Читать книгу Son of a Hundred Kings - Thomas B. Costain - Страница 26

Table of Contents

Ludar awakened to a sense of deep comfort. He was free at last of the clothes in which he had spent so many weeks. His body had the relaxed feeling which follows a steaming hot bath (he had roused only partly in the tub), and he was wrapped from chin to toe in a garment which had served William once as an overcoat (how old and worn it must have been for him to discard it!) many years before.

He was sitting in a Morris chair in which pillows, collected from the beds, had been piled up to serve as cushions. The room was not large and must have been in the center of the cottage, for there were five doors opening off it, and two windows. It was plainly furnished: a much-nickeled coal stove which was throwing out a wonderful heat and had at least twelve feet of pipe suspended on wires from the ceiling, a tall and ornate secretary of reddish wood (William had made it in his spare moments) with six or seven books in the space provided for fifty, a table with a chenille cover on the middle of which stood a lamp as round as the belly of a Buddha and with a shade of the same proportions, and a carpet-covered stool with a wobbly leg.

Through one of the doors he caught a glimpse of a larger room which must be the kitchen, because it had a coal range and a wood box and a string of pots and pans on the wall. It was serving also as a dining room, for there was a table with a red cloth at which two people were plying knives and forks in the total silence possible only to couples who have been married a long time. William was one of them. He was facing the door, and at the other end of the table was a severe-looking lady in an apron which covered her from head to foot.

William perceived at once that the boy was awake. He put down his teacup, brushed off such moisture as might be clinging to the tips of his mustache, and came into the room where Ludar sat. He said in a hearty tone, “Well, young fellow!” at the same time nodding with an expression which hinted at a secret between them. When he came close enough he said in an urgent whisper: “Remember what I told you, sonny. Put your best foot forward.”

As Ludar had been asleep when the matter of his conduct had been mentioned, he was at a loss to understand why he should put his best foot forward. It added to his perplexity that he did not know which was the better of the two and that both were bound up so securely in the old coat that any movement at all was practically impossible.

The lady in the apron came into the room with a look on her face which said, as even a small boy could tell, “Just try to make me like you!” She would have been a rather good-looking woman if it were not for a habit of compressing her lips and drawing them down at the corners. Her eyes were a light blue and her hair was dead black, and she had, it must be confessed, a rather large and formidable nose.

“Well, Ludar,” said this forbidding lady. She added after a moment, in most proper tones, “I am informed that such is your name.”

“Yes, ma’am.” The boy had been put on the defensive immediately. “Ludar Prentice, ma’am.”

“I was informed of the whole name.”

William, standing behind his wife, was forming words with his mouth: “Aunt Tilly. Call her Aunt Tilly.” The boy showed his nimbleness by grasping what was meant quickly.

“Yes, Aunt Tilly,” he said.

Mrs. Christian turned and said accusingly to her husband: “You put him up to that. Don’t tell me you didn’t, Billy Christian.”

William became apologetic. “I said it would be best if he considered us his uncle and aunt while he lived with us. He has to call us something, doesn’t he?”

His wife continued to face him as though determined to stare him down. “I won’t be shoved into liking him. I won’t be rushed, Billy Christian. You should know that by this time.” As indeed he should. She even began each day with such a determination not to be rushed that he would prepare and eat his breakfast before she as much as turned over in bed.

“Don’t you think he should have some supper, Tilly?” suggested William.

Mrs. Christian turned back and looked at the occupant of the chair in which ordinarily she spent her evenings. “Are you hungry?” she asked.

“Not very, ma’am.”

William felt an explanation was in order. “He has a weak stomach. He was sick on the train coming from T’ronto.”

His wife turned stonily in his direction. “And why do you think it necessary to tell me he was sick, Billy Christian? Didn’t I see the state his clothes were in? Are you reminding me that I was not on the train from Toronto but here at home alone all day?”

William smiled at the boy as though telling him that none of this meant anything at all. “Would you like some soup, Ludar?”

The boy nodded. “Yes, sir.”

“What kind do you like best?”

“There you go!” exclaimed his wife. “Spoiling him already. Does it matter what kind he likes best when there’s a pot of one kind on the stove this very minute?”

William looked abashed. “It’s barley soup, sonny. I hope you like it.”

As it happened, barley soup was a special favorite with the boy. He answered, “I like it very much, sir.”

“Good. I’ll get you a plate right away. It’s a fine and filling dish.”

He was back in a few minutes with a tray on which reposed a steaming plate of the soup, a slice of ginger cake as piping hot as the soup, and a large spoon. Ludar took a bite of the cake, and his face lighted.

“Um-mh!” he said. “That’s good, ma’am.”

It was clear at once that some progress was being made. The severity of Mrs. Christian’s expression seemed to diminish slightly. She did not smile, but she said in a voice which told that she had been pleased: “Eat it up, boy. There’s more in the kitchen.”

A knock sounded on the front door. William said, “That’s your uncle Alfred.” He could never be mistaken about Uncle Alfred’s knock and often said that, when the Lord arrived at the front door of the world to announce that the end of things had come and the judging would begin at once, He would knock in exactly the same way. He moved with reluctant steps to admit the visitor.