Читать книгу Mary Wakefield - Mazo de la Roche - Страница 10

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Mrs. Lacey whose father-in-law had been one of the first of the group of English naval and army officers to settle in the vicinity of Jalna and whose husband had reached the rank of Admiral in the Royal Navy sat beside the tea-table in a room which seemed scarcely large enough for the impressive Victorian furniture. The sofa and principal chairs were covered in horsehair of the best quality, their frames of ornate carved walnut. Unlike the Whiteoaks who had brought their furniture from England the Laceys had purchased theirs from the reliable Canadian manufacturers Messrs. Jacques and Hayes. So admirably was it made that it might well last for ever, but it was inclined to impart rather a sombre look to a room even though the sunshine poured in, as it was now doing. Mrs. Lacey and her daughters had made a number of gay-coloured antimacassars for the backs of chairs and the arms of the sofa, and had embroidered a pale blue silk drape for the square piano. Another drape, this one of rose colour, hung on the mantel and a third, of shell pink, decorated the picture of a square-rigger, in a storm at sea. One of the daughters of the house painted on china, and many examples of her work decorated the mantelshelf and the what-not. The floor was covered by a green carpet with pink flowers across which the June sunlight fell, through the small windows. Perhaps there was a little too much furniture in the room but the effect was one of long establishment and well-being. The daughters were the third generation of Laceys who had occupied the house, and that was a considerable time in this young country.

The figure of Mrs. Lacey fitted in very well with the character of the room. She was short, plump and of pleasingly fresh complexion. Her greying hair was neatly parted in the middle and crimped above her smooth forehead. She wore a black dress with innumerable shiny black buttons down the front of the bodice, and a long gold chain on the end of which was a gold watch tucked inside her belt. A delicate white ruching brightened her collar and set off the pinkness of her cheeks. She always held herself upright in her chair and seldom sat down without a piece of needlework in her hand. Her expression was almost always cheerful. She was pleased with life in general. Admiral Lacey was just the sort of husband she had wanted; her daughters just the sort of daughters. Of course she would have been pleased if they had married. They had had their chances and, if they had not taken them, well, it was rather a pity but it left them at home to be company for their father. He was very fond of them and would greatly have missed them. And after all they were only in their early thirties.

Now Ethel and Violet came into the room, their hands full of trilliums, for they had been gathering them in the nearby woods.

“Look, Mamma, aren’t they heavenly?” exclaimed Violet. “I’ve never seen such large graceful ones.”

Mrs. Lacey glanced at them approvingly but said, “Do put them in water and go and tidy your hair. Philip Whiteoak is coming in. Surely you didn’t forget.”

“I’m afraid we did,” laughed Ethel. “It isn’t very exciting to have your near neighbour to tea.” It would have been truly exciting to her if it had been Nicholas who was expected. Years ago she had wanted to marry the eldest Whiteoak. He was the only man she ever had wanted. But Nicholas had known her all his life. To marry her would have been tame. So he had gone off to England and married there. After some years of marriage his wife had eloped with a young Irishman and Nicholas had divorced her. Ethel had not seen him since but occasionally, in the dreamings of solitude, she thought how strange it would be if, when Nicholas returned to visit his old home, they might still come together.

Violet held up the trilliums, admiring them.

“I have a mind to paint them,” she said. “Wouldn’t they look too lovely, white on a pastel-blue ground?”

“Violet, I do wish you wouldn’t use so many superlatives. Things are always too lovely or heavenly with you.”

“Only flowers. One really can’t use too many adjectives to describe them.”

“Well, well,” her mother smiled tolerantly, “call them what you like but do put them in something and come to your tea.”

“Where is Father?”

“He’s here, waiting as usual,” growled Admiral Lacey. He came in, looking much more good-humoured than his words sounded. “I’m always waiting for one of you three women. What are those things you’ve got, Violet?”

“Wood lilies—trilliums—aren’t they ravishing? They seem to have gathered all the spring into their petals.”

“Really,” declared Mrs. Lacey, “I can’t do anything with that girl.”

“What I object to,” said her husband, “is the way those long skirts of theirs gather up dead leaves and twigs. Think of going to the woods in such a get-up!”

“What would you have us wear?” asked Ethel.

“Shorter skirts—bloomers! We men know you have legs. Why hide them?”

“You’re an immoral old darling,” said Ethel, kissing him.

“There is Philip at the door.” The Admiral himself strode to open it.

“Now it is too late to tidy yourselves,” said Mrs. Lacey, in despair. She regarded her daughters as one might regard two mettlesome ponies, proud of their spirit, yet deploring their unmanageableness. This occasion was a fair example of her difficulties with them.

