at it. I’m sure she has gone back in her work since we came here, and her music too. Oh, it’s a pity! If only——!’ but Mrs Shirley shook her head.

‘We’d manage it if it were possible, Joan dear.’