Philip, in loose tweeds and rather sunburned, came in. Mother and daughters greeted him with dignified familiarity. When they were seated by the table and had bread and butter on their plates and tea in their cups Mrs. Lacey asked about the new governess.

“Miss Wakefield?” returned Philip happily. “Oh, she’s a peach!”

The word struck the atmosphere of the room like a blow. Then a woman laughed. And the woman was Ethel.

Mrs. Lacey turned in her chair to take a good look at Philip. “A peach!” she echoed.

“Well, what I mean is she just fills the bill. You liked her, didn’t you?”

“The Admiral and I thought her quite a nice young woman.”

“It was awfully kind of you to look after her on the voyage.”

“It was a pleasure.” The Admiral spoke rather too heartily. His wife turned her head to look at him.

He put an extra lump of sugar in his tea and stirred it stubbornly. “I quite agree with Philip,” he said. “The girl is a perfect——”

Before he could utter the name of that fruit which had suddenly become obnoxious to Mrs. Lacey, she drowned him out.

“Richard,” she said, “if you were to die would you like to think that a daughter of yours, only a few months after your death, would deck herself in such colours as Miss Wakefield wore?”

The Admiral marked his words with his forefinger. “Her father made her promise faithfully that she would not put on black for him. I call it sensible. Who wants to see a pretty young woman trailing black garments?”

“I do, when it is seemly, and I am sure that Ethel and Violet do too. Don’t you, girls?” But her daughters rather disconcertingly agreed with their father.

“Do you mean to tell me,” Mrs. Lacey looked outraged, “that you would wear a spray of yellow poppies in a hat, with your father scarcely cold in his grave?”

“By George, this is a depressing conversation!” exclaimed the Admiral.

“If Father wished it,” declared Ethel, “I should wear yellow poppies.”

“Good girl,” said her father. “It’s understood, then. You are to wear yellow poppies and Violet is to wear red.”

“I dislike such foolish talk.” Mrs. Lacey was getting annoyed. “I will go into black and the girls will go into black.”

“Who for?” demanded the Admiral.

“For you.”

“Well, I like that!” His colour was rising. “What makes you so sure I’m going to die first?”

“Men do,” said Mrs. Lacey. This was unanswerable. The Admiral looked downcast.

“My mother,” said Philip, “put on widow’s weeds after my father’s death and is never going to take them off.”

“And quite right,” said Mrs. Lacey, and nodded several times as though affirming that she had every intention of doing the same, though she would not hurt her husband’s feelings by saying so.

“After all,” Philip said reflectively, “men sometimes do outlive their wives. I’m a widower.”

“Good!” exclaimed Admiral Lacey heartily, and realized almost at once that he should not have said that.

Violet interrupted tactfully, “Do tell us how the children like Miss Wakefield, Philip.”

“Very much indeed. Yesterday we all drove to a Mr. Craig’s along the lake shore and I bought a beautiful mare. We got along famously. Between threats and bribes I persuade the little rascals to behave.”

Ethel asked, “Do tell us about these Craigs. I hear that they are very rich.”

“I believe they are. And by the way, Admiral, there’s another widower!”

“Splendid,” exclaimed the Admiral, “and, by jingo, here comes a third!”

Dr. Ramsey’s spare figure could be seen passing the window. Violet ran to let him in. He entered with a diagnostic look round, as if, though no one in the room was ill, they were, at any moment, likely to be. All three of the younger ones he had brought into the world. He had seen Mrs. Lacey through three accouchements. He had seen the Admiral laid low by sciatica. In humble postures all had lain on beds before him.

He declined food but accepted tea. Philip took two more slices of thin bread and butter, turned them together and proceeded to eat them with relish.

“I suppose,” said Dr. Ramsey to Ethel and Violet, “that you are delighted to have your parents home again.” He said this with a twinkle, as though it were understood that they had been up to tricks when authority was removed.

“Oh, yes,” they answered.

“It was the first time,” Mrs. Lacey remarked, “that we had left them alone and we did feel a little anxious.”

“Not me,” said her husband, “I never gave them a second thought.”

“Really, Richard, you ought to be ashamed of yourself.” But Mrs. Lacey laughed.

“I don’t know what it is to be ashamed.”

“Come, come,” said Dr. Ramsey. “Don’t tell me you are never ashamed.”

“Never. Are you?”

“Many a time.”

Those present looked at him incredulously. He paid no attention to their expressions but quoted: